INGLETON’S between Darlington and Staindrop, its village hall decked last Saturday evening with the flags of France.

There are to be French songs and French food, maison Morrison’s. A French journalist might call this a tricolor piece, a town twinner might suppose it Fringleton.

The star is Angela Arundel, who teaches French and German at primary schools in Ingleton, Gainford and Staindrop and sings beautifully, too. “French teachers never looked like that when I was at school,” says Neville Kirby, the compere, not unreasonably.

Piaf the action, Angela sings everything from Je Ne Regrette Rien to Les Moulins de Mon Coeur, which translates (apparently) as the Windmills of Your Mind.

She also sings Les Bicyclettes de Belsize which, until Saturday night at Ingleton village hall, I’d always assumed to be Les Bicyclettes de Versailles, but which proves to be the theme song from a 1968 film in which a bloke’s riding round Hampstead on his bike, crashes into a billboard and falls in love with the bird on the poster.

Angela, mum of three, says afterwards that music is her passion and teaching her love. “Teaching French should be fun, especially in primary schools. We get brilliant support from Durham County Council to make it possible.”

She’s accompanied, accomplished, by the Dalesiders Folk Band, Neville’s gang. A thoroughly enjoyable evening raises £504 for village hall funds. Très bien, or what?

WE’RE sitting with Tony Hutchinson, known universally as Hutch, who himself plays in a Seventies rock band called Burnt Houses. Burnt Houses is a one-horse hamlet above Raby Castle; thereby hangs another tale.

John Battye, another member – pressingly known as Bench, he was a champion weight lifter – has a lovely, lively little daughter called Nikita, just four when in September 2009 she was critically injured when kicked by a horse. They carried her across the fields to the family home in Butterknowle, anaesthetised her on the kitchen table, flew her to hospital.

Convinced that but for the Great North Air Ambulance their daughter would be dead, John and his family determined to raise funds for that charity and for others.

Burnt Houses is really about burning bridges, about new life, about starting afresh. Hutch and Bench are joined in the band by drummer John Wilkinson from Hamsterley, by 15-year-old keyboard player Jack Robinson from Butterknowle and by Dave Heppell. Dave’s the singer.

“We’d been going several months before we realised none of us could sing,” says Hutch. “Dave has a dry cleaning business in Crook.”

Whatever the French might call it, the Romans would suppose that a non-sequitur.

Chiefly they play the village halls of Teesdale and beyond, organising their own support, disco and catering – that’s Christine Hutchinson’s end – fundraising for the air ambulance and for the Chyrelle Addams Breast Cancer Trust, so successfully promoted by a remarkable lass from Willington.

In September, however, they’re supporting Eighties stars Dr Feelgood at The Sage in Gateshead, and for the same causes.

In July, back at Butterknowle village hall, they present their own Burnt Houses awards to 15 village halls in the area.

“We might be ageing rockers, but at least it gives us a chance to go out and do a bit of good at the same time,” says John.

Supported by Robson Field, a Shadows tribute, Burnt Houses will be at Staindrop village hall this Saturday – tickets £5, concessions £2 50.

They’re at Middleton-in-Teesdale village hall on March 26.

A POSTER describes Fringleton as “International Village of Culture.”

So it seems. On Wednesday March 23 (7.30pm) the village hall will be the only County Durham venue for Ro:Toro, an Estonian folk band.

“They’re wonderful musicians,”

says Neville Kirby. Tickets are £6, £3 concessions, on 01325-730250.

AFINAL musical note, another charity event. Direct from the Royal Albert Hall – well, pretty directly, anyway – Bruce Foxton plays Shildon Civic Hall, on March 31.

Foxton was with The Jam when they had four No 1 hit singles between 1979 and 1982. “This is the most prestigious thing I’ve ever done. They were as big as Slade and the Beatles at the time,” says promoter Paul Evans.

The evening will raise funds for the MacMillan Cancer Foundation, Foxton’s band – From the Jam – supported by Circuit 68 and The Silence.

Tickets are £20, available from the venue between 9am-noon or by post, cheques made payable to Shildon Town Council, from the Civic Hall, Shildon, Co Durham, DL4 1AH.