THIS was an offbeat gig, aptly off the beaten track, with a girl called Alessi Laurent-Marke and alas no ark. Her friend Rachael Dadd was there, however, just as they had been in tandem at City Screen in York in February.

Present too was Ichi, the avant-garde Japanese musician with whom Rachael has latterly tied her hand in marriage, and The Hand, an “extraordinary world/folk duo” with one of those bulbous kora instruments from West Africa.

“We were looking for a dream double bill but got a quadruple one instead,” joked promoter Nigel Burnham before the gentle chaos of Friday’s ever-so-relaxed concert.

The night’s erratic flow was more in keeping with the impromptu spirit of a folk open session, certainly in the overlapping contributions of Rachael Dadd, the glue that bonded the contributions.

Ichi by name was itchy by nature, arriving on stilts, brandishing an oversized moustache and restlessly switching instruments and styles in the manner of a talent-show novelty act, one minute exploring the percussive possibilities of a typewriter, the next improvising jazz by releasing air from an inflated balloon through the mouthpiece of a cornet.

Young folkie Alessi played solo, accompanying her “cosmic madrigals” on acoustic guitar, inviting the audience to choose next between robots, time travel or a bird song, no sooner had she sung The Chicken Song. If that sounds twee, she wasn’t; free-spirited and natural, yes, but not twee.

To finish, Dadd and Ichi, by now attached to a steel drum, returned to assist Alessi fulfil The Band Room’s convention, a Dylan cover, feeling their way their way through a hastily learnt You Ain’t Going Nowhere as lovely as the evening sun.