Nice one Don.
Nerd
Yup - straight out of the swinging sixties - couldn't believe it.

97 verse ballads:
MacColl told us that in the early days of 'The Ballads and Blues' club, he used to split the long ballads in half; part in the first half of the evening, the rest in the second (he mentioned Gil Morris as an example).
It was only after a number of complaints by audience members that he eventually sang them right through.
Finger-in-ear:
One of the Irish Traveller singers we recorded, Mikeen McCarthy, from Cahersiveen in Kerry, was a ballad seller in his youth, hawking song sheets around the fairs and markets of Kerry in the 1940s. He used the technique when he sold on the street, but he said he had first been taught it by his father, who would sing "in the bar with one hand over his ear - just like Ewan MacColl".
Interestingly (to me anyway), Mikeen made clear distinctions between 'street singing', 'pub singing' and more intimate 'fireside singing' styles.
One day there'll be a book on Mikeen.... if we live long enough.
Jim Carroll