An old beautiful thing and a terrible one

Mark Hayes

Aug 8

Last weekend I was in Stroud attending their annual steampunk event, doing the author thing and a certain amount of prating about. It was a lot of fun, as such events always are. On this occasion I took with me an old beautiful thing and a terrible one. Well a stack of terrible ones, but lets talk about the old beautiful thing first... And no I don't mean Matt McCall the other person in the picture below...

The old and beautiful thing is the Banjolele I'm holding in the picture. It is probably my favourite instrument in my large and occasionally ridiculous collection of things with strings from which the talented can perhaps get a tune. The reason it is a ridiculous collection is of course because while I own a couple of electric guitars, an Epiphone semi, a twelve string semi, an electric bass, a battered old acoustic, and a cigar box guitar ( oh and a lyre ) I can't really play any of them. Unlike the rest however I didn't buy the Banjolele, that was inherited.

My Banjolele was made by John Grey & Sons (London) Limited, some time around 1900, what I do know for sure is it was bought by my great great uncle Fields through my maternal family line in 1905, and it has been in the family ever since passed down the family line from my grandma Edna Herrington (Fields), through my mum Pat Hayes (Herrington) to me eventually. Over the years since the death of my Great Great uncle in the war it has been play with by generations of Fields, Herrington and Hayes children, right down to my own, with all the reverence and respect you would expect. Which is to say it has been battered bruised by us all and on occasion has been used to batter and bruise one or two of us by our siblings.

The varnish is somewhat chipped, as you can imagine, and when I finally rescued it from my parents house a couple of years back it had only a couple of drum hocks left, was missing a couple of strings, tuning pegs were loose or locked solid, the neck bridge was snapped. It as basically in need of a little love an attention, but then it is at least 118 years old, and it not exactly been kept in a glass case. In fact it is in its original compressed card case which is also something of a thing of battered beauty.

I spent time and a little money rebuilding it, sourcing parts and oiling the ones that could be saved. It is still battered, I have not re-vanished it, as that would mean stripping back to the wood and frankly that chipped and battered frame is what makes it beautiful. It still sounds wonderful when in tune, it has a strangely oriental tone when plucked. I've been playing the old thing since I was a child and first found it hiding in the bottom of my parents wardrobe. I have never learned to play it properly but then I don't have the thin aquiline fingers needed for such a delicate neck. But it still brings me joy. Like old battered beautiful things often do. As it has for generations of my family and in time I'll pass it down the line to the next keeper.

As I mentioned at the start last weekend I also took with me a terrible thing, or a stack of them. The terrible thing in question was another new book. One I have not advertised or spoken about until now because I made it specifically as keepsakes for those wonderful, mad and put upon souls who had agreed to put on a terrible if fun play with me at a couple of events earlier in the year. Because, well, the minimum size a book must be to make a paperback on POD is all of 24 pages and putting the pay into paperback form appealed to me.

It actually ran out at 36 pages in the end and I intended to just order the copies I needed to give the cast one each, but in the end I ordered a few extra ones because I could. I originally planned to then un-publish the book, but terrible thing though it is I feel it's earned its existence.

To be clear at 36 pages long its really not much more than a pamphlet, it has the full script, some notes on putting it on, a cast list and and introduction and that's about all. It is also expensive for such a tiny book as the minimum I can charge for it is set by amazon. So, to be clear here, it isn't worth buying... I am not going to attempt to sell it. And this is probably the only time I will mention it. But on the off chance anyone does want a frankly terrible (if fun) play, it will remain available.

If anyone ever does put on their own production of The Drag King in Yellow, please get in touch and send me pictures