About us

Bringing folk back to East Dulwich

Well it's nearly five years now since we started The Goose, so we reckon that we have well and truly brought folk back to East Dulwich - consequently we had to completely rewrite this bit!

After a very steep learning curve, we had just got cosily settled into our venues when the rug was whipped from beneath our feet. We lost one completely and had to move the other two. Oh well. Change is good, no?

If you don't already know, we have (mostly) three different kinds of Goose evenings.

We have concerts - now at The Crown and Greyhound - where we have a well known headliner plus two pre-booked support acts. These are monthly apart from July, August and December.

Then we have traditional folk club nights - now at The Old Nun's Head - where we have a usually less well known headliner, plus floorspots from whoever wants to sing. We also have the traditional folk club raffle - with a difference ...... you'll have to come to see what the difference is ..... These are also monthly apart from July, August and December.

Then we have FREE monthly Singarounds, also now held at The Old Nun's Head where anybody can come and sing a song, join in the choruses or just listen. These are held all year round including the months when we don't hold ticketed gigs.

For more information on all these evenings, please scroll down the page!

back to top

What will the evening be like at The Crown and Greyhound?

Doors open at 7pm (but see the note at the bottom of this section) and you can have a drink while listening to our resident Big Chill DJ Folk2Future. The bar is downstairs, so you can either bring your first drink up with you or come up and bag a seat first!

The seating is chairs in rows. Please note that seats are not reserved, so to be sure of a seat in a position you prefer you should come early. We cannot guarantee a seat if the event is very popular and you arrive after the advertised door opening time, although there will be standing space available until we judge that the room is full.

If you have already bought a ticket, you are of course guaranteed entry. If you haven't, if the event is very crowded unfortunately we may have to turn you away, so we do recommend wherever possible that you buy your ticket in advance.

The live music will start at 8pm with a support artist, followed by our headlining artist at 8.30pm. Then there will be an interval from 9.15pm to 9.45pm, then another support artist and then a second set by our main act at 10.15pm. This order and the timings may occasionally vary if there are circumstances outwith our control.

We aim to finish the second headlining set at 11pm, although for various reasons such as hideous technical issues this may not always be possible. Also, there will usually be encores which extend the live music beyond 11pm. These will be followed by more chilled DJing from Folk2Future. The bar downstairs closes at midnight and you are welcome to bring drinks back upstairs and chat to us - though we will be clearing up!

The 37 night bus stops very close to the pub, so if you're lucky enough that it drops you off somewhere convenient, you can have a relaxed late evening without worrying about getting home! For details of other transport, see our find us page.

Note: We do our very best to open the doors at The Crown and Greyhound at 7pm. This isn't always possible as sometimes musicians are late or there are other circumstances beyond our control.

We take the view (and we hope you do too) that you would rather we had a thorough soundcheck to make the sound as good as we can than cut corners to let you in bang on the dot of seven.

Please understand that for various reasons the vast majority of artists are not happy to have members of the audience sitting in on their soundchecks, so that is why we cannot let you in during the soundcheck. Sorry!

Please also understand that we will have been at the venue for hours before the door opens in an effort to make the evening as good as possible for our audience, so if you have to wait a little longer than 7pm to get in, please don't take it out on us!

Occasionally there may be technical or other issues which mean that the evening finishes slightly later than scheduled. We do our best to avoid this, but please also be aware that all times are approximate.

A choice of real ales (both draught and bottled) is available. If you want to eat, we recommend that you do so downstairs before the music starts, as there are no tables upstairs.

Sadly, we now have to add here what surely should be obvious to everybody - PLEASE do not hold conversations with your friends during the live music. This is both disrespectful to the artists and disturbing to other people who are trying to listen.

Obviously some essential things may have to be said. That is a different matter to continuing to talk about non-essential things, particularly after you have been asked to stop.

In future, people who persistently talk during the live music will be asked to leave the gig.

Our concerts at The Crown and Greyhound are normally on the last Friday of the month, but this may occasionally vary if that Friday is a Bank Holiday.

back to top

What will the ticketed evening be like at The Old Nun's Head?

Our ticketed evenings Upstairs at The Old Nun's Head are run along the lines of a traditional folk club. There is no PA.

Our nights Upstairs at The Old Nun's Head are normally on the second Friday of the month, but this may occasionally vary if there is a bank holiday in the month.

The door opens at 7.45pm. (yes OK we know that's different to our concert nights, but it's a smaller room, we have fewer people to get in, and we don't have to check advance tickets!) The live music starts at 8pm and we aim to finish at 11pm, though there will be encores.

There will be two sets from our main artist plus floorsingers in each half. There will be a late bar till 1am.

If you like traditional and traditional-influenced folk music, of any country or culture, do come along. Whether you sing or play yourself, like joining in choruses or just want to listen to others, we'll sure you'll have a great time!

If you would like to sing or play a floorspot at The Old Nun's Head, please click here for details!

back to top

What will the FREE singaround be like Upstairs At The Old Nun's Head?

The evening will start at 7.30pm and go on till whenever people want to stop singing! When we first started, we expected to finish around 9.30pm, but we've found that things usually go on longer! We'll have a short break in the middle. The bar closes at 11.30pm which is later than our previous venue, however as many people have work the next day we don't expect that the singing will go on till closing time!

The singaround is very informal and participative - no mikes, no lights, no audience, we will be singing for ourselves. You can sing whatever you like, but as we're a folk club we'd prefer it to be at least folk influenced, and if it has a chorus or is a well-known song which others can join in with, all the better! Songs from any country or culture are welcome!

To make sure we don't miss anybody out who would like to sing, please put your name down on the list when you arrive - singers will be in the order of names on the list, and when we come to the end we will start again, so if you are early you are more likely to get more than one song.

You are welcome to bring an accompanying instrument, but please note - this is a singaround, not an instrumental session.

If you want to come and just listen, of course that's absolutely fine too - we don't want to make anybody feel uncomfortable, or feel that they have to sing. You don't! Though we hope if you're a bit shy that at some stage you'll give it a go!

We have put together some songs which we and others have sometimes sung at the Singarounds and which we think are good tunes, and here they are if you want to print them out - first the titles and then the songs!

We haven't included page numbers in case we want to add any more in the future - but they are all in alphabetical order, so you should be able to find them easily once you have the titles - we hope!

They're in Word document form (.doc) at the moment but when we get a minute we will try to turn them into pdfs in case that is easier for people to download.

Download some Singaround titles here!

Download some Singaround songs here!

back to top

Are you coming by yourself?

We know that many people would like to come to Goose events but don't like going to things by themself. If your friends aren't into the same music as you, please don't let that put you off coming. Ask for Sue at the door (or email us beforehand) and we will do our best to introduce you to other people who have also come by themselves, or at least some other friendly faces! Hopefully you will end up knowing lots of people with the same folkie interests as you!

But please if you are by yourself, try to come when the door opens, as once the room is full it becomes harder to find you a free seat with friendly people nearby (we're sure you are all friendly, but hey we don't know you all yet!)

back to top

The Goose's music

There used to be - maybe still are in some places - heated discussions over what Folk is, or what it "should" be.

Our main criteria are that all the artists and support artists who we book in advance should be good, and that they should have what could loosely be described as a folk influence.

We will also only book people who we personally like listening to, on the basis that if we do, then probably you will too. We hope you'll come to see people you may not have heard before as well as those you have. That's how we've discovered great music in the past!

Our folkie musical tastes are pretty wide, so we expect to have a real eclectic mix from what some consider "pure" unaccompanied traditional Folk (we both love it) via blues, roots, world to nu folk, twisted folk, electronica, whatever.

As we've said elsewhere, from the hammered dulcimer to the laptop.

If there's someone you'd love to have come to the Goose, let us know, and if we agree we'll try to book them, budget permitting!

back to top

Would you like to sing or play for the Goose?

We want to encourage up and coming singers/musicians, and particularly local talent.

If you would like to sing and/or play at the Goose, please read the following carefully as we have different policies for our different venues.

The Crown and Greyhound

Our headlining artists at The Dog are usually very well known, and this is reflected in our ticket prices for this venue. We don't have floorsingers on these evenings. People who turn up "on spec" for a floor spot might be brilliant, or - they might not. If they're not, we feel that isn't fair on an audience which has paid good money for a ticket.

So we have decided that the artists supporting our headlining acts will be people who we already know and love (and the number of those is increasing all the time!)

So if you'd like to come and sing/play at The Crown and Greyhound, and we don't already know you, please send us a link to tracks online we can listen to, or (preferably) send us a demo CD (contact us for the address) - we are always happy to listen! Or tell us where/when we can come and hear you live (though we can't promise to do this).

We do prefer CDs as we can listen to them in the car when we don't have a zillion and one other things to do, so if you send a CD we are more likely to listen to it within a reasonable time frame ......

Sorry but we can only pay our headlining artists, though you'll get free entry and an appreciative audience!

The Old Nun's Head

This is a (mainly) traditional music night (of any country or culture!), and we welcome with open arms anybody who would like to get up and sing a song and/or play a tune! There will be no PA, and enthusiasm and the willingness to share the songs is much more important than whether you are a "good" singer.

Please get there early if you would like to sing or play, and leave your name on the door. We can't guarantee that you will get a spot, however, as this will depend on the number of potential singers on the night. If you have emailed us in advance to let us know that you would like a spot you are more likely to get one, but you will still need to be there early so that we know that you have actually turned up!

We usually give singers one song/tune each to start with and then work through the list again. We think this is the fairest way of giving everybody the highest chance of getting at least one spot.

Please note that this is not an "open mic" night for singer-songwriters. There is no mic, and our headlining artists will be singing/playing mainly traditional music. We don't want to exclude anybody who wants a floorspot, but we would prefer it if the music was at least folk influenced (Davide and Paddy, take note, we are not a rehearsal space for your later gig at the jazz club, lol :D ).

We have a headlining artist (or artists) on this evening, who will do two 45-minute sets and who will be paid. Our hope is that this will enable us to give gigs to traditional singers and musicians who are not yet well enough known for us to put on at our larger venue at The Crown and Greyhound.

If you would like to be considered for a headlining gig at The Old Nun's Head, please click here to email the Goose! and let us have links where we can listen to your music. Alternatively (and preferably, as we can listen to it in the car!) please send us a demo CD - email us for the address to send it to, grammar.

And please note - you can always come to our free Singarounds (second Sunday of the month Upstairs At The Old Nun's Head) where we can hear you sing - a number of people have gone on to get "proper" gigs with the Goose after first coming to our Singarounds - we're always on the lookout for talent!

back to top

Our Venues

The Crown and Greyhound

You can find details of where this is and how to get there on our find us page.

The Old Nun's Head

You can find details of where this is and how to get there on our find us page.

back to top

Who is The Goose?

Nyge is very lovely. He is part of Folk2Future, DJs who have regularly played at the Big Chill Bar in Dray Walk off Brick Lane and also at some of the Big Chill festivals.

• Listen to some Folk2Future music
• Listen to some of Nyge's own music: Flapjack Davey music

Oh yeh, he also DJs as Flapjack Davey, forgot that, confusing eh.

One of Nyge's other claims to fame is that he was a member of The Knights of the Occasional Table, who brought out such great albums as "Knees up Mother Earth", "Les Elephants du Paradis", "The Planet Sweet" and "John Barleycorn 2000". Yep, that has to be kind of folkie with a name like that . It "explores the rich seam of folk in a more modern context of synthesisers and loops", it says here ....

The Knights also had a session with John Peel (R.I.P.) and their single "Eden" was a single of the week on Radio 1's evening show in the nineties.

Nyge has many other claims to fame but he won't let me tell you them! We won't mention that reversible jacket then, eh, Nyge?

back to top

Sue got into Folk way way back in the sixties. She likes to brag that she was at Bert Jansch's first solo concert at St Pancras Town Hall, having sat open-mouthed throughout when she saw him for the first time at that so-atmospheric venue the Fairfield Halls in Croydon (well it was all new then, innit. All that folkie finger-picking stuff.)

Once she'd heard Martin Carthy, that was it really. A folkie for life. In fact Sue and Nyge got together as a result of discovering a mutual (platonic obviously) love of Mr Carthy at a party a few years back. How we came to discover it who knows, must have been fate.

back to top

Sorry Nzoyi we don't have your name in a little circle yet, can't remember how to do it, ooops. Watch this space for Nzoyi's name in a little circle, coming soon!

Many of you will know Nzoyi as our excellent head sound technician at DHFC when we held our concerts there (and we hope that he will continue to play this role at our new venue), but that is just the start of it.

Not only did he find us our main venue at DHFC when we got kicked out of our old one, thus enabling us to book more expensive artists because it was bigger so we could sell more tickets to pay them, he let us use all his PA equipment. He spent hours at every DHFC gig setting it all up, then hours afterwards taking it all down again. That's as well as actually doing the sound checks and monitoring the sound at the gig itself.

As if that was not enough, Nzoyi has been massively supportive to the Goose, being involved in many ways including where necessary using his ace diplomatic skills (luckily not often needed!).

Nzoyi is a star, basically. Please go and tell him next time you see him!

Oh, and he's a musician, too!

back to top

How did the Goose get its name?

A koan is a riddle which cannot be solved by the mind.

A tiny newly-hatched gosling is put into a large glass bottle whose narrow neck is just large enough for it to enter. It lives in the bottle until it is a fully grown goose.

The riddle is: How can the goose be released from the bottle, without either breaking the bottle or killing the goose?

The answer is: The goose is out! Please do not ask us to explain this, as we won't :) It cannot be solved by the mind, as we said .....

Oh - and conveniently, Sue already had the domain name registered, and our original venues were just up the road from Goose Green ..... plus we found some nice Goose-related pix on a copyright-free clipart site .....

back to top

Would you like to help?

As you can imagine, setting up and running the Goose is very time-consuming, particularly for newbies like ourselves! We already have some brilliant helpers, but anybody who could spare some time to put round flyers and posters (particularly outside the East Dulwich area) and help on the door or with the sound or lighting would be welcomed with open arms!

Please contact us if you think you could help!

back to top

• Content © Sue Whitehead 2008
• Design © Flowww Web Development 2008
•