Dave Russell - Poems Songs & a Blues at Bunjies Folk Cellar

Here's the mercurial magician of poetry songs and blues Dave Russell at Bunjies Coffee House in the hot summer of 1997.

Dave Russell was born in Wolverhampton in 1943 the English midlands but lived much of his childhood in Middlesborough north east England. He has lived in London since the early 1960's and until his retirement worked as an English teacher. Dave has performed his repertoire of classic and original poems,songs and country blues around the London open mike circuit since the early 1960's and first played in the renowned Bunjies Folk (originaly a wine cellar)Cellar in about 1962. Dave was recorded in this video in 1997 performing in this venue in which numerous luminaries of the folk,rock and entertainment world had cut their teeth first performing before a live audience.Alas Bunjies closed as a music venue after over 50 years in 1999.

London is a poem by William Blake, published in Songs of Experience in 1794. It is one of the few poems in Songs of Experience which does not have a corresponding poem in Songs of Innocence.

The use of the word 'Chartered' is ambiguous and goes against control and ownership. It may express the political and economic control that Blake considered London to be enduring at the time of his writing. Blake's friend Thomas Paine had criticised the granting of Royal Charters to control trade as a form of class oppression.[2] However, 'chartered' could also mean 'freighted', and may refer to the busy or overburdened streets and river, or to the licensed trade carried on within them.[3] In the original draft, the word used was simply "dirty" ("I wander through each dirty street / Near where the dirty Thames does flow.

Opened in 1953 or 1954, and one of the original folk cafés of the 1950s/1960s, Bunjies Coffee House & Folk Cellar was situated at 27 Litchfield Street (just off Charing Cross Road), London WC2. Below the café, in a 400-year-old wine cellar, was an influential music venue which changed little until its closure (and conversion of the premises into a restaurant) in 1999.[1][2] Allegedly named after the first owner's pet hamster, the venue featured, early in their careers, Tom Paxton, John Renbourn, Bert Jansch, Bob Dylan and Paul Simon.[1] Al Stewart secured a residency at the Folk Cellar in 1965, at the age of 19, which was a significant factor in his later success.[3]

During the 1960s the venue was run by two brothers, Leo and Theo Johnson[4] and, at this time, a range of artists more associated with mainstream pop music than folk happily performed to tiny audiences in the confines of the cellar; Phil Collins, Sandie Shaw, Cat Stevens, Art Garfunkel, Rod Stewart, Long John Baldry and David Bowie being amongst them.[5]

Bunjies was a haunt of many writers, comedians, singers and artists. Regulars have included Jarvis Cocker of Pulp.

Other London folk cafés of the 1950s and 1960s included Les Cousins and The Troubadour.

Kind Regards

Jim Clark
All rights are reserved on this video recording copyright Jim Clark 2015

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