The venue was Ripley Castle, North Yorkshire. Amazingly it was a sunny day. It rained most of the week before this day and rained the day after - but we dropped in lucky. This was such relief as attending an outside music event in a field in the north of England always has a slight edge of trepidation about it. I had visions of having to wear a black bin liner and wellies while attempting to dance in mud.
The grounds of Ripley Castle have a natural amphitheater and we arrived to find those punctual Brits had positioned themselves on most of the slope leading down to the stage with just a few spaces at the back and the sides. Not only were we a little late we were ill equipped compared to the regulars at such events. They had brought an array of picnic tables, sophisticated garden chairs and posh Marks & Spencer's food and wine all laid out for polite consumption during the evening. There were even candelabras. Whereas we had a couple of borrowed foldable chair, a blanket, some cake and a flask of tea.
It was at this point that the Hong Kong experience kicked in. We are British and don't forget it. We can queue with the best of them. We can be polite and stand back and not say anything apart from a tut when in our head thinking 'tosser'. But on this occasion our British politeness and overly reserved nature was pushed to the back of our DNA code to allow us to push our way through the seated crowd, cheerfully saying "Hello" "Excuse me" "Thanks" "Cheers" and then, without looking anyone directly in the eye, establishing our territory and marking it with the blanket and flask, folding out the chairs taking our seats in a prime position with a great view of the stage. The tuts may have been heard but it was guaranteed that no British person would actually say anything and ask us to bugger off.
We settled into our camp. It only took 3.5 minutes to be accepted by the rest of the crowd. The space was claimed. We were established!
It was early evening by the time the music and dancing got into full swing and were treated to many fantastic performances. Starting with Joshua Radin who didn't seem to be famous in July but certainly is now and can be spotted on MTV. A nice young man with a Paul Simon lilt to his voice. The, the star of the show, Jools Holland came on with his plethora of musicians. They filled with stage and the sound with variety. They were rockin! As is usual for Jools he has guests. He must be mates everyone. When Dave Edmunds came on looking grey and frankly a bit of an old hippie I wouldn't have recognized him if he was in front of me in the chip shop, but as soon as start "I hear you knocking' I was hooked and the dancing started. What a great act. Then fabulous and wonderful (not to mention) well endowed, Ruby Turner - amazing voice who shook us all up, threw us around a bit and then tossed us on the floor. She can belt it outs it got dark the candles and candelabras were lit and it resulted in a lovely twinkle as we looked back, from the front as I mentioned, on the crowd.
Jools finished with his big band sound at full belt "Enjoy Yourself" which is one of those numbers that has no ending if you don't want it to. We just went on dancing and enjoying ourselves. Eventually, he had to finish.
To top off the evening they shot some very spectacular fireworks up from a field behind the stage. We all oooed and aaaaaed naturally. What a great gig and completely worth the ticket money of thirty seven pounds.
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