Wonderful, wonderful Copenhagen

Rambling a little further than usual

I first went to The Listening Room International Songwriter’s Retreat on Inis Oirr in October 2006 and have since taken part in several more - including one in California.

As Brett Perkins is now living in Denmark, many of the participants tend to be from there too and the first two songs I wrote there were with Danish co-writers.

Over the years, I’ve been invited out there many times to play and write and at long last, I made it. The 21st of July this year would have been the last day on which I could sing that old Beatles number, ‘When I’m 64’ with integrity and I thought that Copenhagen would be a good place to spend my 64th birthday.

I contacted some friends and was even told that a decent left-handed guitar would be provided for the trip.

I flew out on 19th and was met at Central Station by Jacob Svendsen who, after a quick kebab, brought me straight to a gorgeous little venue where, every Sunday, Copenhagen Listening Room Open Stage takes place. We were early as Jacob is relocating to Nuuk in Greenland in a month or so and was training in new people to take over the sound.

If only Ireland had such open mics. There was great teamwork in organising the venue for the night - tables and chairs, lighting and sound-checking. The venue, while not being a pub, can sell beer to club members and the club is joined by paying the cost of your first beer and writing your name in the members book - you then get your first beer free!

I found Copenhagen to be an astonishingly ‘inclusive’ society and venue (given for use by the local council) and the way the night was run echoed this ethos. People turning up by 7:30 could put their name down for one or two songs - depending on how busy the night was. Artists there for the first time had to put their name down BEFORE the regulars to ensure that they got to play. Wonderful Copenhagen. There is also a ‘featured artist spot’ in between the two halves (30 Minutes) and, I was delighted to be invited to do this for the following Sunday.

The standard of the performers - and writing too - was very high and the ’standard’ of listening, even higher.

My guitar was ‘on the way’ and Brett Perkins kindly offered his spot in the 2nd half in exchange for my earlier one and, even toward the end of the night, still no guitar and, instead of the two songs I’d planned on playing, I did two that I could just about manage on a wrong way around instrument - an old one on guitar and a recent one on ukelele. The audience were happy and I was very glad when my loaner guitar turned up on Monday afternoon.

Thankfully, Jacob put me up for a few days too - keeping my accommodation cost down - and we did some writing and shooting the breeze. Jacob also brought me to some other open mics - again, the standard was amazing, especially as most of the performers weren’t writing in their native tongue.

Some days, to keep my hand in and meet the place, I went out busking - definitely more fun than profit as Jacob pointed out, the majority of people no longer carry cash. It was during one of these sessions that I was invited to jam with a couple of buskers from Portugal with a dancer from Greece. I am not a good ‘jammer’ and suggested that I play a song of mine that seemed to be good to jam too.

Toward the end of ‘The Nice & Sleazy Caledonia Blues, I man who’d signalled for permission to film, asked if we could do it again - from the top - as he did freelance work for Danish TV and thought that they might like to use it.

The days went by way too quickly and, on my last night it was back to Listening Room and my featured artist spot - a great finish to a great week.

Next week , the Copenhagen Songwriter Festival is on and everybody said ‘You have to come back for this’ but unfortunately yet again, the lotto people picked the wrong numbers. Next year?