Sing a sweet melody

After a late night watching nightjars I had an early start today. Due to hitting our first half target at work the powers that be had given us the afternoon off. I did a swap and took the morning off as I had some calls to make in the afternoon. Even so, early was still only about 7am as I headed off up the M40. The target this time was the midlands to near a reserve called Marsh Lane. I went here in 2013 for a dusky warbler but today was a long staying melodious warbler.
The bird had been there for a few weeks already and was a male in full song. The last one I've seen was at Portland 5 years ago, and that was a very brief view. With light traffic I go there about 8.45 and it was only a short walk down a bridleway to the "corner of the recycling area". This basically meant a tip where there were lots of bulldozers!!
From about 100 yards away though I could hear it singing. This must be a very frustrated bird. They are pretty much annual in the UK but have never bred and are pretty rare. So, even though it was singing constantly for the 3 hours I was there, and has been doing that for weeks, the chance of it finding a Mrs Melodious is pretty slim. Another birder was already there with a big lens pointing at the bush, Paul Coombes and we spent a very pleasant morning watching the bird and chatting.
Superficially it is like a chiffchaff, but is larger and has much brighter plumage as well as a characteristic large dark eye, plus other subtler differences.

Most of the time it was lurking around in the bush, so although you could hear it your views were minimal. At least it limited itself to one bush though so we could camp out in front of it.
Occasionally, once every 15 minutes perhaps it would either come out into the open or, more probably, its random movements took into our view. Then you could get to see it a lot better.

It has a much more yellow plumage than other similar warblers, although not as much as,say a wood warbler. It's beak is a whopper though and when it turned towards us you could see the bright orange colouration inside.
All the time it was singing. The call it amazing. Initially it was thought to be a marsh warbler, another bird with a varied repertoire but a view quickly dispelled that thought. It did seem to have many different other birds it was mimicking though. I got blackbird alarm call, goldfinch, linnet, what sounded a kestrel whicker and a few others mixed in.
A few other birders came and went, including one gentleman who apparently is on 565 for his life list and this was only his second melody!!
As the heat built it gradually became more elusive but did favour one or two perches to keep us interested.

  Occasionally a pair of linnets would pop into the bush, although the melody seemed quite territorial and chased them off his territory.

With it getting quite hot and other things to do we decided to pack it in but the melody kept teasing us. First it flitted behind us into a lone tree where it sat out briefly, although this was almost

into the light so not great for photos but probably our clearest view.
Then to add insult to injury as we both had our cameras put away it came and sat out in clear view on the gorse in front of us. Still no complaining. A great bird, with great views and good company. What more can you want!