Is there an English singing style?

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 08:30 AM

"There does seem to be a predisposition to singing in a peculiar nasal style with a non-descript, generic 'Archers' regional accent."

This is very true, but this style is usually affected by those singers who are attempting to imitate their favourite revival
singer(s). It seems unlikely to me that such people have ever listened to a traditional singer - or, if they have, it never seems to have occurred to them that there is anything to learn from such singers. This is a big mistake. Many traditional singers were recorded when they were quite old and I have heard them dismissed as "croaky old gits" and other such ageist drivel. The thing is that their recordings tend to be a world away from slick modern presentations of popular music, including stuff under the marketing category "Folk" (which often has nothing to do with 'real' folk music - see endless 'what is folk?' threads on this board).

After a lifetime of listening to recordings of traditional singers I am convinced that the best of them (Sam Larner, Harry Cox, Joseph Taylor etc., etc.) were great artists and we revival singers still have much to learn from them. If I was asked to define the difference between much modern marketed 'folk' music and recordings of trad. singers it is that the former tend to be obsessively concerned with the overall 'sound', rather than the content, of a song, whereas a traditional singer tends to focus exclusively on unpretensiously communicating narrative and melody. For my taste this is a more satisfying and authentic form of music.

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: Spot
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 08:14 AM

Allo

   Good for them's what I say!!   (rabbit rabbit or whatever it was!!) They're good , those guys - I think I have one of their cassettes somewhere - must look it up...

             Regards to all....Spot :-)

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 08:00 AM

That's exactly why Chas and Dave now sing in their original cockney tones... they got sick of being thought American because they sang their songs like that.

They actually got more bookings and eventually, more money and fame, once they dropped the US tones.

LTS

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: Spot
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 07:45 AM

Allo everybody..

                For me , as long as English singers don't affect a phoney American accent, anything goes!!!

                Regards to all...Spot    :-)

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 07:39 AM

That's a privilege that comes from half-knowledge, like those who will sing arias as if they have a hot potato down their throat.

What I find fascinating is how many people "put on" a singing voice that is very different to their speaking one; as if they are play-acting or trying to be someone else.

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: pirandello
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 07:28 AM

There does seem to be a predisposition to singing in a peculiar nasal style with a non-descript, generic 'Archers' regional accent.

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 07:26 AM

I must say I agree strongly with Mike.

There are at least as many styles as there are singers, and I do find that my own styles vary according to what I am doing at the time.

There are, however, some combinations of music and song which are, IMHO, quintessentially English (as just one example:- Shanties accompanied on concertina). I am sure that there are many others, and I suppose some of them would be sufficiently alike in tone and texture to be placed in a category named "English Style".

Don T.

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: George Papavgeris
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 07:25 AM

Geoff Wesley, not there's a voice I like! Very little ornamentation, but the purity and sweetness of that sound!

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: The Sandman
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 03:17 AM

Malcolm Douglas is right,every country has many different styles,including IRELAND,
Bess Cronin,Sarah Makem,MargaretBaRRy,PaddyTunney,JoeHeaney.are examples
there are a number of revival performers who sound as if they have listened to traditional singers, Roy Harris,Lou Killen,Harry Boardman,Ian Woods Nic Jones[early recordings] ,Kevin Mitchell,Sean Cannon,Ron Taylor Anne Briggs,IsobelSutherland,BrianPeters,FredJordan PeterBellamy.
as traditional singers were frequently unaccompanied,the use of ornamentation in the voice is fairly important.
When a SINGER accompanies himself he has the added option of chordal harmony,and consequently doesnt have to use as much interpretation,
there are of course exceptions Peter Bellamy[highly ornamented whilst accompanied].Bob lewis GeoffWesley[unaccompanied small amount of ornamentation]

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 20 Apr 07 - 02:48 AM

Considering some of the renditions of different folk songs we hear from different performers...can we say any two of them are the same? I suggest there are as many styles as there are performers.....and each persons style may change with the actual type song they are singing at the time........

Subject: RE: Is there an English singing style?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 19 Apr 07 - 09:17 PM

Back in 1998, I went to a conference where an American postgraduate student presented a paper entitled 'Is There a Scottish Singing Style?' I won't trouble you with the abstract, which contained some pretty dubious assumptions; but in essence her conclusion was 'Er, no, there isn't. But there are Scottish singing styles.' It had taken her quite a long time, and a great deal of careful analysis, to reach that stunningly obvious conclusion.

Exactly the same thing can be said of English tradition. It varies from one part of the country to another; and, back when there were still quite a lot of traditional singers, it often varied radically from one village to another.

Some of the early C20 collectors (Sharp, for example) encountered very little ornamentation, and assumed that English singers generally didn't use it; others (Grainger, for one) found quite a lot. The point is that they were working in different areas, and there is not (and never has been, so far as can be told), a 'national' style in any country in this world.

People who don't know much about folk music will always tend to assume that anything you sing or play, if they like it, must be Irish. As you will know, 'Celtic' is a meaningless term as applied to traditional music, though it is a useful marketing tool.

Of course, you may very well have picked up a style of ornamentation that sounds Irish, particularly if you get your songs from recordings made by Revival performers, many of whom have (it would seem) never listened to an English traditional singer in their lives, but instead sing in the hybrid 'folk club' style that developed in the 1960s. There is nothing wrong with that style, of course; except that it doesn't really reflect the way traditional singers actually sang.

Subject: Is there an English singing style?
From: GUEST,vielleuse
Date: 19 Apr 07 - 07:56 PM

People often say to me when I sing that I sound Irish/Celtic etc. Now this may just be because they don't know anything about folk music, and all folk music sounds Celtic to them (which is often the case), but when I analyse the kind of decoration I do, I do wonder whether I haven't picked it up from Irish singing.

Is there a distinctively English style of ornamentation, and if so what is it?