Subject: RE: Excellent Mudcat parody
From:
The Borchester Echo
Date: 27 Mar 09 - 11:56 AM
Someone said:
Status of the tradarts . . . [is] . . . not what this thread is about
Actually, it is. And as there have been umpteen previous unresolved discussions wrecked by the very people being lampooned in the fake thread, there is no need for another.
Lawrence/Frank thought it might be fun to take the piss out of those so removed from reality that they fail to make a connection between their own lives and the cultural heritage that's out there, (in their backyards, to use an English Acoustic Collective expression).
The sainted "tradition" (if it ever really existed), disappeared long ago and its resurrection has been distorted and damaged by prissy middle-class "collectors". Yes, they wrote down a few things (songs lacking words and put tunes through the washer-drier then ironed them) but we'll never know how much these interfering busybodies destroyed or altered. Trad music now is performance art, even the few and far between snippets still being found among travellers. Music of the people being composed today is art music because it involves revivalists seeking inspiration at second hand from those deeply involved in their landscapes, trades and environments (c.v. Chris Wood of the EAC again) or the creators of the Radio Ballads (both generations). It is from here that the tradarts will continue and grow, once songwriters and musicians have recovered from the damage inflicted by (a) the education system over the past several generations which has forced them to ignore and despise their inheritance and (b) from the worst excesses of the snigging-snogging "revival". Children can learn to understand and to love what their parents rejected in favour of instant pop culture and, eventually, will add themselves to the people's culture which is theirs by right.
Contrast that prospect with the snarlings of those who think they're being exhorted not to "have a laugh". Just what is it you think you're laughing at? Of course I think Borfolk is funny on one level (and I believe Dick does too, apart from an unfortunate lapse when he imagined me poor old mate Bleaty was being maligned). I'm amazed (OK, no I'm not) that what some scribblers can't or won't acknowledge is that the hardest swipe is at the GEFFs, those whose idea of "fun" is to belt out one or two usually inappropriate chords topped by a vocal in an unrelated key and call it . . . yeah, that's right . . . in cliquey "clubs" which are, unfortunately, not nearly private enough, and then whinge incessantly when the general public thinks they're bonkers and that the noise they make is rubbish anyway.
It's been my lifelong ambition to raise awareness of the tradarts to the cultural status they deserve, an achievement already realised in most other countries I have worked in or at least visited. It will never be acceptable to laugh at the low, maligned image portrayed (and sometimes deservedly as a result of sloppy presentation) in many branches of the English media. That is why it is necessary to examine the wider implications of such inhouse lampooning and make sure no more of it escapes into wider currency.
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sj
