13 July 2014 - Kent County Show

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During Marston, all the dancers realise they have the wrong garlands
11 of 26

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The last time that Kettle Bridge appeared at the Kent County Show, there had been torrential rain and the whole site was awash with mud, so it was a bit worrying when we arrived at the site with a steady drizzle in evidence. However, the day turned out to be a pleasantly warm one with only occasional showers and plenty of sunshine.

Our first stand of the day was by the funfair where the band had to compete with the music blaring out from the merry-go-round but they coped admirably well. As usual, the first dance was Prescot which got the crowd interested and was well received.

During the second dance, which was Colne, Carol unfortunately broke a strap on her clog and had to rush off to make a speedy repair. She used a dog collar as an improvised replacement strap and this worked very well and the vicar was only too pleased to help (just joking!). In the meantime, Val stepped in to Carol's position seamlessly and the dance was completed without any further mishaps. The third and final dance for this stand was a performance of Shawforth.

Our second stand was outside the Clive Emsworth Conference Centre, so we assembled by the John Deere tractor display, just along from the Fred Reasonably‑Priced combine harvester stand. While we were waiting to dance, a convoy of veteran cars and other assorted vehicles made its way past us. This included some interesting miniature steam-powered lorries and engines – lots of boys' toys, in other words.
This location was a bit busier than the previous one so we enjoyed a larger crowd, and they enjoyed us! The stand included performances of Ealuscerwen, Marston and Annie's.

BBC Radio Kent was broadcasting live from the show and they decided to invite Kettle Bridge to perform on radio! The presenters, Pat Marsh and Steve Ladner, firstly interviewed Sandy to get some background about the side who then performed KBC Processional as a demonstration. Then it was time for the gallant presenters to join in with a rendition of Churchtown. If you are logged on to Facebook, you can click here to see how they got on.

After all that excitement, we made our way to the main gate where we performed a more conventional stand featuring Prescot, KBC Processional and an audience participation version of Churchtown. As always, everyone who had a go thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

There was a reasonable gap between this stand and our last, so we all had an opportunity to wander round and see what else was going on at the show. There were lots of animals to admire, demonstrations to enjoy, plenty of food and drink to sample and many opportunities to buy things you never knew you needed (like 'ITSARAP' Palazzo Style Trousers).

Then it was back to the funfair for our final stand. With the dancers beginning to get a little weary after a long day, we did just two dances, namely Milnrow and Colne. There was time though to present Caroline with a small cake to mark her birthday before we all made our way home. Well done everyone for an excellent day!

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Kettle Bridge Clogs web site by Stephen Cordery is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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