Mythodea - Vollsanger - Here all week

(Submission for information of Fabian Geuss and Katll - Live Adventure)

How can I best introduce myself?  

My name is Vollsanger and I am "Here all Week".

The name Vollsanger, which did not exist anywhere other than in my imagination, is based upon a very bad made-up Viking language - "Voll" or Full, and "Sanger" for Song - or "Filled with Song". There are others who think that the character is full of something else - but we can leave that alone !!

After role-playing in the UK since 1999, in one of the largest game systems here - Curious Pastimes, in 2004 my wife and I formed the first dedicated LARP/Re-enactment Tavern in Britain - the Crimson Moon Tavern. With this mobile Tavern we covered most of the Game systems here in the UK as well as more established Reenactment events. Serving Meads, British Country Fruit Wines, real ales and ciders - and Vollsanger would come out from the bar to entertain..

Asking only a copper piece I would sing your favourite song. For a silver piece I would move onto another table and leave you in peace (I made a lot of silver that way!)  - or for a Gold piece I would write a song for you - extemporized there and then - and in many cases refined it and added to the creation of original and "filked" songs.

"Here all Week"  - Vollsanger - his song! 
(Herstmonceaux Medieval Fest)

Who are you and for how long have you been a musician?

I have played guitar since a child, the Autoharp more recently, and have sung in major Choirs as well as perfomances and local "open Mic" sessions, but mostly I play in the Crimson Moon - which still has over 40 bookings per annum - though under new ownership now.

I specialise now in "re-discovering" lost viking songs - "stolen" by others - "The Sounds of Violence", taken by Simon and Garfunkel, "Welcome to the Coast of Caledonia" taken by the Eagles. "Laars Trekking", and of course the now Notorious "And a Green One" which has now been performed in over 24 languages including Klingon and Dothraki!

2018 and I have been very proud to have been voted LARP Bard of the Year in the UK LARP Awards.

Where are you known from, where have you played on Mythodea/ConQuest, how could our reader know you?

I came to Mythodea first in 2013 as a player with the Grand Expedition. I played Vollsanger, arriving as Der Vollsanger - the head of a Bardic Order second only to Der Meistersinger. I played to camps and for friends and illegally in the town - refusing to join the Guild of Bards until they proved worthwhile - being chased around town with my Son in Law acting as a Lookout and Body-guard - great fun and lovely role play!! 

On my last day I decided to give the Guild the courtesy of a roleplay visit - I was invited to play at one of the Taverns which I did, and they offered me a beer token for my trouble. That fitted with my Bardic Heritage and sense of fun ....  The next thing I knew I was invited to attend the next year as Bard...  I have been in the Stadt/Tross ever since...

And so nowadays, if you are in the Town or the Tross you will find "Der Alte Bard" - the guy with the long Blond Hair (Platinum Blond - not White!!) pushing his Volls Wagen full of instruments, beer and meads. Playing the main Taverns in the evening - but you will find me at the Wein Stube, the Abtei, a street corner, a trader or anywhere someone wants  to hear a song..... or needs a Gin and Tonic...

The Volls Wagen

Do you have a specific / special Mythodea- or ConQuest-song? Is that song online available? 

I have many songs for Mythodea - but over the last years I have tried to celebrate the the great Taverns of Mythodea, and the beautiful people I have met. My Project "Love Chronicles of Mythodea" was almost ready last year and I hope to have the full CD available by next Conquest. 

It is a sad tale of the beautiful women that Vollsanger has met and fallen in love with in Mythodea, (and totally failed to make an impression) and the Taverns that he met them in.....

Taverns include the Heilige Krabbe, Black Pearl, Jollie Rouge, Scorpions, Rote Stern, Klabautermann, and his forsaken loves include Windlillie, Harma, Mona Mour, Finja, Sinistaire, Valeria,

an unknown lady stolen by the Viinshar,

and Tanja - "I said I would write you a song!"

These songs are currently all available on Soundcloud and individually on video - Find them on "Vollsanger Sings" on my Youtube Channel - or on the "Mythodea" Channel on the same place.

What’s your favorite LARP-song by a DIFFERENT bard/musician?

My favourite LARP song is also from Mythodea, by the amazing Klanggespinst : Des Lebens Kreis.

Written by Sarah Krause of Saitenweise - she and Michael Höfer made me welcome as a stranger in a strange land from my first visit into the Bard Guild. It also seems to sum up the whole concept of LARP and Life and Live Action. 

What’s your plans for next year (on ConQuest and elsewhere)? Where can we see/hear you?

This year I hope to once more join the people of Mythodea. To act as Bard and sing and enjoy the great camaraderie of the Bards, the players and the staff. Hopefully the Volls Wagen will be there ..

together with the many friends I have made over the last few years. Seems I have been adopted by a few more groups this year - most particularly "The Flaming Eagles" who are anxiously waiting to hear their new anthem ... "Fear in the Cities" - and a time to visit old and new Taverns.

Oh - did I mention that I also take my camera and video ???  See my galleries and video tracks for a personal view of Mythodea ...  Vollsanger's View - here all week

And Finally - from Conquest 2017 - and the official Website - The "Tavern" Song .... Bad Norderby

Link here : Bad Norderby

Hope to see you there ...

Mr V.

22nd June 2018 - Daffodils

Thought for the day :"If you’re kinky and you know it clap your.. oh they are tied – never mind"

Went out today to get a Daffodil

That may not seem the most usual task for a day - but Côr Curiad have a forthcoming choir fund raiser for Marie Curie in Stradey Castle...  

It seems that Penarth Hospice have a Daffodil that could be used for such events - and it was meant to be quite large - but as we took the details of the size it looked that it may go into the car if we put the back seats down ...

So, Susie requiring a visit to her Chiropractor in Penarth it seemed like a good day to go for it. And so we did ... 

We found the place and went to look at the Daffodil with a chair...

Only the Daffodil was described as being about 4 ft diameter - they didn't mention the 7 ft stem that went with it!! It was a lovely daffodil - with a car battery to light the LED lights and the chair was yellow and covered with daffodils but weighed a ton - I am not sure that we could have lifted it into the car - even if it had fitted

But they had not really mentioned the base!!
They had mentioned that it was round and wooden - but had not mentioned the steel structure and the wrought iron and the 1 ton weight limit....    Apparently -when it arrived at the Hospice they brought it in a lorry into the park and then 4 of the handymen staff rolled it into place as it was impossible to lift ... 

All in all it was not really an option ...

But we had a lovely guided tour around the Hospice - the most lovely place for anyone to stay. Each room looks out upon the sea. It is peaceful and bright and it is clear that it is a place that would be uplifting to attend - as we looked through the recreation rooms we looked out through the window and saw the workmen putting the daffodil back together again - it seems that they had taken it apart for us to use - and we got a clear idea of the real size of this thing ....

It was lovely to have a guided tour of an amazing place and a really worthwhile cause for fund raising.

This view does not give an idea of the view you get from the building...   but I was impressed  

Good luck to Côr Curiad for their efforts to raise funds 

 

Cheers!

21st June 2018 - Longest day again

Thought for the day :"Longest day ? No - it is 24 hours the same as every other one!"

Yes it is the Solstice - but let's be fair - a day is a day !

In other matters I went to Kilkenny Cat last night for the open mic night and played a set of three - Mr Bo Jangles, Ti a dy ddoniau and Tanja's Song. Apparently the Welsh is not too bad ...

Working upon pronunciations and accent - after all they say that I speak Welsh with a Japanese Accent!!

Ti a dy ddoniau

A link to Ty a dy ddoniau - You and your Talents

Ryan and Ronnie 

Tristan a Gwidion

Jodie Marie

So I will leave these here for links

Cheers

20th June 2018 - Tranquility and Commuting

Thought for the day:"Why is it Possession of Marijuana and not Joint Custody?"
I don't mean to get into the questions being raised about he medical use of Marijuana - but that appealed to my sense of humour.

Quite enjoyed this version for the the lands of Mythodea

Flying Darts 

A friend posted how tranquil the journey to work was this morning - I suppose just to wind up those who do not live and work in rural Wales

I thought something was missing ...

That is better ....


And so with this thought I leave you
Cheers !

19th June 2018 - I'm not an Einstein you know!

Thought for the day: "I wanted a herb-crusted fish dinner, but I couldn't find the thyme nor the plaice."


Yesterday was a day where I mentioned the famous Cream and Jam considerations for Scones - with the reference to the Music Festival being cancelled ...

I was then presented with this fine gem from Donald Trump

Jam First !!

Well, Athelstan over yesterday with a Grand Lodge Certificate presentation and a lovely turn out for three candidates.

Forms filled in this morning for Father in Law and Housing Benefit and calls from the DWP regarding attendance allowance for him.

More forms to fill in for the HSBC "Safety Care" assessment - which is a right pain as they keep asking for documentation that they already have - but that is bureaucracy for you - need to have them signed by responsible person - apparently a funeral director qualifies!


But when we think about forms and qualifications - I found this little gem in my wanderings today - Einstein - the rejection slip ...

So.... head in book for Rose Croix - acting Prelate  - ho hum - just a piece in the middle and a trip to Aberaeron.

Cheers !

18th June 2018 - On lessons in being Green

Thought for the day:"Devon & Cornwall joint Music Festival has been cancelled. Organisers could not decide if the Jam or Cream went on first"

A grey day .....

Read this - chuckled a little..

At the checkout in the supermarket, the young cashier suggested to the much older lady that she should bring her own grocery bags, because plastic bags are not good for the environment.

The woman apologized to the young girl and explained, "We didn't have this 'green thing' back in my earlier days."

The young clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."

The older lady said that she was right -- our generation didn't have the "green thing" in its day. 

She went on to explain:

Back then, we returned milk bottles, pop bottles and beer bottles to the shop. The shop sent them back to the factory to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled. But we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day.

Grocery stores bagged our groceries in brown paper bags that we reused for numerous things. Most memorable besides household rubbish bags was the use of brown paper bags as book covers for our school books. This was to ensure that public property (the books provided for our use by the school) was not defaced by our scribblings. Then we were able to personalize our books on the brown paper bags. But, too bad we didn't do the "green thing" back then.

We walked up stairs because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.

But she was right. We didn't have the "green thing" in our day.

Back then we washed the baby's nappies because we didn't have the throw away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy-gobbling machine burning up 240 volts. Wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing.

But that young lady is right; we didn't have the "green thing" back in our day. 

Back then we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of Cornwall. In the kitchen we mixed and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us. When we packaged a fragile item to send in the post, we used wadded up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn petrol just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.

But she's right; we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

We drank from a water fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blade in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.

But we didn't have the "green thing" back then.

Back then, people took the tram or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service in the family's Chelsea Tractor or van, which cost more than a whole house did before the"green thing." We had one electrical plug in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 23,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest MacDonalds.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the "green thing" back then?

Maybe I am another another selfish old person who needs a lesson in conservation from a smart ass young person.

We don't like being old in the first place, but I don't think we need lessons ... Especially from a tattooed, multiple pierced imbecile who can't make change without the till telling them how much.

But then it is a Green One
Cheers !

17th June 2018 - Happy Father's Day - Commercialism ?

Thought for the day :"Don’t you just hate it when you go to check your facebook and are rudely disturbed by a jogger bouncing off the windscreen"
I have always been a little sceptical about Father's Day, considering, for no real reason, that is t was simply an american campaign to sell more celebration cards and a few bottles of whisky (the latter of course has little objection in my particular case)....

However, I had no real reason for this until the wonders of the internet start throwing up all sorts of information that otherwise would not be circulating.

And so it seems that the tradition did indeed start in the united states.

Well, other than the fact that March 19th has been used since the middle ages by the catholic church and some of the more catholic countries. March 19th is St Joseph's day named after fatherly Nutritor Domini ("Nourisher of the Lord") in Catholicism and "the putative father of Jesus" in southern European tradition. This celebration was brought to the Americas by the Spanish and Portuguese, and in Latin America, Father's Day is still celebrated on 19 March. The Catholic church actively supported the custom of a celebration of fatherhood on St. Joseph's day from either the last years of the 14th century or from the early 15th century, apparently on the initiative of the Franciscans.

In the Coptic Church, the celebration of fatherhood is also observed on St Joseph's Day, but the Copts observe this celebration on July 20. This Coptic celebration may date back to the fifth century.

But it is in the 20th Century that we start to get a celebration which reflects male parenting and is introduced to compliment Mother's Day ....

After Anna Jarvis' successful promotion of Mother's Day in Grafton, West Virginia, the first observance of a "Father's Day" was held on July 5, 1908, in Fairmont, West Virginia, in the Williams Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church South, now known as Central United Methodist Church.

Grace Golden Clayton was mourning the loss of her father, when in December 1907, the Monongah Mining Disaster in nearby Monongah killed 361 men, 250 of them fathers, leaving around a thousand fatherless children. Clayton suggested that her pastor Robert Thomas Webb honour all those fathers.
Clayton's event did not have repercussions outside Fairmont for several reasons, among them: the city was overwhelmed by other events, the celebration was never promoted outside the town itself and no proclamation of it was made by the city council. Also, two events overshadowed this event: the celebration of Independence Day July 4,

1908, with 12,000 attendants and several shows including a hot air balloon event, which took over the headlines in the following days, and the death of a 16-year-old girl on July 4. The local church and council were overwhelmed and they did not even think of promoting the event, and it was not celebrated again for many years.

The original sermon was not reproduced by the press and it was lost. Finally, Clayton was a quiet person, who never promoted the event and never talked to other persons about it.

On June 19, 1910, a Father's Day celebration was held at the YMCA in Spokane, Washington by Sonora Smart Dodd. Her father, the civil war veteran William Jackson Smart, was a single parent who raised his six children there. She was also a member of Old Centenary Presbyterian Church (now Knox Presbyterian Church), where she first proposed the idea. After hearing a sermon about Jarvis' Mother's Day in 1909 at Central Methodist Episcopal Church, she told her pastor that fathers should have a similar holiday to honour them. Although she initially suggested June 5, her father's birthday, the pastors did not have enough time to prepare their sermons, and the celebration was deferred to the third Sunday in June. Several local clergymen accepted the idea, and on June 19, 1910, the first Father's Day, "sermons honouring fathers were presented throughout the city".

In 1957, Maine Senator Margaret Chase Smith wrote a Father's Day proposal accusing Congress of ignoring fathers for 40 years while honouring mothers, thus "[singling] out just one of our two parents". In 1966, President Lyndon B. Johnson issued the first presidential proclamation honouring fathers, designating the third Sunday in June as Father's Day. Six years later, the day was made a permanent national holiday when President Richard Nixon signed it into law in 1972.

So, america is to blame - just saying !

Meanwhile, I think we have come full circle. In the old days it was necessary to go out and buy a card and a bottle of whisky to celebrate. Now it is sufficient to post onto social media with an old photograph and best wishes..   I approve of this move away from commercialisation.

It is a pity about the whisky though....

Cheers!