Northstow Mummers

The Northstow Mummers, named after one of the old Hundreds of Cambridgeshire, were founded in 1996 with assistance from mummers in Sheffield and Derby, to perform traditional mummers' plays at the appropriate festivals of the year. There have been changes in personnel since then, but Northstow Mummers continue to keep up the day with their signature play, The Old Tup, which tells the story of the celebrated and legendary Derby Ram. Other plays in the repertorie include the Huntingdonshire Mummers' Play, a Horse Play and a St George play. Northstow Mummers have mummed in all the counties of East Anglia, and in Northamptonshire, at festivals such as Cambridge's Strawberry Fair, St. George's Day at Snape Maltings, the King's Morris dance-outs at Thornham, the Willingham Feast and the Fen Edge Festival at Cottenham. Northstow mummers perform for the love of the art, "for pence and spicy ale" as John Clare put it. The musicians of Northstow Mummers comprise The Traditional Music of Cambridgeshire Collective, plain on one-row melodeon, mountain dulcimer, accordion, fiddle, guitar, bouzouki and hurdy-gurdy. Here is a picture of the current team, May 2009.