Jim Eldon Appreciation Society

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 17 Nov 08 - 10:17 AM

I'm speechless! There I was dreading Christmas and now my heart is brimful of festive anticipation!

This is a work of rare genius; long have I cherished the cassette Jim issued of the Billy Harrison recordings, but this takes it onto another level altogether. How might I beg Jim's permission to sing this myself? And might we ever hope for a festive collection?

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: GUEST,Corona Smith
Date: 17 Nov 08 - 10:03 AM

New youtube video of Jim Eldon performing a tune he learned from Billy Harrison who described it as a Carol. Jim has added lyrics paraphrased from the St. Matthew Gospel.

Watch it here

Seasons Greetings!

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: r.padgett
Date: 15 Nov 08 - 03:01 AM

Regarding the Anglos I now have 2 from Marcus Music in Wales and use them to play tunes!

Ray

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 14 Nov 08 - 03:08 PM

Always thought beards were compulsory in our line of work. I was born with mine,.... I think!

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Surreysinger
Date: 14 Nov 08 - 06:44 AM

What - the Anglos department?? Must have a look.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: r.padgett
Date: 14 Nov 08 - 03:55 AM

Very funny SKG, but perfectly true!!

I appear to have suddenly become rather white in that department

Ray

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 13 Nov 08 - 06:11 PM

Spleen,
Sorry to disappoint but Raymond is now beardless. Watch out, ladies!
He's also sporting a pair of lovely anglos.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: GUEST,Surreysinger at work
Date: 13 Nov 08 - 11:45 AM

Ok - you're Ishmael....

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 13 Nov 08 - 09:45 AM

Call me... Ishmael!

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: GUEST,Surreysinger at work
Date: 13 Nov 08 - 09:29 AM

Aha, Mr Beard (or may I call you Insane?) - that link now works... but it certainly didn't last night... thanks for providing it!

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Spleen Cringe
Date: 13 Nov 08 - 04:17 AM

Thanks to the Yorkshire Garland link ,I can now see that Brother Gardham and Brother Padgett between them sport a mighty fine brace of (insane) beards. Sirs, can I be the first to salute your facial pompadours?

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: r.padgett
Date: 13 Nov 08 - 04:04 AM

O goody goody!!

Steve need a photo of the "monkey up the stick" save to hard drive as jpeg and simply send as attachment by email to whoever wants it!

Ray

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 13 Nov 08 - 03:48 AM

Works fine for me; try This for the Yorkshire Garland site and browse around! Lots of wonders therein, excellent links & four songs by Jim...

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Surreysinger
Date: 12 Nov 08 - 09:12 PM

Sorry ... that should have read Mr Beard ... don't know what happened there!!!

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Surreysinger
Date: 12 Nov 08 - 09:04 PM

Errmm... Steve ... that link to the Yorkshire Garland site doesn't work properly...

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 04 Nov 08 - 02:37 PM

What's a photo-link? I can take a photo, upload it into my pictures then send it as an attachment if that's any good.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 04 Nov 08 - 06:43 AM

Thanks for the heads up, Steve - here's a link to Jim's bits:

Jim Eldon Songs on the Yorkshire Garland

And the rest of it's impressive too! Well worth losing yourself in for a day or two...

Any chance of a photo-link for the flute playing spider and the monkey up a stick?

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: r.padgett
Date: 04 Nov 08 - 04:15 AM

Jim is also known for his "monkey up a stick" and similar hand crafted wooden "toys" that he fashioned and sold as and when he felted the need ~ for a bob or two!

Ray

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 04:30 PM

For any of Jim's fans not in Yorkshire 4 of Jim's Yorkshire songs can be heard for free at www.yorkshirefolksong.net which is the Yorkshire Garland Website. 'Thunderin' sort of a Lie', 'The Lady of York', 'Oh what a windy night!'The Beverley Maid and the Tinker'. Also some of the songs we recorded together in the East Riding are in there. The 4 recordings are live recordings from our Launch day concert at York. Jim is one of our county treasures and the website wouldn't have been the same without some recordings of him.
Some of Jim's songs and ballads from the sixties are among my great favourites, particularly the supernatural ballads.
One of my lads' favourite toys was a flute playing spider made out of leather with a hat on rather like Jim's made by Lynette for them. It sits on the shelf in pride of place.
He is definitely one of the great characters of the folk scene.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Vic Smith
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 02:24 PM

Jim & Lynette are appearing at Folk at the Royal Oak in Lewes on March 12th 2009

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: r.padgett
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 12:32 PM

Jim is to appear at Barnsley folk club on Jan 19th 2009

Ray

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 07:39 AM

Just past Hallowe'en, and almost Bonfire Night, the Dark Season as I've always thought of it, November - The Month of Blood and Bonfires - just the time for braw pies, puddings, mischief and other such eldritch carousings and, of course, some appropriate music along the way: Jim Eldon - Til the Following Night, which is linked to above, but for those who missed it...

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 05:35 PM

Trumpet Hornpipe of course; just testing, ahem...

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Folkiedave
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 01:23 PM

Great lad Jim.

Cannot praise him highly enough.

As for "rough music" a band called "Life and TImes" have a CD called Charivari and there is a track on there called "Rough Music".

I played it on my radio show as a tribute to Matthew Parris.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 11:12 AM

Saw him once at Whitby absolutely priceless. He sang the strangest collection of songs I have heard in a longtime

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: greg stephens
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 10:35 AM

Nice video. But it was the TRumpet Hornpipe I think, not the Sailor's.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 08:12 AM

About time this was refreshed.

Just found this on YouTube; Jim playing Candlelight Fisherman & The Sailor's Hornpipe onboard the Yorkshire Belle!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSaF5CMXYbA

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: the button
Date: 21 Dec 07 - 10:05 AM

Ah yes -- he also wrote the melody for "Jenny Storm" on True Hearted Girl.

I've just got the Mike Waterson album on CD to replace my old vinyl, so I'm listening to it almost every day at the moment.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 Dec 07 - 07:45 AM

He does at that; it was 'A True Hearted Girl' I was thinking of, on which he plays flute and whistle. I saw him once using his whistle as a prop in an old sailor's story, threading it with string & conjuring forth a complex pattern of knots...

A few storytelling threads going on right now; any feelings on Jim as a Storyteller?

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: the button
Date: 21 Dec 07 - 05:48 AM

Jim appears as a chorus singer on The Light Dragoon & Lass of Swansea Town on Mike Waterson's solo album, IIRC.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 Dec 07 - 04:39 AM

Thanks for the link, Matthew - I love those old recordings Jim made with Billy Harrison; essential Christmas listening too, so it's nice to have a bit more background.

Rough Fiddle isn't quite the same thing as Rough Music, though the one doesn't preclude the other - and one might at least ponder just how much of Jim has rubbed off on Eliza over the years. He was on one of the old Watersons albums wasn't he? Though not on fiddle if I remember right.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Matthew Edwards
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 06:49 PM

Sedayne - thanks for starting this thread which I've found well worth following in spite of some of the shallowness of the responses to Jim Eldon's craftmanship. I really like what Jim does with his music and if you want to read where he gained some of his inspiration do read his article on Billy Harrison - Yorkshire Wolds Fiddler on the Musical Traditions website.

So far as I know you are the first person to make any connection between the Holy Modal Rounders/Michael Hurley and Jim Eldon, though I'm not sure where such things might lead, but a Bridlington Fiddler version of The Hog of the Forsaken could be exactly what the world needs right now.

Or perhaps not...yet.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: GUEST,old git
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 06:24 PM

I'm waiting for my pools win

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 04:23 PM

Skimmington Rides were a West Country thing, as described in Thomas Hardy novels.
Rough Music is specifically northern.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Rasener
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 04:11 PM

Ah the good old Black Country.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: The Sandman
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 04:10 PM

This is what Eliza Carthy says in the notes to Rough Music:

"Rough Music is in the Book of Days on October 28th and is described as a form of community punishment practiced all over England. If a man were seen to be (say) beating his wife, or 'allowing himself to be hen-pecked' it says here, he could expect to receive a concert of Rough Music. Basically if they thought you had been naughty (it doesn't say how or if they proved this) all the men, women and children of the village would go round to your house in the middle of the night, call out your name and proceed to bang pots, pans, tin lids and buckets or whatever came to hand, to bring your crimes to attention and drive you out. When my family moved to North Yorkshire at the beginning of the seventies there was a case of a man being driven from our area by this method. However, we've tried to make the album a bit nicer than that.
sounds like another custom called Skimmington Rides.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 04:08 PM

Yes, Bill Caddick did record an LP with that title.
That would be Black Country rough, as opposed to Yorkshire . . .

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Rasener
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 04:04 PM

So Jim's rough fiddle is meant to drive you out?

Out of what - The folk club?

:-)

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Leadfingers
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 03:50 PM

And dont forget that Bill Cadick had an Album of the same name out in 1976 with some lovely songs on it !

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 02:44 PM

This is what Eliza Carthy says in the notes to Rough Music:

"Rough Music is in the Book of Days on October 28th and is described as a form of community punishment practiced all over England. If a man were seen to be (say) beating his wife, or 'allowing himself to be hen-pecked' it says here, he could expect to receive a concert of Rough Music. Basically if they thought you had been naughty (it doesn't say how or if they proved this) all the men, women and children of the village would go round to your house in the middle of the night, call out your name and proceed to bang pots, pans, tin lids and buckets or whatever came to hand, to bring your crimes to attention and drive you out. When my family moved to North Yorkshire at the beginning of the seventies there was a case of a man being driven from our area by this method. However, we've tried to make the album a bit nicer than that."

Rough Music

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Rasener
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 01:24 PM

You been sitting there all day waiting for that LF LOL

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Rasener
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 01:23 PM

He learn't it

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Leadfingers
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 01:23 PM

100

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 01:21 PM

In spite of the obligatory vitriol that some of our posters do so well,
I think this is a very interesting thread.
As a card carrying member of the old time music community in the states "scratchy fiddling" immediately caught my attention.

Questions:
Where does Jim Eldon's fiddling come from?
Is he part of a fiddling tradition?
Did he make it up himself?

Thanks

Russ (Permanent GUEST)

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: GUEST,I Am Agency (not at work obviously)
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 01:15 PM

Jim calls it "rough"

As any fule kno, "rough music" refers to a specific northern music style.
Eliza Carthy & The Ratcatchers have an entire CD devoted to it.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Rasener
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 12:43 PM

>>'Til the Following Night<<

That fiddle playing is what I meant.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 11:20 AM

...that should, of course, be Raw-heads... The quote, incidently, comes from a wee booklet entitled 'Christmas Entertainments 1740', which also includes the following:

"And so far for Enchantment, which some old Women first set on foot to amuse Children, and is now finished by the Author, with no other view but to assure his Readers, that Enchantment proceeds from nothing but the Chit-Chat of an old Nurse, or the Maggots in a Madman's Brain."

I say again, Joy to the World.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 11:10 AM

There's a Jim montage on YouTube with a belting cover of the Screaming Lord Sutch classic 'Til the Following Night:

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=uWg048H_ssU

That's some fine, very fine, fiddle playing; and just what we need for the season too: "...Abundance of Fiddle-Faddle Stuff, Raw-hads, Bloody-bones, Buggybows and such (Sutch?) like Horrible Bodies..."

Joy to the World!

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 20 Dec 07 - 04:34 AM

Regarding our hero's alleged computer illiteracy - who does the Myspace site? (Link given above, but here it is again for the sake of convenience to the curious : Jim Eldon Band - Myspace )

Listening to the wonderful 'Old Johnny Walker' (on the Myspace site) I'm put in mind of the fiddle playing heard in the Holy Modal Rounders / Pete Stampfel / Michael 'Snock' Hurley school of things, of which there is ample traditional provenance of course (for a choice Hurley classic : Hog of the Forsaken - now there's song I'd like to hear Jim cover!)

In these days of increasing blandless in all things, with muso slickness exalted at every turn, Jim's rough fiddle is a veritable salve to the senses to be sure.

Subject: RE: Jim Eldon Appreciation Society
From: Rasener
Date: 19 Dec 07 - 03:03 PM

Interesting Old Git :-)