By Delia Pemberton.

“I will now play you a medley of my greatest hit,” says Ralph McTell with a wry smile as he tunes up for “Streets of London”. He knows he must play it – after all, it's the song everyone knows, the one that went to number two in the charts in 1974, earning him an Ivor Novello award. But it's also the song that brought homelessness and urban poverty to the world's attention, and sadly its message is as relevant today as it was 50 years ago.

Now one of folk's elder statesmen, McTell has seen life from many sides – soldier, labourer, teacher and travelling musician – and his experience informs his songs, some of which are autobiographical, others inspired by those he met or by artists he admires. Accompanied by his fine guitar playing, the master storyteller takes us by the hand and leads us through his own memories (“I Don't Think About You”, “Mr Connaughton”, “Brighton Belle”, “Barges”) and imagined tales of his heroes (“Avalon John”, “Summer Girls”, “West 4th Street and Jones”). And the biting social comment is there, too – most searingly in “Sabreen”, the heartbreaking story of an unborn baby, the sole survivor of a missile strike in Gaza. A sublime and thought-provoking performance, among the most memorable of the week.

Opening for McTell, and resplendent in their sparkly frocks, Yorkshire duo Bryony Griffith (vocals, violin) and Alice Jones (vocals, guitar, harmonium), delighted the audience with a lively set of traditional Yorkshire songs, showcasing their exhilarating vocal harmonies. Delivering their material with pace and humour, they opened with the New Year song “Hagman-Heigh” (proving that Yorkshire had Hogmanay before Scotland!) and a hilarious version of “The Tailor's Britches”, before moving on to the more sombre “Strawberry Tower”, the music hall song “I Traced Her Little Footmarks In The Snow” and the somewhat misogynistic “Willy Went To Westerdale”. “My Johnny Was A Shoemaker” provided Jones with the opportunity to demonstrate her remarkable body percussion skills, and the duo ended with “Early Pearly”, cheerfully described as “a children's begging song from Ripon”. Fabulous!