Shipton Moyne Thursday Club

This morning we travelled across to Shipton Moyne for our fifth visit to the Thursday Club.

The last time we sang for the club was 12th December 2019 – when voting was taking place for the General Election. Much has happened in the world since that time, but very little seemed to have changed with the Thursday Club. As we arrived, most of the club’s members were already in the village hall enjoying refreshments and a chat. Bright sunshine was pouring through the windows, and curtains needed to be pulled across them to avoid us being blinded by the light.

We sang through our programme of Sixties hits followed by some Christmas songs – with the audience singing along. They were in good spirits and after the concert most of them were going of to have a Christmas lunch together.

We were without singer Roger Whitehouse today. Our programme was:-

1. All My Loving          

2. When My Little Girl Is Smiling  

3. Sweet Caroline            

4. Rhinestone Cowboy            

5. Can’t Help Falling In Love    

6. Saturday Night At The Movies       

7. Hey Baby                                 

8. Hello Mary Lou              

9. Always On My Mind                

10. Do Wah Diddy Diddy               

11. Do You Love Me               

12. Amarillo                              

13. Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree

14. Mistletoe & Wine

15. Merry Christmas Everyone

16. I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday 

17. White Christmas

18. We Wish You A Merry Christmas

Chippenham Over 50s Club

This afternoon we sang for the Chippenham Over 50s Club at their Christmas meeting in their new venue of The King Alfred Hall in Chippenham. We have performed several times in the hall for various organisations.

Until the COVID pandemic struck the world we had been regular entertainers at the Over 50s Christmas meeting, but this was our first time back since December 2019. The club restarted its meetings back in August 2021. There was certainly a good turnout for today’s meeting – probably the largest audience we have had for a few months.

We delayed our start by a few moments whilst waiting for Jack to appear, but eventually we decided to launch into our first song without him. He arrived shortly afterwards after finding a car parking space near the old Police Station.

Our programme was packed with familiar songs so that the audience could join in with the singing. We even had dancers performing at the back of the hall, and they really enjoyed themselves. Our final six songs were dedicated to Christmas, and at the end we wished everyone a very Merry Christmas!

We were without singers Keith Bartlam and Roger Whitehouse. Our programme was:-

1. All My Loving                

2. When My Little Girl Is Smiling    

3. Sweet Caroline        

4. Rhinestone Cowboy         

5. Can’t Help Falling In Love  

6. Saturday Night At The Movies  

7. Hey Baby                                

8. Hello Mary Lou                   

9. Always On My Mind     

10. Do Wah Diddy Diddy    

11. Do You Love Me           

12. Amarillo                     

13. Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree

14. Mistletoe & Wine

15. Merry Christmas Everyone

16. I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday 

17. White Christmas

18. We Wish You A Merry Christmas

Royal Wootton Bassett Monday Club

Monday was a little different to the day we had originally planned. We were due to appear at the Coombe End Court nursing home in Marlborough, but last Friday they phoned to say the event was cancelled due to the ill health of their activities co-ordinator. A last minute scramble enabled us to confirm a replacement booking with the Monday Club, and hence we travelled over to RWB for a 3:00pm start.

It has been three years since we last visited the club. There were 21 members at Monday’s meeting, and they were all enjoying games of bingo as we arrived and set up. Barry and Chris were once again in charge of the afternoon, and had made two song requests – ‘Amarillo’ from our standard repertoire as well as ‘Land Of Hope And Glory’ for the finale.

It seemed that all those present for today’s performance had watched us at previous shows. The club are only just getting going again after the Pandemic, and so it was perhaps expected they would not yet have many new members.

Our performance was a little marred by a couple of failures with the rhythm machine which changed tempo of two songs during our performance: the first time it happened we stopped and re-started the song from the beginning; the second time we stopped the machine and carried on with an acoustic performance. But our singers are well prepared for singing through adversity and the performance was enjoyed by both singers and audience.

Our programme is listed below. Two singers were unable to be with us for the concert: Keith Bartlam and Chris Scott. Jack was able to meet up with his Chiropodist at the end of the concert – she only recognised him when he was introduced for his rendition of ‘Fields Of Gold’.

1. All My Loving               

2. When My Little Girl Is Smiling

3. Sweet Caroline                 

4. Sylvia’s Mother       

5. Rhinestone Cowboy         

6. Let Your Love Flow        

7. Can’t Help Falling In Love      

8. Saturday Night At The Movies    

9. Hey Baby                               

10. Fields Of Gold                  

11. Hello Mary Lou             

12. Tequila Sunrise             

13. You’ve Got Your Troubles   

14. Always On My Mind           

15. Do You Love Me         

16. Amarillo              

17. Hey Jude