Perhaps; but our folk music here in the U.S. has been political, topical, AND sentimental ever since the first lyrics to "Yankee Doodle" were penned. The themes that are sounding in the back of my mind just now are "We Shall Overcome", "This Land Is Your Land", "Oh. Freedom!", "The Universal Soldier", "Lay Down My Sword and Shield", and many others. All of these reflect the core concern of plain people addressing their nature as groups and communities, and the politics is a natural extensionn of that.

As for the UK's folk music being non-political in nature, I think it could be argued that "Lili Bulera", "Kevin Barry", and "The Campbells Are Coming", to name just a few quick items, are very much evidence to the contrary.

It would be a sorry thing indeed to see the amorphous and dynamic term "folk music" being pinned down like a dead butterfly to the narrow boundaries of love, horses, individual passions, trains, ships and bank-robbery. Woodie would be spinning in his grave.


A