return and a centenary

Saturday 10th May 2008

10:48 a.m. BST I am back on the Pride of York again (for my sins!) having taken a six-month break from the ships. Again it doesn't feel like I've been away for any time at all. I’ve just done my first couple of round trips which went OK. Tuesday night was a quiet affair, but a good one nevertheless. As I was still in the process of getting the sound levels right, my first set consisted of a few regular instrumentals plus some more experimental stuff, including a 12-bar blues which went down well. Not long after I had begun, a man in uniform came over and shook hands with me and introduced himself as the captain which was quite unexpected! There was a good atmosphere in the bar and a good response during my first vocal set, which I think was partly down to me having a carefully chosen set-list. The numbers dwindled during the rest of the evening, but the audience seemed fairly appreciative throughout. By the time my last set was coming to a close there were only a few people left in the bar, and a woman asked if she could sing Chasing Cars so I played it and sang some harmonies.

On Wednesday the weather was very warm and sunny in Belgium so I took a walk down to the beach briefly, but had to come back as the heat became unbearable!

Wednesday night was fairly quiet again, although not as much as the night before, with a steady number of people in the bar throughout the evening. There was a spectacular sunset mid-way through the evening which I could partially see from the piano. There was a couple sat nearby for most of the evening, the man was also a singer and at the end of my penultimate set he guested on House of the Rising Sun, which was the best received number of the evening!

Had a fairly slow start to Thursday evening but it soon picked up, I played Sway and this proved popular. I had a few requests including one for New York New York which I don’t tend to play very often but I did it and people were singing along.

Last night was pretty quiet for a Friday, although there was one large group in as well as several smaller ones for the second half of the evening. Again there was a couple sat nearby who I was chatting to throughout the evening and they made a few requests. During my second set I played a couple of new standards, namely Beyond the Sea and All Of Me.

While I was on my second break I was stood on deck just after another amazing sunset and I saw something moving in the water beside the ship. A moment later I saw the dorsal fin and back of a dolphin.

Footnote: I've just realised that this is my 100th Blog post!