St Germain sur ay Normandy 11 August

Just as an intro I have been playing a gig at St Germain for the last 3 years organised by an organisation called un soir dans la manche . I was contacted by Gilles Perrotte a fan of my albums to do a film on the area and film a few song s2 and a half years ago . Gilles now a friend suggested I might play a gig at the same time while I was over there which incidentally took place in a catholic church. We carried this on the following year in a place called the cabaret des artistes in St Germain which interested me because of the its kitsch nature, the walls were full of paintings of Edith Piaf ,Claude Francois amongst others and the piano on the stage was it was claimed the piano that Charles Dumont wrote je ne regrette rien. Great story amazing piano.

That was last August . By the way I was joined by 3 excellent musicians Vincent Lemarchend bassiste ,Vincent Aubert trombone and Moranne Brossard vocals who have also since become good friends from the beginning of this story . At the time I interviewed for this film a very charismatic shepherdess who kept her herd of sheep on the beaches/fields in St Germain sur ay. She had come to the cabaret gig and suggested we could organise a gig the following year on one of her fields. The tide and moon had to be right.

So here we are. A field in st Germain. Within 3 hours the members of the soir dans la manche created a stage made out of drift wood and hay bails a marquee for a bar and a marquee for the food , all made from the produce in the area .

Here is what I wrote on reflection straight after the gig.

Wow! As the sun went down, the sea came in engulfing the little road that me and my daughters had walked on only 5 or 10 minutes before. It came up so quickly that one of my daughters thought we had missed a rain storm.

It was now crepuscule. The stage had been set up using old beams from a barn and hay bales a la francaise to protect all of us and the hardy audience from the wind.

Amazingly given the geography and weather people did come in cars and I kid you not canoes as by now the water had come up to the back of the stage.

The food was either grown out of the seafield or had lived off the seafield. The soup presale was delicious!

Steph Maube who farmed the seafield what a force of nature and all the members of un soir dans la manche had pulled it off.

Thanks to everyone who made a very special evening and one we will never forget!

Special mention to all who made the effort I hope you felt what I felt.

Olivier who came from Paris ,Patrick who entertained us royaly ,the drummer from the Valentinos from Caen (really interesting conversation) Yves who we met at the show jumping (that was bizarre ) the precious day,the lad from Orlean and of course musicians who over the 3 years have become good friends Vincent Basse , Vincent Trombone and Steph Lemarchand who did a fantastic job on vocals! Basically everybody I talked to that evening . C’est beau la vie!

Bill