Singing in dialect

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: toadfrog
Date: 19 Apr 03 - 06:51 PM

Is this thread basically for stage performers, or ordinary club singers? As one of the latter, I have no problem about singing in any dialect or language I feel I can handle.

There may be a different problem for stage performers who want to develop a following and a stage persona. Surely Utah Phillips would never be caught dead singing in Broad Scots or Geordie!

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: Mark Cohen
Date: 19 Apr 03 - 08:50 PM

Don, you called the Catskills "The Irish Alps"? Oy, veh! Such a meshuggineh kop. My Bubbie would plotz!

Aloha,
Mark

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: DonMeixner
Date: 20 Apr 03 - 01:06 AM

Mark,

Just the area around East Durham, everywhere else is still Borscht Belt. So halvahn't gotta put no plotz in your shuga

Don

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: TheBigPinkLad
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 03:52 PM

I once made the mistake of reading Dylan Thomas' Child's Christmas in Wales in a booming Welsh accent. I did a great job of it too, a real Taff told me so. Alas, two days later the local radio station played a 1930s recording of the great man himself reading it on BBC radio. He had a plummy English accent! I felt a right pudding.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: GUEST,Q
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 04:18 PM

The dialects of the the South have died out to the point where the old stories and songs would not be understandable to people who have descended from that heritage. See thread 59230, running now, on Georgia plantation songs: Harris Songs
A very simplified version of the dialect, in order to preserve some of the flavor, may be best.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 30 Apr 03 - 11:32 AM

I heard an early American recording of Under Milk Wood, with DT as narrator, and guess what? They all sounded Welsh except Thomas! And BTW, I've met people who knew him, and his name was pronounced Dillan, not Dullan (the Welsh way).

Steve

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: GUEST,The Vulgar Boatman
Date: 30 Apr 03 - 05:41 PM

Have we considered the possibility that in terms of performance we are rather akin to actors, who think nothing of learning an accent or dialect for a role. Problem is, we don't keep it up for a seried of songs and spoil "the willing suspension of disbelief" and maybe that's what grates on the audience.

Two truths:
Once there was a man called James MIller who was born and raised in Manchester, England. He had Scots forbears, and when he took to singing, freely interchanged his working class Mancunian accent with a broad if unidentifiable Scottish dialect. Once he became Ewan MacColl, he then presumed to lecture the rest of us mere mortals about singing from your roots...

and

a quote from Dave Swarbrick, who when asked by Carthy if they could do something to a particular song replied, "Martin, the music doesn't mind.

Keep the faith

Chris.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: GUEST,Yorkshire Tony minus cookie
Date: 01 May 03 - 02:35 AM

For what its worth, I think you should try to pronounce the dialect words correctly but not try overly hard to 'put on' the dialect. Otherwise stick to the English translation. I get very irritated by singers performing a dialect song with words from the wrong dialect - Scots or Geordie in a Yorkshire song for example.

I also get irritated by the preponderance of fake US accents in Country singers in Australia - isn't their own distinctive variety of the English language good enough for them any more?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: JennieG
Date: 01 May 03 - 07:19 AM

Tony,

Even Slim Dusty sings with an American accent - he always has done - he might deny it but you listen to "The Pub With No Beer"!
I would not dare to put on another accent (Scots, Irish) unless it was in fun and I was inviting people to laugh at me as well as with me. But I will leave dialect words in a song, as changing them can also change the song, and just sing in my own gorgeous Aussie accent.

Cheers
JennieG

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: GUEST,mink
Date: 01 May 03 - 07:54 AM

This is not always under concious control.
I hate myself for it, but I've started singing "da" instead of "the" in Irish-y songs. And I know its just because an Irish bloke I talk to down the pub has a perfectly genuine tendency to do that in his speech.
I don't know in advance that I'm going to do it - and then it grates like hell when it comes out!
Ditto some faux-northern bits in the trad English songs - due to listening to too much Waterson/Carthy.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 01 May 03 - 08:16 PM

Rambling Jack Elliott's version of "I belong to Glesca" was a classic.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 02 May 03 - 10:30 AM

Stumbling Jack Elliott's version would have been interesting! (JE of Birtley, for those not in the know.)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Singing in dialect
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 May 03 - 05:49 PM

I've always liked the notion of some booking agent getting the two Jack Elliott's gigs mixed up.