{"id":55,"date":"2013-04-15T18:07:00","date_gmt":"2013-04-15T17:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/2013\/04\/15\/dont-pick-a-flower\/"},"modified":"2013-04-15T18:07:00","modified_gmt":"2013-04-15T17:07:00","slug":"dont-pick-a-flower","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/2013\/04\/15\/dont-pick-a-flower\/","title":{"rendered":"Don’t Pick a Flower"},"content":{"rendered":"

Don’t Pick a Flower<\/b> was a curiously named folk duo was based at the Coventry Arts Umbrella club<\/i> c 1971 led by poet and songwriter John Leopold<\/b> who led many of the folk and poetry sessions at the Umbrella around that time.
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\nAlthough I saw them at the Umbrella, I can’t remember all the details. They played at the Umbrella Club on ” May 11th 1971 Don’t Pick a Flower – John Leopold’s folk duo. Poetry and Folk session. Contemporary and own songs<\/i>.”<\/span><\/div>\n
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\nI have a note in my 1971 diary for Sunday14th February at the Plough Club on the London Road. A gig and disco run by Silk Disco<\/b>. Dando Shaft<\/b> were playing along with Music Box<\/b> (Colin and Rob Armstrong). The entry says I got the addresses of Music Box<\/b> and Don’t Pick a Flower<\/b> at that gig with a view to them playing at the Umbrella Friday night band nights I was organising at the time. I’m not sure that I put either outfit on at the Umbrella in the end for whatever forgotten reason but collecting contact address was part of the process.<\/p>\n

Don’t Pick a Flower<\/b> were a gentle harmony folk duo with interesting lyrics as far as I can recall. They seemed to be around the Umbrella a lot at that time, weekends, sitting in the coffee bar, playing guitar and chatting.
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\nI can’t be sure but the full name may have been Don’t Pick a Flower Unless You’re Sure<\/b> – although i may be confusing that with a quote i heard somewhere.<\/p>\n

John Leopold had been involved with various poetry and folk events at the Coventry Arts Umbrella in the very early 70’s and although John often played <\/span>in the Umbrella coffee bar as conversation raged on every subject – often to the wee hours<\/span>. <\/span><\/p>\n

John Leopold had performed with the Umbrella Poets in the 1970 presentation of Geoff Pegg’s <\/b>Knotted Sheets<\/i> (launch of his poetry chapbook for Outposts) at the Belgrade Theatre. He performed one of his songs called Dinosaurs Lament<\/i>. I seem to think John play at other venues with the Umbrella poets during this period as well as folk clubs.<\/p>\n

A short bio of John Leopold<\/b> exists in the Knotted Sheets<\/b> programme that reads –<\/p>\n

John Leopold<\/b>
\nThe writer of the other song, Dinosaurs Lament. A talented songwriter and guitarist who takes personal preference to the 12-string variety. His songs are apart from anything produced by other writers and they use some excellent chord sequences.<\/i>.
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Don’t Pick a Flower was a curiously named folk duo was based at the Coventry Arts Umbrella club c 1971 led by poet and songwriter John Leopold who led many of the folk and poetry sessions at the Umbrella around that … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=55"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=55"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=55"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsrainbow.com\/coventryfolkclubs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=55"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}