The Single Malt & Song Society

Origins

Whisky and song and good company.  What a combination.  Mostly, it is the last of the three that really does it, but the first two provide the setting.  This isn't at all what I expected when SMSS first met; it's far better and more enduring than any of us could have hoped for.

In May of 2002 a small group of us somehow, against all odds, managed to have a conversation in the George Dilboy Post VFW hall (Davis Square, Somerville) during a session of the New England Real Ale Exhibition.  Anyone who has attended a NERAX session will understand why this is noteworthy; the hall is small, very crowded, and extremely noisy.  Somehow the conversation turned from the delicious ale were were all sampling to whisky.  Specifically, to Scottish single malt whisky.  I had been introduced to Lagavulin while living in Chicago, and was very interested in learning more about single malts, but they were (and remain) far too expensive for me to go out and buy all the bottles I wanted to taste.  Chicago had one or two bars with enough single malts available to warrant whisky menus, but they poured larger glasses than I wanted for tasting many different malts while remaining sober, and charged accordingly.  One obvious solution was to go to such a place in a group and share glasses, but somehow this had never happened in Chicago.  During that unlikely conversation in Davis Square we came up with another idea; if we each were to buy one bottle then we could get together and taste all of them.  And we would enjoy some singing while we were there as well.  I volunteered Angela and I to host, and soon sent out email invitations including the following:

The concept: Let's lounge around on a Saturday night sampling different single malts and singing songs.  Please note that I have only a small selection of whiskies, so this will be much more fun if people bring some along so we have more variety.  So consider it a sort of BYOSM (Bring Your Own Single Malt).  Feel free to bring along musical instruments to augment the singing.

That May 18th we gathered around a dining room table in Somerville.  Over the course of the evening, night, and some of the following morning, this group drank single malt whisky and sang songs, and the Single Malt and Song Society was born.

Since that night we have enjoyed many fine bottles of whisky, many fine songs, and much fine company.  The whisky has come from all over Scotland (with bottles from Ireland occasionally sneaking in), but the songs have come from everywhere.  We have sung folk songs from various lands in various languages, we have sung chanties, we have sung parodies, we have sung show tunes, we have even sung commercial jingles.

In May 2005 we celebrated three years of SMSS with our 25th gathering, and the celebrations continue.  May we continue enjoying them for a very long time to come.

Jeremy H. Kessler
     Somerville, Massachusetts
     April 2004 (updated May 2005)