Folk Club 142 – Hope for 2024

What better theme to kick off a New Year in our currently war-torn and uncertain World than ‘Hope’? From unrequited lover to pigeon racer – hope comes in myriad shapes and forms as our evening was to prove. In fact, the very first thing to hope for at Dotty’s for Folk Club #142 was refreshments. Bar owner Roland was on holiday, but the charming Natalie came to our rescue with a refrigerator full of drinks and the equally charming Detlef once more stepped up to the mark admirably with baskets of snack food. The evening can begin!

It quickly became apparent that we would miss dear Bob Marabito’s seating expertise as all seats were quickly taken. I’d like to think he was guiding late-comers to where spare chairs could be found, since found they were by the time John Harrison shouted out “Good evening!”

Trust Trentonian Mr Harrison to find a message of hope in a pigeon racer from Derby. Said pigeon, ‘The King of Rome’, is, famous enough to be stuffed for eternity in a local museum, but his exploits and fame live on. There was a new exploit for John himself as he sat down at the piano explaining that his playing was based on guitar chords so we should bear with him as he both played and sang Duke Ellington’s & Joe Turner’s ‘Rocks in my Bed’ – daring to up the ante on his piano skills by, at the same time playing a mouth harp and tapping his right foot to the beat. Multi-talent? He relaxed afterward with a splendid rendition of Kipling’s ‘If’ by way of Vin Garbutt.

If you took part in a poll asking your opinion of what is the best song about hope you would probably have come up with the first one presented tonight by Hans Ihnen. It wasn’t Lennon’s famous white piano, but the old one in the hall this evening that did a splendid job as Hans sang ‘Imagine’, as did the audience who accompanied Hans word for word. Which could also be said of the second choice by Hans, ‘What a Wonderful World’. If only War mongers would let it indeed be a wonderful world. Imagine…

You might be surprised to know that Folk Club has its talent scouts out and about in the Bonn/Cologne area, and the open mic appearances by Andreas Kulik were so impressive last year that he was offered a spot at Dotty’s. I am so glad that he accepted too. His is a quiet, melodic style of playing that accompanies excellent songs. This was particularly so on the Cat Steven’s classic ‘Father & Son’ where shifts in vocal key were handled with consumate ease. Passenger’s ‘Why Can’t I Change’ was also perfectly presented and despite saying he was nervous Andreas was brave enough to also play a self-composition in Polish. Hopefully the first of many visits of Andreas Kulik to Dotty’s.

I’ll cover both sets by Grün & Huth later, so a quick fast-forward to a break filled with visits to the cold-drinks cabinet of Nathalie and Detlef’s life-saving snack baskets.

John got part two off and running with an example of teenage hope – unrequited love. It’s a timeless theme and a timeless song being ‘Not Fade Away’ that has served musicians well from Buddy Holly to The Rolling Stones. Mario Dompke stood in admirably at short notice due to sickness by the planned act and showed himself to be a consumate professional by bringing us four excellent songs with minimum rehearsal time including the tongue twisting chorus of ‘Meine Hälfte’ which even the vociferous Folkclub audience left to the Maestro. ‘Schon Wieder’ was particularly relevant with its hope that warmakers come to their senses before they make everything in the World ‘kaputt’. ‘Die Neue Welt’ was certainly on theme wishing for a new order in the World where there is no place for racism and violence. A World built around humanity. Hope indeed.

Wolfgang Schriefer brought us a poem of hope too – based not on people but on Nature. Come through the dark days of November and we will be rewarded with Spring and Summer. All will be well, as further evinced in his short limerick ‘Jahreszeiten’ where bad will finally make way for good.

Very thoughtful texts then from both Mario and Wolfgang. Time for something a little more lighthearted and Uwe with his ukelele was the perfect act to follow with a couple of Muppetshow-inspired numbers where the weightiest matter to consider was “Why are there so many songs about rainbows?” (‘Rainbow Connection’) and the simplistic beauty of ‘I’m Going to go Back There Someday’. Why did Kermit never get the Nobel Peace Prize for his visionary stance on World issues? Was it purely ‘Puppetism’ from jealous judges? We may never know.

Today’s Star Guests, Grün & Huth, have appeared at Folk Club before but so long ago that even long-time regulars probably won’t remember. ‘Chansonkabarett’ is how they describe their style, and if you put that in Google as one word you only get links to – Grün & Huth. Which is proof of how unique they are, rather good too as it transpired.

Ursula Hoffmann (Grün) and Stephanie Hutmacher (Huth) were making music together as far back as the 10th class in Germany (late secondary school in England). As Stephanie recalls on their website they could be found “In an 8 square meter ‘youth room’ at Ursula’s. Playing guitar together, listening to songs, looking for fingerings, singing, adding a second voice to House of the rising sun, the Beatles, Peter Paul and Mary, Cat Stevens, Leonard Cohen, Brassens, everything we liked, at parties and in a house-share for two with others singing along. Then we took to the streets: In the pedestrian zone in Bonn, we earned 90 DM in an hour and felt big and good!”. By 2010 they had first place in the Public Chosen prize at the Potsdamer Chanson Festival.

But this evening we are in the cosy non-competitive atmosphere of Dotty’s where the duo are proving that German can be fun, and also funny. Their opening song listing ‘Dinge des Lebens’ is in effect a list of all things great and small that make life worthwhile (a handwritten letter for example) and make life irritating (full waste bags that burst open for example). Indeed, the duo have a penchant for compiling lists in songs such as ‘Mein einfamilien reihenhaus’ (places to live in Bonn happily or less so) and their unique approach to a love song ‘War ich ein Cognac‘ that begins with the line “If you were a dog I’d be your bone” and hilariously lists togetherness as comparing such perfect pairs as a button to a buttonhole. I won’t spoil your enjoyment by listing everything, but wonderfully ludicrous.

My favourite of the duo’s excellent two sets was undoubtedly ‘Morgen Veilliecht’. If, like me, you are a martyr to procrastination (the art of putting off until tomorrow what you plan today) then you will enjoy the list of examples they provide which I plan to add to this review tomorrow as I need to research it first…

So, a full-house for Folk Club number 142 and a promising start to 2024 – a year of Hope!