Tuesday, 26th February 2008

Looking back over the posts to this blog, I find (probably unsurprisingly) that one of the overarching themes is the strangeness of the session as a social environment. Where else can you find a situation where the following occurs:

People from any background, nationality, race and creed gather together in one place. Each generally has no knowledge of the others apart from their first name and the instrument they play. They bond together loosely for the duration of the session and support each other before dispersing to the wind. Some characters turn up again and again; some drift in and out. Friendships do form of course, sometimes bands emerge from the session in some kind of coalescence like cosmic dust forming a new star. It is inevitable over time that sessioneers will find out more about their fellows and I'm not sure that the additional information is at all helpful. You hear comments like 'He's pretty good - for a .......' - whatever the profession might be. The slight air of mystery about sessions is always attractive.

Of course there is often a mix of those who play or sing for a living and those for whom it is a hobby or pastime. There is rarely any friction between professionals, semi-professionals and amateurs (in the best sense of the word - lovers of ...) because of an underlying respect for anybody who has the courage to play music in the presence of their peers and the public. Indeed to be accepted as a peer for the duration of a session by a professional produces an incredibly warm feeling. Most professionals are incredibly generous as well. They will not take over but they will encourage and nurture talent wherever it is found.

This said, it follows that the characters at sessions are often just that - isolated characters seen in one context only and therefore might appear as slightly strange, zany or colourful to others. Whether it is part of an act or not is hard to establish, but it is the character that comes through - so much so that the Welsh naming convention applies sometimes - so and so the pipes for example. Sometimes it is a characteristic or reputation rather than an instrument - like John the Archivist (Hi John).

Apart from some very disruptive elements who bring totally inappropriate instruments to sessions and play them with little or no discernible talent (I'm thinking cutlery, tea chest bass, electric whatevers, shaky eggs and the like), all sessioneers are respected. I do know performers who are masters of the spoons and the skiffle bass but sadly we don't see them in session often enough.