Our First Sidmouth
Aug 11 2010
Well, that was exhilarating. Boggarts have emerged from their first Sidmouth unscathed (for the most part) and excited to do it again someday. When we’ve rested up a bit. A week is a really long time. But we made some new friends, including the fabulously step-perfect Gaorsach Rapper and Step and met up with old friends like Pig Dyke (WE LOVE YOU!) and Sheffield City (Sorry we only saw you the once!). The weather was great, the fish and chips were… actually, a little disappointing, but we can thoroughly recommend Brophy’s as the best cafe/lunch joint in town, thanks for all the gluten free lemon muffins on the run, guys! Anyway, now, onwards and upwards towards our weekend of dance!
Boggarts Dance For Life
Apr 22 2010
Boggarts are officially in training to dance the 5k Race for Life for Cancer Research UK this summer. The event takes place in Sheffield on Sunday, 20 June at 2:30pm. Only the girls are allowed to take part, which has left the men bereft and dejected, but they are bravely agreeing to sit in a pub and drink beer while we are out having a blast. Bless them.
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We Support Folk Against Fascism.
Mar 30 2010
Well, it’s not always easy to agree on stuff, but this, we have decided, we all agree on. We are backing Folk Against Fascism in their effort to counter the BNP’s recent attempts to promote nationalism with folk music. Of course English traditional culture is beautiful and precious and worth celebrating and preserving, but what the hell good is it if it’s not for sharing? As an immigrant, I feel personally affronted by the idea that any folk culture should be used as a tool for excluding outsiders from the culture in question. The English folk community helped me make this country my home and I’m proud to consider myself at least partly English. And any BNP member who thinks his or her family didn’t migrate here at some point in the past was obviously not paying attention in history class. -Grace
Haaaahahahaahaha!!
Mar 07 2010
We shared a stage with (or rather we invaded the stage of) the Spooky Men at Towersey. They were lovely, and one of them fell hopelessly in love with our tiny, little Abi and gave her his tricorn hat in exchange for hers. He later proved fickle and they exchanged back, much to her chagrin, but this pictorial evidence has just come to light. Be wary of exchanging hats with strange men from far places… isn’t there a folk song to that effect?
Speaking of the Spooky Men, you really must go and build your own:
http://www.spookymen.com.au/byospookyman/index.html
Marvellous!
A Rather Lovely Christmas Party
Dec 08 2009
Well, it’s been that time of year again and Boggarts have celebrated in their time-honoured posh frocks, but in a new venue, the Walnut Club in Sheffield, which is very posh indeed. The food was incredible (always is, that’s why I love it) and the atmosphere was brilliant, particularly in light (get it) of the fact that they can change the colour of the walls, bar and tables to suit, so of course we had it all blue.
Everyone went above and beyond in terms of looking amazing, and Grace even debuted her “evening kit” in the hopes that we will all be kitted out like deranged victorian showgirls when we go out as a team of an evening. Well, I suppose the men could be deranged victorian gentlemen thieves, that might be more appropriate, mightn’t it?
Aren’t We Popular?
Sep 29 2009
An incredible influx of newbies this year has swelled our ranks to above 40, which is just ludicrous, really. However, they’re all very promising, we’re pushing them through the training at a clip and they’re coping fine so far. Face painting lessons uncovered some serious talent among their ranks, so watch the photos for some great new faces. Now if any of them last more than a month or two, I’ll have to see about adding them to the team profile pages…
Another AGM Survived
Sep 09 2009
Another year, another AGM and no blood spilt this time. A bunch of stuff was decided, but we’ve all forgotten what it was by now, so next Monday we’ll just get on with dancing roughly as we always have. The only bit I remember is that there are about 10 newbies coming to join, so it’ll be a bit hectic for the first few weeks. Well, bring it on, if there’s anything we can cope with, it’s hecticity.
Boggarts Triumph at Towersey
Sep 01 2009
Last weekend’s Towersey Folk Festival was a great success for us; we danced well, ate well, drank very well indeed (some of us more than others) and were able to sabotage the ceilidh tent in order to avoid having to perform our play. Just kidding, it was Hammersmith who sabotaged the ceilidh tent, and we were gutted not to perform the play. Never mind, we’ve just had the official pre-invitation to Sidmouth, and we’re spreading rumours that we’ll practice the play for a year and put it on then. Perhaps we will have got good at it by then. No promises.
Thanks to everyone who gave us such good feedback on the ground, we really enjoyed dancing and were pleased that so many people came up and said they’d enjoyed watching. Made us all warm and fuzzy. We particularly enjoyed overhearing people explaining to their children that the campsite toilets’ water was blue because the Boggarts lived in there, and if they took too long on the loo, they’d get their bottoms bitten. We’re currently working on a poem about this. Watch this space.
Workshop attenders: I’m sorry if anyone believed the boggarts who were suggesting that our dance notation was available on our website. The truth is, there is no dance notation, except in a couple of cases where overseas teams have requested written instruction to accompany youtube videos from which they were learning stuff. If you can’t figure it out by watching youtube, please write to us and we’ll see if we can explain it.
Also, if anyone got any good pictures and/or video, please send to (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), cause I was too busy dancing to take many pictures.
Thanks! -Scary Grace