How old are these people? What sort of demographic do they occupy?


Code for "It was fetching and they were nonplussed to find themselves transfixed, which was socially embarrassing and therefore unacceptable." Did the landlord ask you to quit early?


This is very disturbing. There's no call for it. None.


Remote as that must be, then these "friends" of yours should have a meeting with the landlord about it if it bothers them so much, and not behave as thugs instead. Failing that - and somehow I think such will be the case - YOU should have a meeting with him, and see what kind of solution there may be for it. If you're being menaced to the point of fear of physical harm, this is important, and if I understand anything I've heard about British law, it would be of great interest to the authorities.

The landlord was very supportive actually. But short of calling the cops, he wouldn't have been able to do anything on that particular night. He certainly didn't ask us to quit early. In fact he said that we were always welcome. But the fun had gone clean out of it. And this guy (the complainer/troublemaker) was loud, abusive and extremely aggressive, even with the bar staff. No way could we have carried on playing. Frankly, apart from anything else, I feared for my instruments. I wanted to get them in their cases and out as quickly as possible.

Mid-40s, what used to be called "working class" which, these days, is code for "unemployed", at least here in the UK.

This guy's behaviour (and that of one or two friends of his) would certainly have been "of interest to the authorities". But I have no desire to make things difficult for the pub, which is where the difficulty lies in situations like this.

In my world that alone would get a guy kicked out and no question, maybe for good. The three ineluctible rules of the bar, as far as the bar is concerned, are these: 1) The bartender's authority is next only to God's (metaphorically, of course); 2) You DON'T abuse the staff for your pleasure; and 3) It is not your constitutional right to be served, particularly if you act like a dick. Good patrons who reject barbarity accept this social contract, for rights extend to the help, too. Is everyone afraid of him so?

It's really unfortunate to even have to speak of rights, when simple human consideration could take care of things.

I live in Alabama, and in a college town. This creates an interesting mix of white trash rednecks and college students, with some overlap. The students in my experience are open to the music, or at least tolerant. It's the other demographic that tends to give the dirty looks. I've seen people that can't wrap their tiny brains around the idea of someone that's "not a queer" willingly play a flute. Last week, from across the room I saw a couple of rednecks mocking my finger movements and laughing while I played whistle.
But, it's not all bad. We were ousted from our former venue when the bar changed owners. Now we're in a chain restaurant that hosts kid's night on the same night. Which could easily be horrible, but some of those kids have enjoyed it more than any adults I've seen.

Last week I was on a trip visiting relatives that took me to several large cities across the US from east coast to west. As usual, I did my session.org search for some music in each locale. In one large metropolitan city listing it was recommended to call first. So I called the chap that apparently ran the session. He sighed, paused and asked me where I was from. When I said Hawaii he said, "Well, there can't be much Irish music there! This high level session and is not for beginners." When I said I wasn't a beginner he then began to interrogate me. How many tunes do you know? What speed do you usually play a reel? What is the time signature of a slip jig? When someone starts a tune you don't know, what do you do. How many times do you have to hear an unfamiliar tune before you can play it? On and on it went. The longer this interrogation progressed the more flippant my answers became. I didn't hang up because I was incredulous at what was happening. This session did not sound like a fun evening and I did not intend to go. Apparently while on the phone with me he googled my band's web page and said reluctantly that since I was in a band he guessed it would be okay for me to come. I asked if he would be there. He said, "Oh yes of coarse!" "Well, in that case", says I "I'll be giving it a pass."

That evening, after a dinner with my family we were looking for a place to have a drink and there, two doors down, was the pub in question. We went in to check out this "high-level" session and the jerk who ran it. Well, as it turned out, it was indeed a high level of music and craic! Everyone was very nice and welcoming (I still had my instrument with me)...except one curmudgeon in the corner. I asked the fellow next to me if that was the fellow who ran the session. He said, "Not anymore... Too big an a** hole." All evening every time he opened his mouth to complain about something several people would tell him to shut-up. Funny dance they had going there.

PS: Now that session.org lets any member edit the original listing, I removed his number. Hopefully nobody else will have to suffer this insufferable fool... He was a good player though.

Our sessions are such a mess you never know what's going to happen. But often they're a good kind of mess, so I don't mind.

As for stories ... where do I start? It takes all kinds, I guess.

I remember Craig Herrity (who was a member here) laughing at a session he witnessed where some were playing in Eb and some in D. I was at a recent large session where a box player was in C and far side in D, a bigger gap. With the amount of background noise from the people in the bar and the distance the players were apart I think this is very understandable. It was only for one set of tunes and really was no ones fault so I guess it might be considered all part of the fun of sessions.

We do have to suffer a lot at some of these sessions. Background noise that means you have to be inches from fiddles to be able to here them, guitar or bazooki players insisting their electronic tuner is correct-- because that is what the do--calibrate button-- where-- no that's alright-- meanwhile you struggle to get your flute to play at something around Db -- ( luckily they now have a new tuner as they did not understand the calibrate button) it’s OK for the fiddles they can just retune, bad tuning in general, too many bodhrans especially where the players are struggling to hear each other, bodhran players never suffer with that, people drinking your pint, or worse still spilling it, bodies falling on you or your instrument mid tune, drinks falling on you or your instrument, no room to move, smoke so thick that the sound can't get through (before the smoking ban or in exclusive bars now), lack of smoke so you now find out how much the place stinks, on and on...

It is amazing that anything good can ever come out of these things, sometimes! I've just had some great sessions.

One night we had a woman visit the session pub. Lets say she used to be quite a looker and had been, in previous decades, used to admiring glances. She was dancing, or perhaps, falling with style in amongst us as we tried to play. She bashed into us and knocked instruments off the table, tried to pick up someone's banjo until our collective teeth grinding virtually drowned the music out. Then she demanded to know what we thought of her dancing.....

I was horrified to hear she was a regular, but luckily haven't seen her since.

I have seen a guy get thrown out of a pub for jumping on the musicians' table and attempting to do a sort of Highland sword dance over the pints and fiddles on it.

I might be in the minority, but I tend to think many sessions live on sufferance anyway. After all, we're not being hired to entertain. We're being offered a place to have a drink and conversation just like any other patron, only our conversation is of the musical variety, and depending on the size of the session it can get kind of loud at times. So I'm grateful for a corner, and over the moon for a drink or two -- and I make sure to show it.

Also, we always make sure to tip the waitstaff generously, which helps build goodwill, especially when we're getting drinks for the tunes. If we're better customers than the jackasses, it makes it easier for the publican to decide which side to take.

As for the crazed punters, what can you do? If it becomes a life-and-limb problem, better to buy a pony keg of Guinness and have the session at someone's house. The music's more important than turf, at least in my book.

the second paragraph is very good

Similar experience, but voice-related.

A lady blessed with enthusiasm and volume, but little sense of pitch, joined in every chorus and all the songs she knew.
Her contribution dominated most of the vocal offerings and resulted in several songs being cut short by the original singers/soloist.

She only took the hint when, after completing a solo of her own (totally unopposed!), three or four seconds of stunned silence were punctuated by a gentle Irish accent asking "Sure, didn't there used to be a tune to that?".

I'm in nominally the same country as you, Ben, and at most of the sessions I have played in, the landlord/managers have always had our backs when it came to troublesome individuals. I remember being hassled in the Oran Mor and I went to the bar staff to say these guys were giving us a hard time. Next thing I know, the guys in question were being physically removed from the pub by the bouncers. At another Glasgow pub, the landlord has banned people who caused trouble for the session.

Trouble is, Emily, we're really only there on sufferance down in this neck of the woods. Depending on the pub, you can at least find a reasonably supportive one up there, and at least it's a reasonably common, familiar phenomenon to people. So they know, and certainly ought to know, what to expect. Down here, we're mostly unwelcome, and always alien. Ah well, soldier on, eh?

We're on more sufferance than you think.

D and I were playing in our little fortnightly session last night. There were only three of us but it was still going well. Then a pal of mine from the Mountaineering Club stopped by to say hi, so we took a 5-10 minute musical break to have a natter with him, which is fairly normal session behaviour anyway, right? Well, the damned assistant bar manager put on the bloody PA because there hadn't been any music for like five minutes. The last two times we had this session, a different manager was working that night and he's cool, but this time we had the manager we have decided is kind of a tw*t. Anyway, we didn't start playing again. Didn't feel like nagging the manager every time they turned on the music. On our way out of the bar, a couple asked us why we were leaving so early (it was like half ten), as they had been enjoying the music. We said it was because the bar staff turned on the PA. The couple went on a rant about how the recorded music being played was sh*t. So here's hoping they complained.