PICTURE the scene. It is Christmas time, spirits are high and people want to sing.

But the church does not approve of your weird and wonderful variations of carols and kicks you out for being too exuberant. So where do you go next? The pub, of course.

This actually happened during the Victorian days in south Yorkshire and more than 200 years later the tradition continues. From late November to New Year’s Day, on Sunday lunchtimes, families flock to their pubs to sing and be merry.

The custom has been a part of Kate Rusby’s life since she was a child as her parents used to take her for a singalong every year.

The folk singer-songwriter said: “I was taken along to these sings from an early age, and along with my siblings we’d sit in the tap-room with the other kids colouring and eating crisps, while all along the songs were seeping into our brains.

“My favourite is a pub called The Royal in the little village of Dungworth, it was the main one I was taken to. Some of them have a piano in the corner leading the singing and some have a brass band tootling away in the corner. It’s always the start of Christmas for me.

“These songs were thrown out of the churches by the Victorians, but the people who loved singing them took them to the pubs instead, where they could combine a good old sing song with beer and a catch up with friends, and there the songs have remained.

“They have been passed on down the generations and still thrive there. It’s not a folkie thing or a religious thing, just people from all walks of life, young and old, gathering on a weekend to catch up and sing at the top of their voices.

It truly is a thing to behold, all those voices crammed together in a room singing, the happiness spills out of the place.”

Those memories are what inspired Kate’s Christmas shows which are quite different to her concerts at other times of the year. She is performing at Parr Hall on Friday, December 16.

The 42-year-old said: “As I was touring around the country for years I realised that other areas of the country had never heard these songs so I decided to get my band together, joined by a brass quintet, and we took these songs around the country to share them. There are more than 30 versions of While Shepherds Watched sung in pubs, all with different tunes and choruses, they’re so happy and jolly.

“So the songs themselves make our Christmas gig different to most others. I adore Christmas and I adore these songs so combining the two is just perfect. We have been doing the Christmas tour for about 10 years now so we go back to towns around the country, it’s something that fills my heart with joy when we strike up a song from my little part of the world and people who live hundreds of miles away are singing them with us.”

The downside of touring right up until Christmas though is missing out on another part of the festive season – spending time with family and friends.

Kate added: “We are actually missing our daughters’ Christmas school play this year which I’m really sad about, as one of them is playing Mary and has a solo song to sing. But I’ll just have to be tough. My dad is taking his video camera to film it so that’ll have to do.”

Kate was born into a family where music was part of everyday life but she did not think she would end up as a professional musician.

The BBC 2 Folk Award winner said: “My parents both play and sing, mum plays the piano accordion and my dad plays string instruments like banjo, mandolin and guitar. They actually met through music at the folk clubs too. They had a ceilidh band when we were young which my sister and I joined when we were old enough.

“I have an older sister Emma and a younger brother Joe, we all started playing the fiddle when were about five or six. My dad taught me a few chords on the guitar and I would sit for hours working out songs, I taught myself to accompany songs on the piano too.

“My parents found early on that if they sung to us and taught us songs while we were in the car it stopped us from arguing amongst ourselves, so we were singing harmonies before we even knew what the word meant.

“We were taken along to a lot of festivals through summer as back then my dad was a sound engineer at a great deal of them so again, we were surrounded by music and gigs, of course we thought this was normal. I never thought I would end up being a singer though. I remember all my friends deciding on GCSE subjects and I was walking about thinking: ‘How do they all know what they are going to do in life?’

“I went to performing arts college in Barnsley called the Electric Theatre to do drama but I wasn’t great at it. Then when I was about 15 or 16 a friend, who ran a festival in Holmfirth, was visiting my parents’ house. I was in the garage playing the piano and singing away and she stuck her head in the door and asked if I wanted to play at the festival.

“My mouth said yes as my brain was screaming no. I did it and vowed I would never again because it was the most frightening thing I’d ever done, but someone else came up after my spot and asked if I wanted to do a bit at their festival, again my mouth accepted, and on it went from there.

“I think it was fate. I believe it found me rather than the other way around!”