Does it matter what music is called?

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: glueman
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 09:25 AM

1954 definitions are held so dearly because they support the illusion that the tradition is under threat. If you want to make something precious beyond its normal currency tell people its under attack. They'll rush to support it in a way that suggesting folk's simply been ignored and drifted from popularity would never do.

If it was under threat, the horse had already bolted; the fox was shot by 1954. There is enough 'hard copy' of traditional music and recording available that it will never disappear so that leaves the idea that folk music is a cultural-historical artefact that should be foisted upon school children and others in a similar way to industrial archeology, a separate sealed diegesis about the old days divorced from context.

What appears to have happened is the core concerns of folk - acoustic music of intimate scale about disenfranchisement and/or locality - has survived in rude good health free of the distraction of attribution and academic formuli.
My taste doesn't run to Dylan or Simon and Garfunkel (or even Steeleye Span come to that) and I wouldn't visit places that included their songs as 'folk' but their music is more widely spoken of as such than that defined by 1954 advocates.
A new word, or words would be handy but the onus is now on traditionalists to prove committee defined nomenclature under the weight of popular assimilation.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Peace
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 09:10 AM

I agree with Dick.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 09:07 AM

It's not a mater of return to 1954. It's not a matter of exclusion. It's simply that some of us, who have preferences (or limited time and means), would like to see a meaningful label for a bin of recordings (most "folk" is now filed under "pop-rock" ), and a rough guide as to what to expect when considering attending an event featuring someone we haven't heard before.

If you don't like "folk" as such a label, can we come up with another one? "Traditional" is well on its way to meaninglessness.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: theleveller
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 09:06 AM

"I would never call myself a folksinger"

Ah, Peace, but would you call yourself a folk-singer?

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Nick
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 08:52 AM

I always thought the quote attributed to Duke Ellington (though it's attributed to lots of others too) was:

"There's two kinds of music: good and bad. I like both."

Being very lazy and not knowing the history of all this but when did this problem start?

If people keep looking back 54 years to a definition I wonder why someone felt they had to define it THEN? Perhaps someone could explain. You only try and define things that have existed for a long time when you have a problem and folk music predates 1954 (by defintion!!) - for example compare measurements which were non standard for a long time (my cubit's not your cubit) and needed standardising at a time when precision became relevant and important.

Presumably in 1954 it was felt that the situation was already out of hand and needed sorting out.

What was the problem THEN and when did the problem start?

Why are people constantly trying to return to 1954 when there was already a problem?

Why did everyone ignore it between 1954 and say mid 1970s and include all these other non-folk stuff under the folk umbrella? By then my idea of folk had already been corrupted. I don't think that Seth Lakeman - like him or not - is really the problem

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Peace
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 08:47 AM

That's closer to something I'd like to see, leveller. I have never been a folksinger. I've done a few folk songs, but they appealed to me and I arranged a few to suit sets I did. Today, I'm just another singer-songwriter whose influences include but are not limited to people like Tom Paxton, Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger, Joni Mitchell, Kingston Trio, Mitchell Trio, Lonnie Johnson, Joan Baez, Kytrad, Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem, PP and M, Pat Sky, Stan Rogers, Dave Edmunds, The Kinks, JS Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Dave Brubeck Quartet, Glenn Miller, Miles Davis, The Double Six of Paris, Bikel, Mary Chapin Carpenter, The Dixie Chicks, Shania Twain, Richie Havens, Country Joe, The Incredible String Band, Bill Garrett, Noah Zacharin, Ron Bankley, The Ville Emard Blues Band, Bill Staines, Maddy Prior, Steeleye, Whittle, Papavgeris, Moorhouse, McKeever--dang. I could go on for another five hundred people I've listened to closely to learn techniques, phrasings, etc.

For me, music is not about categories--and I think it isn't to most folks. But the traditionalists have a good point. Whether the 1954 declaration still holds true is really beyond my scope/knowledge. There are people on this site who talk and I listen. Malcolm Douglas, Q, Azizi, Jim Dixon, Jack Campin, Kytrad, Nerd. They are serious researchers/scholars in their chosen areas of expertise. There are wonderful areas of music that MUST be preserved, imo, and they in their ways cause that to happen. I would never call myself a folksinger. I'm not. I neither put myself in that category (nor do I wish to be spoken of as if I belonged in that category).

The world of music does not start or stop with the UK. But the people doing collecting and preserving of folk songs are entitled to the same respect we would give other serious experts in fields of study. Whether I agree with their conclusions to do with Seth Lakeman is another matter. I like the guy's work. I've listened numerous times to him and I like his work.

I would love to go to some trad clubs in England/Scotland/Ireland and be part of the audience. I would also love to go to a performance by Lakeman. I simply like to listen to people who are good at what they do. We are all of us composites of our influences. I doubt that will ever change. I hope not, anyway.

Best wishes to all of you.

BM

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: theleveller
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 08:23 AM

Oh, and, of course, what-the-folk.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 08:22 AM

Interesting credit on the song playing when you open Tom's site.

I'm not clear precisely what on his site is deemed a "smart approach" - but if it's offering a choice of a singer-songwriter set or a folk set, I think Travelling Charles Fyson used to dotaht, and indeed go one stage further by offering US folk/county or English folk as options as well as singer-songwriter.

So maybe it's a trad of folk solution to the problem.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 08:01 AM

Folk-off?

:D

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: theleveller
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 07:33 AM

Right, I think I may have come up with the answer - two types of folk music: Traditional Folk and Hyphen Folk (as in folk-based, folk-style, folk-inspired, folk-orientated etc.). Anyone buy that?

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: glueman
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:55 AM

I like the way Tom's thumb creeps round the E string too. If guitars were made to be pinnioned with a thumb they'd a) have a slot in the back, b) be made of a matt material, c) wouldn't have a convex neck. Seems like a pragmatist all round.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: GUEST,Peace
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:43 AM

That guest was me.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: GUEST
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:42 AM

Worth reading what Tom Bliss has done. VERY smart approach.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Peace
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:34 AM

Either either, neither neither.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: theleveller
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:32 AM

You say 'tomatoes' and I say 'tomatoes'. What's the last line....?

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:23 AM

: What this thread has done is prove the original argument: that any definition of 'folk' is ...
:"sod all use to man nor beast".

The original message was a lot more general than that. Sure, "folk" in the English-speaking world is too fucked up to be any use any more. So people reinvent new terms to do what it can't: the singer-songwriters use "acoustic" to exclude traditional tunes and ballads, people who do those describe theor act as "traditional".

The people with the largest problem and the most refined solution to it are the pop and rock performers. Look at the "want to form a band" ads in any music shop and you see cards with lists of "influences". The effect of that is that the advertiser is defining their own subgenre in an extremely precise way, which they need to do because they have a LOT of subgenres. And if the ad lists Velvet Underground and The Pixies, you are *not* going to persuade them you'll be a useful addition by saying you used to be in a Fairport covers band and "there are only two kinds of music, good and bad" (bleurgh).

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: theleveller
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:21 AM

By POX, I assume you're referring to Preternatural Oral Xenophobia or the irrational fear of foreign folk songs.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Peace
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:13 AM

Too true. But a POX on my Booswoggle? What a great time to discuss 'the pox' in both trad and contemporary song.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: glueman
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 06:06 AM

Bah, Hillsworthy was a nest of liminal hybrids and amplification. Some were passing polyphony off as folk in the pub. There was never a swirly trouser or leather tankard seen in that village. A pox on your Boonswoggle.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Peace
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 05:54 AM

"Does it matter what music is called?"


If it doesn't, then may I suggest Horatio Boonswoggle of Hillsworthy until such time there is a formal selection?

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: glueman
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 05:37 AM

One of the (many) amusing facets of this debate is that those who privilege unattributed transmission of music get their knickers twisted when the common, unidentifiable, word-of-mouth man decides what music shall be called. That it seems, is the work of committees and academics.
Well folk have decided what folk is called and ignored the dead hand of authority - which is perfectly in keeping with its progenesis.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: glueman
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 04:43 AM

It's a 'malevolent falsehood' I'd love to claim Bridgie but I was merely concurring with Rich further up the thread. Like yourself I was applying no original thought to the matter.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Paul Burke
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 04:29 AM

For instance, ask a group of philosophers, a neurologist and a poet to explain 'consciousness' and you'll end up with a brawl.

If you ask folkies* to define folk, do you end up with the Horse's Brawl?




*I originally wrote "folies" there. What about the Folkies Bergere?

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: theleveller
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 03:37 AM

Why can't we just accept that some words and phrases defy definition?

For instance, ask a group of philosophers, a neurologist and a poet to explain 'consciousness' and you'll end up with a brawl.

What this thread has done is prove the original argument: that any definition of 'folk' is ... "sod all use to man nor beast".

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 03:28 AM

Should we have an 'I Can't Believe it's not Folk' category - then people would know what it almost is?

I think that's my point - what we have now is precisely a 'Folk-Only-Not-Quite' or 'Like-Folk-Only-Different' category, but it's called 'folk'. To quote myself from further up, "[Seth Lakeman]'s working in a field ('contemporary folk') which is defined as like-that-other-stuff-only-better; both its opponents and its partisans feel strongly about it by default."

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Nick
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 03:16 AM

What about Hissyfit and Linda Kelly? They seem to be playing a lot of Folk festivals and venues. Again these misguided people who arrange and book these things seem to be getting it terribly wrong.

Are Linda Kelly's songs folk? Northern Tide or Sweet Minerva for example. By those who are stuck with trying to return to a definition that coincidentally is contemporaneous with my birth (perhaps someone did it out of spite when they heard I was on the way) this is not folk. It's unaccompanied; it has structure and content; it is rooted in community and a way of life; it talks of feelings and truths etc etc and it sounds like folk but apparently it isn't.

So if the word 'folk' has a place in explaining what sort of music to expect (or avoid) and is related to the content and the sound of the music how does it help me to know what Hissyfit are like when they are expressly excluded from the definition? Is it a bit like 'I Can't Believe it's not Butter'? Should we have an 'I Can't Believe it's not Folk' category - then people would know what it almost is? What point does it serve?

'Pop' music has changed in meaning over time as many of the types of music that form a subset of the whole did not exist then - though they had their roots back then. Would you have had Oasis without the Beatles or a lot of Indie music without the Sex Pistols?

'Jazz' seems to have managed too and probably is hugely more diverse than any of the other ones.

Surely 'folk' in common parlance is an umbrella term that has a much wider definition than the narrow 1954 one in the same way that 'jazz' is not just a specific southern US style of music as played in the early 20th century (or perhaps it is - oh god another group of purists offended)? Within that umbrella lies that particular genre that a lot of people cherish greatly and would dearly love to reclaim the word so that it refers to what it used to and what they believe it should refer to. The problem is you can't reclaim it because it's gone too far in the public consciousness to get it back. You can't remove the connotations of the word now and cleanse it anymore than the happy, frolicking Elizabethan chaps can have 'gay blade' back again to it's original meaning.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 10 Jul 08 - 02:30 AM

Gigi alleges that "folk" is only ever defined so that material may be excluded from the genre.

A similar spirit seems to lurk in the minds of others.

The oddity of it is that I don't think I have ever heard a '54 definitioner assert that other people should not play or listen to material that was not "folk".

Why do people continue to assert Gigi's malevolent falsehood?

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Don Firth
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 11:45 PM

Question:   the difference between definition and content?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: katlaughing
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 11:35 PM

Bravo, Nick!:-)

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 10:54 PM

Labels only help, they do not define the content. The problem is, people are trying to put the meaning into a singular word like "folk", which cannot be so simply defined. It is also a word that evolves, and meanings change with the times.

People tend to look at labels as a stereotype and become hung up on definition instead of content.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 10:46 PM

No, Ron, but a meaningful label helps.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 09:59 PM

... Maryff, I forgot to add something.

When I looked at your list of artists, I fully understood what EACH one of them represented by the brief, but appropriate, description you gave. Your series truly covers a number of diverse folk traditions, and I can pick and choose what I please.

A simple word like "folk" or even "traditional" is only a starting point. No one should be expected to read the label and know what they are getting by those two words alone.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 09:56 PM

From Richmond Folk Music website -
"Most traditional music enthusiasts would define "traditional" folk music as songs and tunes which have been handed down through several generations, and which have no known author. This is what sets traditional music apart from "folk" or "acoustic" music, which could include very modern material that may not sound traditional at all. Traditional songs often tell stories and vocals may sometimes be sung unaccompanied. The beauty of traditional music is that it has been honed over the years by countless singers and musicians, all of whom have left their mark on the song or tune. "

I'm sorry, but your definition tells me ver little about what to expect. From the standpoint of a person who is going to decide to buy a CD or attend a festival, your description tells me very little. It is the same with using the words "opera" or "rap" - it says very little about what the music is - unless you have a stereotype in your mind about what the music is.   Opera and rap are just as diverse as folk.

But that is the whole damn point! You do not need to tell me more! Folk music is not like buying a box of cereal where you need to read the ingredients to find out how much salt, nuts or fiber is contained.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Maryrrf
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 08:29 PM

Well yes it does matter what music is called, from the standpoint of the person who is deciding whether or not they are going to buy a CD, attend a performance, or otherwise go out of their way to listen to it. The term 'folk' can and is very broadly defined by some - if I was told about a folk festival I'd never heard of I'd probably check out the list of performers and the description of the acts and, if it was mostly singer songwriters I probably wouldn't attend. If it looked like there was a strong traditional element, which is what I'd be looking for - I might give it a shot. If it was opera, pop, rap, or some other genre I know I have little or no interest in then I wouldn't even bother to check who the performers were. At least the label 'folk' enables us to narrow things down a bit, although there are subcategories and 'crossover' acts that may have crossed over just a little too far (for my tastes) into some other category such as pop or rock. At the concert series I run I state clearly that it is 'traditional folk' and define what I consider that to be http://www.richmondfolkmusic.com . That way potential performers know what we are looking for (and it is further clarified in the 'Information for Performers" section), and the prospective audience knows what kind of music they can expect.   I do get inquiries from performers who clearly don't fit with the kind of music we present, but I just politely reply that we are looking for traditional folk music, and we specialize in traditional folk because we feel there are so few venues that feature it. That's our 'niche'. There's another concert series in town that mostly features singer songwriters that also bill themselves as 'folk' and that's okay with me.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Nick
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 08:25 PM

What do I do about John Martyn?

First time I saw him was in Leicester put on by the Leicester University FOLK club (who also put on Wizz Jones - Derek Brimstone - John Renbourn - and many others) and he played Spencer the Rover. Now I believe that's Trad and, (perhaps because I was in an educational establishment and they wouldn't get things wrong would they?) I thought he might be a folk musician along with some of the other people I liked at the time.

But apparently none of these people are folk at all. I must write to someone and complain. I reckon it must have confused a lot of people along with me because I've come across people who think that Fairport Convention, Steeleye Span, ISB, Pentangle (jazz band surely? The Cuckoo doesn't go like that), Jansch and Renbourn, Davy Graham and loads of other people had something to do with folk. James Taylor doing the Water is Wide - how dare he take so shamelessly from another genre? Roy Harper (singer songwriter). Dylan. Donovan.

I blame the educators who pulled the wool over my eyes for so long. If I'd only known. My sister who is a few years older than me used to go to well known folk clubs in London in the late 60's onwards and I think she might also have turned my view with all the wrong people that were put on at that time.

These folk people in the 60's and 70's had already gone way off track and have a lot to answer for as they cocked it up for two generations of people. Now seemingly they are looking for someone to blame and it's our fault - or the young musicians - or the people who buy Seth Lakeman CDs - or whoever.

Language does evolve and things change. The acid test used to be the 'man on the Clapham omnibus' and if anyone lives around Clapham or Wandsworth (and isn't in a Starbucks or Wine bar) and still uses public transport perhaps they could ask the man what he thinks.

Because of the definition of folk that I was brought up with (I went to see Judy Collins at the Albert Hall in 1969 and she sang Turn Turn Turn and all sorts of things that I thought were folk music) I haven't really had the angst that many who post here have. I have enough brain (and there is enough computer access) to know how to check out people before I go.

I went to see Jenna Reid recently (wonderful but is she folk music? - it was put on at the Early Music centre in York by the Black Swan Folk club - how misguided and confusing is that); I enjoyed listening to Christine Kydd and Janet Russell singing on a tape I have (I think that is folk music - but they do a version of the Bluebell Polka which has just thrown me again); I have been to our weekly (folk? - it's what people who come choose to label it) gathering and have had a bucket of unaccompanied song, Ewan MacColl song, load of fiddle tunes and then I had to go and cock it up by playing a Tom Waits song (Boden and Spiers got away with it so why not?). And I liked the story in Joe Boyd's book about Taj Mahal, Bob Copper and the Watersons which suggested that most of them have some grasp of what sort of tradition they have hold of.

I am a lover of music trapped inside a wrong definition. I'm going to go and lie down now and see if I can sleep with all this confusion racing through my head.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Peace
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 07:51 PM

OK. Booze I understand.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 07:35 PM

"Ron, what does it matter what it's called? If you enjoy it, drink it. "

That is exactly my point!   Words I live by!!!

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Don Firth
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 07:27 PM

I have a substantial library of books such as Carl Sandburg's American Songbag, Folk Song U. S. A., by John and Alan Lomax, English Folk Songs in the Southern Appalachians, by Cecil J. Sharp, The Ballad Tree, by Evelyn Kandrick Wells, and a couple dozen others along this line. I also have a large collection of recordings of many of the songs in these books, variations thereof, and other songs like them. When I hear someone use the words "folk song," I immediately think of the kind of songs I find in these books and on these records.

I discovered that a young woman who lives upstairs in this apartment building has just released a CD. She and I got together and we chatted some. She doesn't say that she regards herself to be a folk singer, but she writes her own songs and, for want of a specific category, I believe she considers them to be folk songs. She told me she learned all about folk music from a friend of hers who also writes his own songs and has some of his songs on MySpace. I listened to him. The only resemblance he has to what I might think of as a "folk singer" is that he accompanies himself on an acoustic guitar. I don't think either of them have ever heard the names "Lomax," "Sharp," or "Child."

In the spirit of "support your local musician," I bought a copy of Melissa's CD from her. The songs on it are quite interesting and certainly a very worthy effort. She has a way with words and she puts her words to distinct melodies (as contrasted with the three or four generic tunes that most singer-songwriters seem to employ). And she has a very nice singing voice.   She doesn't play guitar or anything, she just sings, and someone else accompanies her on the CD—guitar, drums, and bass. Her songs are somewhat different from the usual singer-songwriter fare. One song in particular on her CD is a bit of a gripper!

I would not, however, regard the songs she and her friend have written as "folk songs" because 1) all their songs have been written within the last couple of years, and 2) they are the only "folks" who sing them. I guess I'm just weird that way. . . .

She's a very nice young woman, and I'm not going to argue the point with her. But—I may try to slowly and gradually educate her over a period of time.

Don Firth

P. S. I do think words should have meanings. Otherwise, we're back to grunting and pointing.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Stringsinger
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 07:03 PM

It matters only for purposes of identification. That way a person can select the music according to taste.

There are, however, musical values that apply. These have to do with musicianship,
theory, construction, counterpoint etc.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 06:57 PM

Whilst recognizing that we couldn't exist without definitions, someone has already posted that the language is evolving all the time, and therefore definitions are also changing all the time, some words, e.g., ballad, going around in circles and from one extreme to another. Whilst institutions nowadays are largely responsible for proposing new meanings (definitions) it's the 'people' who decide/accept/reject these meanings. Lexicographers merely collect these meanings (yes and they perpetuaute them by publishing them). With 'folk' the people have spoken and they obviously like the wider meaning, so no amount of whingeing on these threads is going to make a hapoth of difference to that!!

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 06:42 PM

I don't think that even middle of the road pop can be definitive. We have heard Mr Lakeman categorised as such. Righty or wrongly is irrelevent. There is the rap style of Emimem which the real rap fans say is MOTR pop. The jazz of Acker Bilk and Kenny Ball were in their day MOTR pop. And what on earth did the Oyster Band (aka Fiddlers Dram) do with 'Day trip to Bangor'?

So called purists love to label anything that is vaguely akin but not quite 'their style' as MOTR and, more often than not, rubbish. It isn't bad. It's middle of the road and popular for a reason. It's comfortable. People like it. It's like going to a Little Chef instead of the French bistro down the road. It will never be as good as the best the bistro can offer but the quality will be consistent and, quite often, better than some of the some of the dishes at le petite cordon bleu:-)

Why can't we be happy to sample a little off each plate and, as many have pointed out before me, just decide what is good or bad? I would still like to know, in advance if possible, if I am eating Chinese or Italian though!

Cheers

Dave

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: GUEST,glueman disguised as a
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 06:37 PM

"the only reason people ever want to define 'folk' is to decide which acts can be excluded from the genre"

True. The loathsome puritanical streak gnaws away until folk is no more than a reference in an academic journal, so pure and revered that nothing meets the definition, even 1954 left behind as the vague and inclusive trawl of dilettantes and revisionists. One Santa lookalike with a sore throat singing to nobody in a closed pub, the austere beauty of it noted only by the landlord who had all his punters driven away by the wretchedness of their own condition in its awesome, awful, beautiful, tuneless, pathetic thrall.

The thread also touches on my other pet hate, the time served folkie, as though dedicating your life to the music compared to a single iota of talent.
Have we done the misunderstood unappreciated folkie yet?

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 06:33 PM

Shimrod, from reading your posts on many threads, well what can I say...?, and I give a damn about the music, it's categories I don't care about.

I mean is that SO hard to understand, apparently it is for some people, apparently Shimrod you are one of those people.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 06:07 PM

I am deliberately not participating...

Much

And for some reason many people seem to think of me as a dyed in the wool chauvinist who refuses to listen to or play anything that does not fit the 1954 definition (whereas in fact I think the defintion is useful because it tells us what something is not merely what it sounds like)

But tonight I have been experimenting with trying to put metal style guitar chugs onto some tunes that I think are trad but put in to a minor key for a morris side, and played the Stones "Play with Fire" and the Small Faces "All or Nothing" on my 12-string. Those chugs are hard work on a 12-string.

I am however put in mind of Magrath's eponymous "THe Bovril's with the gravy but the Marmite's with the Jam".

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: TheSnail
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 06:01 PM

Ron, what does it matter what it's called? If you enjoy it, drink it.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 05:54 PM

"I'll repeat one more time, musical definitions mean nothing to me, besides I'd rather be playing the music than labelling it, not being a major record company nor a music retailer. I mean is that SO hard to understand, apparently it is for some people."

It's hard to understand why you're participating in this debate.

Oh yes, your medal for 'not giving a shit' is in the post. Wear it with pride!

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 05:39 PM

"Ron - thats exactly where we are in UK - Folk covers ALL the various styles "

I think we are in agreement there, no matter which side of the Atlantic we view the sunrise/sunset from. My disagreement with your statement is that there is a large faction in the U.S. that accepts singer-songwriter as one of the folk styles - but not to the exclusion of the traditional forms.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Lord Batman's Kitchener
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 05:35 PM

I'll repeat one more time, musical definitions mean nothing to me, besides I'd rather be playing the music than labelling it, not being a major record company nor a music retailer. I mean is that SO hard to understand, apparently it is for some people.

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 05:34 PM

As far as performance is concerned there are only TWO kinds of music ! The stuff Iplay and the stuff I DONT play ! And a label appended by someone else has NO bearing on either category !

Subject: RE: Does it matter what music is called?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 09 Jul 08 - 05:06 PM

BTW, the only preference I expressed is one for meaningful terminology. I play and sing music which I consider to be folk, and music which I don't. Repeat after me: FOLK IS NOT A VALUE JUDGMENT!

I recognize that there are many to whom such a distinction is meaningless. What I don't understand is why they should get involved
with attacking other folks' definitions.