Back in real life at The Gunners on 21st October
Important information on our new venue and the upcoming programme
Last online singaround: this Thursday - 14th October
If you saw our last mailing, you’ll know that our- live venue relaunch is at The Gunners in Highbury,Islington, on 21st October. Before that, our final online singaround will take place this coming Thursday, 14th October - at 8pm.See below for further details. Tom Reid & CHaS - Our first guests, on 21st October, will be Tom Reid & CHaS. Admired by many for his powerful voice and songwriting, IFC regular, Tom Reid, was born in Kilkenny, Ireland. At age 11, he was sent to a religious boarding school. His experiences there inspired the title song of his album Broken Glass. Tom will be joined by CHaS who are Christine Connolley, Hazel Richings and Steve Last. Bringing their beautiful three-part harmonies to both traditional and contemporary material, they will also join Tom for many of his songs during what should be a fantastic evening for the start of the coming season. Autumn programme - Following the first night, at least until the end of the year, the club will meet fortnightly. The full Autumn programme is as follows (all Thursdays & all @ 8pm): 21st October - Tom Reid & CHaS 4th November - The Old Time Wasters 18th November- Robb Johnson 2nd December- Jim Murray & the Too Good to Hurry Band 16th December - The Kimberley’s Christmas Show
More information regarding our Autumn guests will be in the next mailing. Band & floor spots - The club will function as it has in the past with our resident band, and floor spots before the guest spots. If you want to do a floor spot but haven’t previously performed at the club, we can usually fit you in. Please speak to the MC at the venue before the evening commences. The Gunners - The Gunners pub is under new management. Very near the old Highbury stadium, it is of course associated with Arsenal. During the current football season, as the team is not playing in either the Europa or European Conference leagues, Thursday evenings are available. However, from next September onwards, it might be a whole different ball game - ha ha! Please note that the pub does not do food and that anything bought from the bar must be paid for with a card. Cash is not accepted. The pub is at ground level. It has disabled access and facilities. Location and transport - The Gunners is located at 204 Blackstock Rd., N5 and is well-served by public transport. It’s a 10-minute walk from Finsbury Pk. tube and National Rail station and 6 to 7 minutes from Arsenal tube. The following buses all stop very nearby: number 4 which runs between Blackfriars and the Whittington Hpl. (stopping at Finsbury Pk.); 19 running between Parkgate Rd. in Chelsea & Finsbury Pk; 106 running between Whitechapel & Finsbury Pk; 236 running between Hackney Wick and Finsbury Pk. If you’re coming from the south, you can catch either the 4 or the 19 at Highbury and Islington Station. Membership and Admission - We began issuing memberships for 2021 in January of last year but obviously stopped doing so when the club closed in mid-March. Anyone who was a member in either 2019 or 2020 will be regarded as a member for the duration of 2021. We will not require or need you to show an old membership card. We will begin issuing memberships for 2022 in January next. In January of last year, the folk club’s Annual General Meeting agreed an increase in the price of admission however the club committee has agreed that for the remainder of the year, admission will be charged at the previous rates. These are as follows: Member £6 Unwaged or student member £4 Non-member £8 Unwaged or student non-member £6
If you want to pay us for admission with cash, you can still do so, however we now have the facility to take payment by card. Volunteers - We still really need some people to help with setting up the room and the door. This will be crucial in terms of taking the club forward. We wouldn’t necessarily expect people to do it every week but if we had a small pool of people we could put on a rota, that would be great. In terms of the door, it would be helpful just having people to cover for the main door person when that individual needs to take a break. If you feel you could help, please get in touch by return. Last online singaround - Once again, the last online singaround will be this coming Thursday, 14th October at 8pm. We’re aware that some of you will be disappointed that the online singarounds are coming to an end, particularly those of you who are not able to attend the club physically and have joined us from other parts of the UK and from even further afield. However – and it is alluded to in the above paragraph - our resources are limited and have now to be concentrated on getting the club up and running in its new location. This Thursday, as on previous occasions, you should be able to join the gathering any time after 7:30pm by clicking on the link below. At the last singaround, there was an error with the link. This should not occur again, but should you have any problems, please email us at islingtonfolkclub@gmail.com and we should be able to sort out the problem. https://us02web.zoom.us/j/89007240623?pwd=WElvT0gvdkgvUzlBRTZ4eUZ0bFNIZz09
Meeting ID: 890 0724 0623
Passcode: 666083
