Dinner Dance at Barn Ruche Near Watton

Carl elected to drive me over in the Galaxy on a cold, foggy evening. The fog was bad enough to keep speed down after Thetford so it took us a full 50 minutes to get to the gig, but I’d allowed a bit of contingency so we were still there just before 6:00 pm. I walked in but apart from the kitchen there wasn’t anyone around. However, I could see a poster confirming the gig so we went into the concert room to get things started. The concert room was dark and we couldn’t find the light switches but I got the concert room door open and had just started to load in when Nige arrived. He set up a portable light over the porch so we could at least see to load in. As we started load in. the manager (Sean) arrived and switched on the lights for us. There is no stage here and looking at the size of the dance floor we decided to set up compactly in the corner to give a bit more room for dancing. We soon got all the gear in and set up nicely making good use of the acoustic foam to damp down corner resonances. It was after 7pm when Nige and I looked up and then at each other to voice the question: “Where is Greg?” Nige got on the phone and eventually got hold of him in Dereham. He was delayed in the fog and feeling sick. Nige talked him back onto the route and he arrived about 7:30pm but still feeling rough. We got his gear in before the dinner started and then we had to exit to the bar for a couple of hours. After a while Greg started to feel better and I sneaked him through to the hall to quietly set up his kit as the diners hit the pudding. So apart from some minor drum adjustments we were set up ready to go. We finished our beers and went to get changed. The big changing room upstairs is used for brass band practice and there are many bits of memorabilia (e.g. old drums) there. We got changed into our white shirts, black ties, waistcoats and trousers so we were ready to perform when called. The dinner finished about 9:20pm and Greg got the message ‘the floor was ours’ so we took off to do our bit. We made the usual start with “Foot Tapper, Just One Look, Heartbeat” and then the ‘Heavily’ Brothers with “Walk Right Back – When Will I Be Loved” The on-stage sound wasn’t great but manageable. However, we were getting warm applause from our audience of about 50. No takers for dancing early on, so we bantered our way through to the obligatory waltz with “Around The World” which I thought would fill the floor – but still no dancers? “Blue Suede Shoes – Whole Lotta Shakin” was well appreciated but still no one came up for a dance? Ploughing on with my intro about the ascent of man into the Monkees “Daydream Believer” we were surprised to see people coming up to dance en masse and they stayed there dancing though the Beatles and our finisher: “Ferry Cross the Mersey”. A good first set I thought! We took a ten minute break and resumed with Ace’s “How Long”. This got people up’n dancing and we kept them there as we progressed through “The Searchers Medley and Do It Again” with Nige stepping in to do very brief introductions as we kept things going. We had great response to “Move It and All Shook Up”. Nige took us on into “Lets Dance and Mony Mony”. At this point I called for “Words” as the slowey at the right place and time. This filled the floor so well we did the extended version. We carried on with “The Twist” then I called for “Hey Baby”. Nige and I got at cross purposes on the key and we ended up in the key of A which is no longer familiar to me! As I thumbed through my crib sheets to find the chords for the second middle eight we carried on with some mistakes on my part as I transposed the key of G to A. However, the crowd were in a party dance mode and we got them to sing the refrain: ladies first, then the men and then all together. I called for “Amarillo” as we finished. There was something odd about the beat on this. I’m sure Greg would be doing the authentic version but it’s not that dancey – might need to settle for something more disco beat there? We we did a short “Unchained Medley” to fill the floor with romantics, then we called Johnny B Goode as the last number to ‘rock them to bed’. We finished to a great round of applause and encored with a short “Wonderful Tonight” to close slightly over time at 11:35pm. It had been a successful night and quite a few came up to thank us. Greg was looking a lot better after his groggy start. I was pleased to have Carl assisting as we packed up ‘cos my sciatic leg was hurting a bit. It was still cold and foggy outside as we loaded up. We got underway about 12:30am and there were some dense patches of fog on the way home slowing us down to 20 mph in places. We finally got back about 1:30am – earlier than a trip from the Norfolk coast though! Next day Carl took the Galaxy to Manchester ‘til Xmas so I’ll be using the S-Max or Focus for the next few gigs.