Rabble Folk Theatre perform traditional plays, dance Border Morris, sing, play music and take part in various calendar customs around the year.
We were formed in December 1993 from three families who were between Morris sides and looking for something to do. The landlord of a pub called the ‘Hooden Horse’, near Ashford in Kent, rang Gail Duff to ask if she could arrange some traditional Christmas entertainment. Two phone calls produced enough people to be able to perform a Mummer’s play and a Kentish Hoodening play, which were so successful (and so enjoyable for all concerned), another local pub was fixed for a New Year’s Day outing.
This second pub was called ‘The George’, and soon another play was being written for St. George’s Day at the same venue. This play was the first ‘Rabble original’, using words from traditional plays, and adding others, to produce a new twist on the story. Then, securing a booking for a Medieval event over the May weekend at Bodiam Castle, we swiftly produced ‘Robin Hood’, with Robin as the ‘Summer King’ and Guy of Guisborn as ‘Winter’. Throughout the following summer there were performances at more Medieval and re-enactment events, country fairs and Faversham Hop Festival.
If you get bookings, you need a name and we came up with ‘Rabble Folk Theatre’. ‘Rabble’ because we wanted to look like a ‘rabble’ and not identical. The kit rules were, and still are, anything green, black and gold that is slightly different to what most people would call ‘normal’ dress, with tatters in those colours. The men can choose either top hats with feathers or tatter hats. They black up for most occasions and the women always draw designs on their faces in dark green or black.
Once a Morris Dancer always a Morris Dancer and very soon we began to get itchy feet. The next winter, Rabble decided they would dance as a mixed side. Nearly everyone in the side had danced Border Morris for some years before Rabble was formed and so they were able to devise and learn six new dances for the summer season, which have been the core of our dance repertoire ever since.
A Plough play, a Derby Tup play, The Story of John Barleycorn and yet another St. George play are now in the performance repertoire. The original Mumming and Hoodening plays have gradually changed and adapted but are still the mainstay of Boxing Day and New Year. Rabble have also written plays and performances ‘to order’ for various countryside management organisations, including ‘The Forest Play’, about conservation, and ‘The Farming Play’, encouraging people to shop locally. ‘Puck’s Tale of Hallowe’en’ was a lantern-lit walk around a woodland with various happenings in the trees. The recent ‘Ghosts of the Heath’ brought to life past inhabitants of a small Kentish hamlet.
Rabble also go out as a Morris side, performing regular pub stands on Wednesday evenings throughout the summer, and at various events and festivals locally and further afield. The dance repertoire now numbers thirteen and there are four, five, six, eight and nine person dances, plus one for an unlimited even number. As all Morris sides, numbers have risen and fallen over the past thirteen years, but the original three families are still members, augmented by other family groups and individuals and we were able to have a dance with sixteen up on New Year’s Day, 2007. We have always welcomed the younger generation and included them as much as we can. Some of our original ‘children’ are now the strongest members of the side.
Rabble perform throughout the year and follow the old Celtic festivals besides as many Calendar customs as possible. We ran a Plough Sunday event for some years and always take part in local Wassailings. We dance at the Spring Equinox, go egg rolling at Easter and still perform on St. George’s Day. We make our own Jack-in-the-Green for Beltane (1st May) and dance in the Hastings Jack-in-the-Green procession on the first Monday in May. Throughout the summer there are various festivals and fairs, including the Banbury Hobby Horse Festival, and in autumn we take part in Sussex bonfire processions. Since we began, we have run the Tree Dressing on the first Sunday in December at the Weald and Downland Open Air Museum. Then round to Midwinter again, with Mumming and Hoodening.
Rabble has always been a way of life rather than just a Morris side.
