Ridin' The Edale Train in The Evenin'
 By Derek Brandon
, Chester
I REMEMBER BEING SURPRISED at seeing Tom Travis & Friends on TV last year playing on a train to Edale and thinking “ That’s a good idea!”, but I was even more surprised to hear that the Edale Folk Train is a monthly event which has now been going for more than a year. The organiser, Tony Wills, of the Hope Valley Community Rail Partnership, books a folk-style band to play on each train and at The Rambler in Edale. This time it was the turn of The Rainy City BG Band ; their third appearance. It was a glorious, hot, sunny day so Jean & I decided that an evening’s picking in Edale should be nice - and so did half of Manchester, it seemed! A frantic drive from Chester via two wrong motorway turnings got us to Piccadilly Station back entrance (£1.50 for 4 hours parking) with 3 minutes to spare. A sprightly dash up 3 flights of stairs, up in a lift, across a bridge and down a flight of stairs carrying banjo, guitar, camera bags, etc., brought us to the near end of platform 14...
The train departed in 1 minute from the far end of platform 1... Fortunately the specially-chartered double-carriage diesel was a bit late departing, due to whatever incompetent business now runs the trains cancelling the 18.30 regular train and transferring all the passengers onto the chartered 18.47 one. We boarded somehow and found the band already happily picking away in the middle of a carriage. Trevor was on his electric bass, which was powered by what looked like a life support system that Tom & Bill Degney had built. We had expected lots of ‘groupies’ and pickers to be there, but the only other picker we recognised was Bev Williams. The phrase "sardines in a hot, bouncing, shaking can" hardly conveys the experience of the ride to Edale! Every available square centimetre had someone standing on it. At even the slightest distortion in the track the carriages bottomed hard on their suspension - quite frightening, really. In true Glen Miller fashion, ‘The band played on’ un-perturbed and to much applause, though I doubt that the words could be heard beyond a few feet. The train spent more time than it should stopping at every station, thus wasting good drinking and concert time at the pub, but it eventually emerged from a tunnel and burst into the beautiful Edale Valley in brilliant sunshine - a wonderful sight. A 2 minute stroll led to the Rambler, with a horseshoe of chairs laid out for the band at the bottom of a slope. The moderately-priced barbecue was sizzling and the landlord wondered what had hit him - this biggest-ever crowd made them run out of glasses. The band played very well without amps - the acoustic sound was clear and refreshing - what more can I say? It took a long time to sink in that we were drinking a pint in the serenity of Edale, in the sunshine(!) and listening to bluegrass, when only shortly before we were stuck in the frantic life of home.
As daylight failed the spotlights were turned on and eventually “Last song” was called and it was time to hurry back to the train, bumpity-bumpity-bump. Someone won a railway book in the free-to-enter raffle and everyone was happy. We arrived back at Piccadilly at 22.00 hrs, all safe and in one piece. In September it’s the turn of Leeds’ Hired Hands - good luck, guys! Details/bookings/gigs: Tony Wills, 43 Buxton Lane, Marple, Stockport, Cheshire, SK6-7QL; tel: 0161-427-5207. Tony writes “What a great evening we with had the Rainy City - definitely the best one we’ve had!” and seriously, it really was a great night out!
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