FROM KRISTI (not yet billed as Kirsty this year):
I'm sure other performers have written about the experience of playing at The Bridge Hotel in Newcastle but not yet me. The upstairs venue has been graced by far brighter luminaries than myself over many decades. Photos of superstars line the narrow steps to the room above the bar. The hotel is nestled up against a huge steel riveted bridge with two levels, one for light rail and the other for buses. It crosses the Tyne River alongside another half dozen or so bridges. It's on a slope down to the riverside, and at a level below one of them. Another trestle follows the riverside with yet another light rail train. The Bridge Hotel is a well-kept, classy, glassy, brassy place with bevelled mirrors, big polished door handles, and stained glass everywhere it seems both upstairs and down. The room upstairs, with a stage and tables seating around 45 at most, has high ceilings surrounded by colorful stained glass windows. On this moonlit night the trains criss-crossed in two directions high above us, lit up. As they glided by without wheels they weren't sonically intrusive but were hard to ignore. They lit up the colors of the stained glass from both walls near the ceiling, and appeared dream-like, to be sailing off into the stars.
We drove to the Bridge Folk Club alone this time. Many times we have come with other people but Jimmy and Val were out gigging, and so alone we drove. Dave Minikin was already there with a few other regulars at the club. We have stayed with Dave, and his wife Christine in the past. We caught up with personal news a bit; both of us have moved. Dave and Christine have moved to a smaller house, and we have moved to a larger house. It wasn't long before Fraser Gill showed up, and after him old friends from Leicester Pete and Kate Burnham. I had heard that Pete had moved up north somewhere. Jimmy and Vals' friends who we had gone to dinner with on Saturday night, Jim and Allison came as well. By the time everyone had had their floor spot, and it was time for us to play we were personally acquainted with about half of the audience.
The night started off with everyone who had a mind to performing. There was a blues guy with a lap acoustic slide guitar, several unaccompanied singers, and at least one poet. The last singer was Jim Wigfield who sang a song that he wrote about South Shields where his wife is from. Our sets went very well. I sang "Durham County" written at the home of our deceased friend Fred Brierly. I've got to admit that by the end of the song my eyes were wet, and I couldn't manage to sing the last line in the song as I had reminded myself quite well of Fred and all the times we had spent together in his last few years.
It was lovely seeing everyone. Getting out of the vicinity of the Bridge Hotel was interesting as the streets were full of young people who had been drinking. It was St. Patrick's Day, and Newcastle has a drinking reputation to keep up, and I must say was doing quite well for a Monday night. They were on the sides of the street, so many that it looked like a parade. As cars stopped for stoplights, the pedestrians came out in the street. I didn't see anyone get hit by a car, and I saw a lot of smiling faces. It was a fun night in Newcastle, and we were part of it.
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