An eyewitness account from last week's 15th Frances Folk Gathering:

Witching Hour at Frances, all was going well

till a bunch of new arrivals started raising hell

banging a tent together in the middle of the night

then yelling at each other until the dawn's first light

Campers stuck around them hadn't said a single word

But early risers, smiling, showed them what they'd heard

by clanging round at breakfast, making quite a din

A banjo player nearby camped quite happily joined in

by walking round their tent while playing them a solo

Everything was funny until what was to follow

As mentioned, no-one had complained about the night-long noise

But aparrently there's different rules for local camping boys

For though we'd suffered all night long without a single peep

these lads complained the banjo was preventing them from sleep

Those boys are pretty lucky that none of them is dead

for the banjo player, hearing this, suddenly "saw red"

and spying that the tentflap was still open just a crack

went charging in amongst them, with his banjo gave a whack

Twas just enough to scare the lads that they'd no longer sleep

Next night they were too buggered to raise more than a peep

The moral of this story of a banjo player's sins?

Often problems can't be solved by using violins