Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,JTB
Date: 04 Oct 10 - 07:03 PM

Did anyone catch young Lucy Ward at Shrewsbury. It would be hard to call her boring or mediocre.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 04:02 AM

I wasn't going to bother Soldier but since you have brought it up:

"comforted that their mediocre tradition is safe in the hands of the even more mediocre ......... "

This simply misses the essence of music - it either does something for you or it doesn't. That's it really. Calling it mediocre is irrelevant.

"our entire nation should be celebrating" This is never going to happen. I don't think this entire nation has ever celebrated anything has? The end of WW2?

My experience, only nearly 50 years, is that if you present old songs and tunes well in the right environment lots of people enjoy it. That's it really

L in C#

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Hesk
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 05:17 AM

Hi Les,

We've never met, but I think you may have met my daughter, Helen, who helped to run the Green Festival, at Chorlton.
I have read many of your threads with interest and want to thank you for your good common sense.
Your recent post, above, was a case in point. I couldn't agree with you more.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 05:23 AM

Thanks Ms / Mr Hesk, that's very kind.

I have been involved with the Big Green and much fun it was. We are thinking of a Ceilidh in Januaryish involving as many Chorlton environmental and community groups as possible.

Perhaps you and you family & friends will come and shake a leg?

Les

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: MikeofNorthumbria
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 05:48 AM

I think Peter would have been greatly amused by what's been written on this thread, and infuriated by some of it. What he would have posted in reply, I can't imagine – but I'm sure that even if I disagreed with it, I would have enjoyed reading it.

The earlier question of what he would have thought about today's folk scene is (IMHO) unanswerable. Like the Elephant's Child in Kipling's "Just So Stories", Peter was possessed by a "satiable curtiosity". This made him a perpetual seeker, experimenter, and challenger of entrenched orthodoxies. He was always asking new questions, exploring new territory, and offending somebody's sensibilities.   So if he were still here today, he wouldn't have exactly the same tastes and opinions he had twenty years ago (though many people would still have found them infuriating). I wish he had given us the opportunity to discover what they would have been.

Not having been at Shrewsbury Festival, I have no basis for questioning Caroline Foster's assessment of the performers she encountered there. But the general tone of her comments suggests that she is making what Professor Gilbert Ryle used to call a "category mistake".   This is like regarding an apple as something that has tried to be a banana, and failed. People who love apples and don't much care for bananas have a perfect right to organise apple festivals. And people who love bananas and despise apples should look somewhere else for entertainment.

Wassail!

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 05:56 AM

" ... Catherine how would you like IT to be presented?"

Yes, Catherine, I think we should be told. You can't just tell us that something is rubbish without telling us exactly why you think it is rubbish. Some examples and counter-examples (derived from what happens in other countries, perhaps?) might be a good place to start.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,glueman
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 05:56 AM

MoN, I disagree with your assessment of what I took to be Caroline Foster's point, which is that the music she hoped to find had been mis-sold. An analogy might be entering MacDonalds and asking for a double cheeseburger and expecting it to look like the thing on the poster. The mistake was her's but it was an error of expectation, not type.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 05:57 AM

People who love apples and don't much care for bananas have a perfect right to organise apple festivals. And people who love bananas and despise apples should look somewhere else for entertainment.

I think we should all strive to the ideal of the fruit salad, though there are times when only a single fruit will do. Do people approach vegetables in the same way? Even your Traditional Roast is a thing of complements and contrasts; added to which are the mustards and sauces, which are always a matter of taste. Peter Bellamy was like a fine Horseradish Sauce - an essential garnish to The Traditional Roast Beef of Old England, though perhaps a bit strong for those who prefer everything boiled to a pulp.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 06:47 AM

Brilliant Sean

Les

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 07:34 AM

Not being a folkie really I never heard of PB.
Been for a listen on Spotify and enjoyed listening'
Cheers all

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Howard Jones
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 12:12 PM

It might be worth pointing out that Will Fly has started this thread to discuss the issues Catherine Foster has raised:

'More pretentious than Bellowhead'

Perhaps Catherine could visit that and explain what she'd prefer.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: MikeofNorthumbria
Date: 05 Oct 10 - 02:43 PM

Dear Catherine - profound apologies for mistakenly referring to you as Caroline in my last post. (As it happened, I had a CD by somebody called Caroline on my desk at the time of writing.)

And please do enlighten us - here, or on Will Fly's "more pretentious than Bellowhead" thread - as who and what you would like to hear more of at folk festivals. You never know, some festival organisers might be following this correspondence, so this is the time to ...

"Accentuate the positive,
Eliminate the negative,
Latch on to the affirmative..."

Wassail!

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 06 Oct 10 - 03:07 AM

Well Catherine you know what they say here in Yorkshire, ' them as can, do, them as can't, criticize ' [ or teach ]

Dave H

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 06 Oct 10 - 04:11 AM

'them as can, do, them as can't, criticize ' [ or teach ]

Steady on. I teach criminology.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,glueman
Date: 06 Oct 10 - 04:39 AM

Didn't Thatcher get rid of doing?

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 06 Oct 10 - 08:34 AM

Yes Pip, so you're obviously not a criminal.

Dave H

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 06 Oct 10 - 08:50 AM

I didn't think it was entirely for lack of ability, though.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 07 Oct 10 - 05:29 PM

We spent the day being happy tourists in sunny Chester today. One part of this pilgrimage was to visit THIS on the old Bellamist trail. Thanks to PB, I've become a huge RC fan, collecting many originals, including The Fox Jumps Over the Parson's Gate, which furnished the art for PB's album of the same name which, for shame, gets short shrift on the otherwise very welcome Fair England's Shore CD reissue.

Talking of PB albums, my favourite is Keep on Kipling in its original vinyl form as the CD re-issue messes up the continuity with various extraneous session tracks with mess with the original sequence. They would have worked better as extras! Anyhoo - I won the album off PB at a gig as part of the raffle, and asked him to make the choice for me. He have me KOK saying it was the best thing he'd ever done. Both Sides Then runs it a close second, CD re-issue included. which features Maid of Australia, one of PB's near perfect duets with Swarb. Shame they didn't do more together really.

What's yours?

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Brian Peters
Date: 08 Oct 10 - 04:38 AM

Both Sides Then. Bought it mainly for the YT / Watersons big band, was disappointed by those tracks but loved everything else on it.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: pavane
Date: 08 Oct 10 - 07:03 AM

I have a copy of KOK, signed by PB - but not for me - bought s/hand

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 08 Oct 10 - 07:43 AM

"Rummy Conjuring Tricks" - Peter Live and Kicking Ass.

Don't tell me this would not compare favourably with any genre 'cos you would be wrong!

If you ain't heard it before, it will delight and scare the pants off you, in the same minute...Genius is a term used too lightly...but he was one of the few that has yet come to light, out of our music...he was a wild, unstable, reliable, volatile, scary, honest and true, gentle-man.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 09 Oct 10 - 04:27 AM

My only problem with Both Sides Then is Martin Carthy's bass; shame they couldn't have got a more convincing bottom end in there and it would have been perfect.

I could have got my my copy of Keep On Kipling signed, but felt a bit weird about it at the time - a mixture of being in awe of the man yet wanting to acknowledge his humanity at the same time. Hey, remember that time a few years back when you were reduced to grovelling for a doss from strangers at The Bridge? Well, I'm the one they sent you up to bar to seek out. Hadn't heard of you then of course but thanks to my mate Raymond I'm now of the opinion that you're the most important singer on the scene and as a performer you generate as much excitement as the Art Ensemble of Chicago who I saw last week in Leeds by the way...

Yes - Songs & Rummy Conjurin' Tricks - which is a fine piece of work & always a firm favourite over the years since his untimely demise which made it his swan song thus giving it that unique status in any body of work, which I have to say it more than adequately lives up to. I can't help feeling there was something else on his mind that night - maybe like recording the near-perfect live album??

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: raymond greenoaken
Date: 10 Oct 10 - 07:11 AM

Well, I'll throw my potsherd in for Merlin's Isle Of Gramarye (1972). Fairly early in his recorded oeuvre – he was only 28 at the time - but its impact for me was tied in with the fact that it's the first of his records on which the sheer blast and serrated edges of his voice had been captured successfully on tape. Suibhne's right, of course – you had to hear him in the flesh to experience the Bellamy pipes at full operating capacity.

Plus the songs themselves are quite monstrously good, and the arrangements perfectly honed. Nic jones' fiddle accompaniments are the very pip. If Pan played the fiddle he's sound like that. And then of course there's Harp Song Of The Dane Women, on which PB sailed well beyond the sight of land and produced something the like of which had never been heard before, a thing of sheer uncompromising otherness. And all with a cheap guitar and a bodhran made out of a garden seive.

Having said all that, Songs And Rummy Conjurin' Tricks captures a giant in his pomp. His last thrill and testament!

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 10 Oct 10 - 07:58 AM

Oddly enough my favourite on MIOG remains The Queen's Men; the rest of it is as anomalous a piece of wyrdness as you could wish for in the context of folk. Seminal I calls it, with respect of the primal muse that moved RK to write such stuff in the first place, let alone for PB to give it such chthonic resonance. When will it see long overdue re-issue from the Argo vaults in a gleaming digital edition with OA&K? Maybe when some mobile phone company uses Song of the Men's Side as an advert soundtrack. For those who don't know THIS is a good place to find out.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 10 Oct 10 - 08:00 AM

Make that THIS

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 10 Oct 10 - 06:30 PM

"Plus the songs themselves are quite monstrously good, and the arrangements perfectly honed. Nic jones' fiddle accompaniments are the very pip."

Nic Jones was always keen to promote the folk club where he was appearing, Before he finished his act, he would ask, Who's on next week? He would then encourage everyone not to miss that artist.

On one occasion in Southport, the answer came back, Peter Bellamy.
Oh, said Nic, Who's on the week after?

I'd give anything to see Peter again.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Mick Tems
Date: 11 Oct 10 - 06:45 AM

Peter stayed with me a number of times, but my fondest memory was at Bracknell Festival, just after his American tour, when he proudly wore a gaudy, light-flashing Rolling Stones T-shirt which he'd spent some dollars on! He truly was one in a million.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: raymond greenoaken
Date: 11 Oct 10 - 03:33 PM

"Nic Jones was always keen to promote the folk club where he was appearing, Before he finished his act, he would ask, Who's on next week? He would then encourage everyone not to miss that artist.
On one occasion in Southport, the answer came back, Peter Bellamy.
Oh, said Nic, Who's on the week after?"

Brilliant! PB always described NJ as his "favourite English revival singer". Clearly the respect we mutual...

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: raymond greenoaken
Date: 11 Oct 10 - 03:34 PM

er.."was" mutual. You know what I meant.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 11 Oct 10 - 03:40 PM

He didn't "always" ~~ at various times, I heard Pete describe Martin Carthy, Nic Jones, Paul Brady and Mike Waterson as the best revival singer. But, indeed, he certainly regarded Nic very highly.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 06:22 AM

Odd that as I've never got Nic Jones at all, though his fiddle accompaniments on MIOG are, indeed, the very pip, he seems to belong in a very different world to Peter Bellamy. Paul Brady? Never got him at all either, though I've always enjoyed Martin Carthy and could listen to Mike Waterson all day. Here's a thing - our car sprung a leak the other day necessitating we borrow Rachel's folks' car, in the CD player of which is a folk compilation featuring (amongst other things) ISB's First Girl I Loved, the Young Tradition's Lyke Wake Dirge and Martin Carthy's Scarborough Fair, the latter of which I'd never heard before, though I've heard plenty about it. I have a mind to burn off a Bellamy disk and put in there for a treat when they come home from their holiday...

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 06:37 AM

What's 'odd' about it, Suibhne? We were talking about Peter Bellamy's tastes, not yours. Why is it in any way 'odd' that they should not be identical?

Regards

~M~

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 07:13 AM

My deepest apologies, MtheGM - I must always remember to preface my comments with an IMHO in order to clarify the entirely subjective nature of what it is I'm expressing here. In my world Nic Jones and Paul Brady don't feature much beyond the easy-listening folk racks of a few regretable purchases made long ago, whereas I've got Peter Bellamy up there on the shelf with Sun Ra, Rahsaan Roland Kirk and Jim Eldon. I have revival issues anyway, unresolved since I was 13 and used to listen to Jim Lloyd in a state of abject despair in the hope of hearing some actual folk songs that weren't mired in MOR gloss. But that's entirely subjective too, deriving from a love of Traditional Folk Song and the Traditional Singers thereof, which is why the singing of PB made such perfect sense to me and why I'm surprised to read of his affection for the singing of Nic Jones and Paul Brady which never did. IMHO of course.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: pavane
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 08:48 AM

Suibhne, have you heard Nic's first four albums (now unobtainable)? His style evolved considerably in his later albums, and became more what I would call 'laid-back'. But in the early 70's his gigs were much more lively.

And he was also responsible, at least in part, for writing tunes to songs he found in broadsides, many of which have been taken up very widely.

(Sorry for the thread creep)

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 10:02 AM

I've think I've heard them all over the years - I know I've certainly had most them in my keeping at one time or another, though right now I can account for Ballads and Songs, and the eponymous second album on Trailer. I have mixed feelings about his ballad settings, though I'm not about to raise any sort of stink over it (though I might over his tune for Mad Maudlin / Mad Tom o' Bedlam purely because it's the one you're most likely to hear it sung to at the expense of the original which is too fine a melody to go unsung).

Just personal taste though; I think it all depends how receptive you are to certain artists when you first hear them. Or maybe it's just folk guitarists I have a problem with - Bellamy excepted, natch, where the occasional appearance of a borrowed guitar for Ramblin' Robin, or Devil Got Your Man, or even Motherless Child made you sit up & ponder, or else give thanks for his trusty anglo. Also on my father-in-law's folk compilation the other day was Bert Jansch singing Blackwaterside which didn't do it for me either, so you might think of me as a lost cause in this respect!

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 10:33 AM

I must confess that PB's bleatyness doesn't strike the right chords with me, but I do think his arrangements for Kipling's poems are fabulous and far more engaging than any self-penned 'folk songs' I've heard. I could happily learn much of what I've heard. Harp Song of the Dane Women remains one of the most inspired and other pieces of music I know, and much-like Mad Maudlin's Search (as referenced by Suibne above) is a song I'm still a tad too daunted by it's potency, to properly tackle.

As for the rest of the revival, it's still pretty much a 'meh' from me. As I've said elsewhere, barring a Pentangle compilation lately reclaimed from my teens, the odd youtube and some purloined research materials, I'm pretty much still revival-free in my listening habits. I'll no doubt ditch most of what I've purloined once I get around to tidying up iTunes, but I'll certainly be keeping my PB bootlegs.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 11:14 AM

Suibhne ~~ I was not criticising your opinions qua opinions; nor in any way questioning or impugning your right to hold them. It was just that I was exercised as to why you should consider it "odd"
("Odd that as I've never got Nic Jones at all," were your exact words) that they should have been different from Pete's. I mean, they would be, wouldn't they? ~~ or anyhow they well might ~~ as you were two different people.

~Michael~

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 11:34 AM

Odd as in aesthetically disparate let's say, to my ears anyway; odd as in surprising, but always good to know of course, and a lovely anecdote from HenryP besides. Oddness too, it would seem, is highly subjective and probably best not analysed too closely.

Meanwhile, I'm sitting here looking at the Peter Bellamy VHS on the shelf wondering how best I might get it up onto YouTube...

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Working Radish
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 12:20 PM

"Quickly"?

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 12:28 PM

Quickly means playing the tape whilst pointing my wee camera at the TV screen. People actually do this, and it works, up to a point anyway as you might imagine. None of the video footage is exactly high quality (badly edited 10th generation dub) so, I'll have a think & see how it turns out. There are places who'll do a digital transfer for you onto DVD-R, but I've heard there is a significant loss of sound.

Also on this tape is as documentary on Cox & Larner. Maybe I should invite everyone over for viewing? Bring your own crisps, pop & cake...

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Working Radish
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 12:33 PM

Sorry, just got distracted there by the thought of Suibhne's Bellamy tape.

What I wanted to say was in reply to CS, about the 'bleat'. I think my introduction to Bellamy solo was the song "the London Waterman", which he does magnificently but... um... it's a bit... y'know... raucous, and, er... bleaty. Some time later I came across the song again, this time sung by June Tabor, and immediately had to learn it. Once I'd got the words and the tune off I started really listening to how the song sounded when I was singing it; I knew I wanted to do something different from June Tabor's version, which is very nice but a bit too pretty, and that meant being a bit declamatory here and a bit more emphatic there... At that point a lightbulb went off - so that was what Bellamy was doing!

This doesn't explain the actual tremolo, I have to admit, and that does get in the way when you're not used to it. But I think it was all part of his way of getting a performance out of every song.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Working Radish
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 12:35 PM

And "quickly" really means "as quickly as possible consistent with getting something decent at the end of it", I'm not demanding haste at all costs! Just another way of saying "yes please", really.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 12:55 PM

ah but could that be the problem that suibhne has an identity crisis, I hope he doesnt think that he is becoming like the policeman// bicycle in the third policeman.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: raymond greenoaken
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 12:56 PM

"He didn't "always" ~~ at various times, I heard Pete describe Martin Carthy, Nic Jones, Paul Brady and Mike Waterson as the best revival singer. But, indeed, he certainly regarded Nic very highly."

Fair play, michael – I should have said "more than once". And we'd probably have to add Louis Killen to that list.

As for the "bleat". Cards on the table– I like the bleat. Love it, actually, and can't see why anyone has a problem with it. It adds something indefinable but essential. And I don't hear it as a tremolo effect but as a sort of chuckle, always inserted at exactly the appropriate point. It came from Harry cox, of course, but PB does something quintessentially..er.. Bellamyesque with it.

Let's hear it for the bleat!

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 12 Oct 10 - 03:09 PM

i) Love the bleat; love the Killen too.

ii) I've been losing sleep over De Selby's theory of molecular interchange for some years now. For this reason alone I don't ride bicycles, though have noted how regular travellers on Blackpool Trams have a certain tram-like lurch to their walking gait.

iii) London Waterman - you heard Bob Roberts sing this? You may forget the rest, though PB's particular garnish is more than acceptable, but it remains very much Bob's.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 13 Oct 10 - 09:33 AM

Okay.

A bit poorly today so I spent the morning pointing my wee camera at the TV screen whilst playing the Peter Bellamy VHS. Not perfect quality, but then again the original tape isn't really that much better, so I judge it acceptable in the circumstances. Part One is up one YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bt3tKhVXBc

Part two - two songs - will be following shortly...

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,David E.
Date: 13 Oct 10 - 10:35 AM

Thank you.

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Oct 10 - 10:50 AM

Thanks Sean, I really enjoyed that

Les

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: GUEST,Ed
Date: 13 Oct 10 - 11:12 AM

Suibhne

I really appreciate you taking the time to put this up.

Thanks,
Ed

Subject: RE: Boring, Bleating Old Traddy (Peter Bellamy)
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 13 Oct 10 - 05:24 PM

Many thanks. A great man. (I'd love to have heard his version of "You can't always get what you want"!)