The Concept of FREED Folkmusic

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 21 Oct 10 - 05:42 PM

OK, Don, Conrad, Spaw - go for 2,000!

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 09:59 PM

Yea, verily!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Tootler
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 08:27 PM

The "folk process" has gone high-tech!

And we have You Tube. Isn't it wonderful!?

My audio library on my computer has a folder called "You Tube" where I store songs I have downloaded so I can learn them.

It's an incredible resource.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 03:34 PM

There are so many misconceptions and so much misinformation in Conrad's posts that I think it IS valid to ask him what planet he inhabits!! One statement from several of his posts back:

"People dont generally learn songs from recordings, most dont they use them for further entertainment whilst remaining mindless."

The vast majority of the songs I know (pushing 700) are learned from recordings. In fact, during the mid-Fifties and into the Sixties, everybody around here was buying recordings (Folkways, Elektra, Riverside, Vanguard, and others) to learn songs from—AND we would borrow each other's records and often tape them (most of us bought tape recorders—big, honkin' suitcase-sized beasts back then), not with the idea of bootlegging records, but as a means of swapping songs. We would often lug these tape recorders to hoots and songfests, turn them on, and let them run, with the idea of trolling for songs. Later, small portable cassette recorders saved the wear and tear of lugging around both a guitar case and a tape recorder. Now, there are neat little digital recorders like the Zoom H2 which we use for the same purpose.

The "folk process" has gone high-tech!

I have four feet of shelf space devoted to vinyl folk records that I bought over the years. And recently, I have at least seven feet of shelf space containing CDs of folk music—from which I am STILL learning songs. And the swapping is STILL going on.

I have many records of early Burl Ives, Susan Reed, and Richard Dyer-Bennet up through Ed McCurdy, Joan Baez, Jean Redpath, Ewan MacColl, hordes of Seegers, and on up to just about everything that Gordon Bok has recorded—and scads of other singers in between.

I have dozens of tapes I made years ago. Bob Nelson (Deckman) has over 300 tapes, most made at song fests and "hoots," that he is digitizing for archiving purpose—to be made available to anyone who wants to learn songs from them.

An even more high-tech, not to mention long-distance, method is the number of web sites devoted to folk music that offer MP3s of entire songs that one can download on one's computer.

PLENTY of material to learn and sing. More than one can possibly learn in a dozen lifetimes!

Jayzuz, Conrad!! Join the 21st century!!

Don Firth

P. S. Perhaps, Conrad, if you'd show up sober and be willing to simply shut up and listen instead of insisting on telling people they're doing it all wrong, you might learn of more musical events going on in your immediate neighborhood. There may be a very good reason why you think that you (and the rest of the world) are living in a barren desert. Quite possible (judging from a lot of things you've posted here) that you've made yourself so obnoxious that local singers don't want you around, so they make sure you never hear about local songfests and musical events.

Because the folk music realm isn't barren at all. It's quite lush and green.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 03:08 PM

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: catspaw49
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 11:35 AM

Does anyone think they canput together a list of mistakes, untruths, or outright bullshit on Corny's websites?

Having been recently hacked and still as I'm too unwell to put back together - I was in hospital on a detox 4 weeks before and trying again to pick up the pieces and dropped the rebuild as I could not face it and the temptation to have a drink to "get me through". It may be one of the last things I'd do to another.

Do I get where Conrad comes from though? Politely, I don't understand the man.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Bettynh
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 02:30 PM

"Its quite lost over here"

There's no doubt that you're the one lost. I've already described one magical moment when an audience of about 2000 people, without songsheets or accompaniment, sang, with harmony, a song they most likely learned from a record or (even more likely) a sappy movie. They knew all the words. Sorry, but you don't get to dictate what music will last with "the folk," or even how "the folk process" will occur.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: catspaw49
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 11:35 AM

Does anyone think they canput together a list of mistakes, untruths, or outright bullshit on Corny's websites?   For a blowhard demanding more education from others, he has shown himself to know less than diddly shit on his web pages.

At the start of this thread I got blasted for picking on poor Conrad and ask why I was so mean to him or whatever. After 1200 posts can everyone see why I think this guy is a doofus and deserving of absolutely no respect?

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 11:23 AM

he spent his life in the *Durham* coalfields and so would qualify only marginally, if at all, as a "Newcassel" songwriter.

My point exactly.

He wrote of the Durham coal-field and the culture thereof, though he did write of missing a train to Newcastle once, did he not? Must check up on that! He celebrates the parochial in such a way that certain of his songs still survive in folk memory. For example you can talk to people who know about The Marley Hill Ducks who know not of Tommy Armstrong, nor yet the song; on one occasion I overheard a Stanley man singing the chorus of Oakey Strike Evictions but whilst he didn't know the rest of it (just something his father used to sing) he could tell me where Oakey's Houses used to be.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 11:03 AM

S: Either way the title is ludicrous, as was Crawhall's intention as a well-heeled Antiquarian Novocastrian. To include Tommy Armstrong's songs in any collection of Newcassel Sangs is way off the mark anyway...

I've always thought of Tommy Armstrong as a *Durham* poet/ songwriter. He was born in Shotley Bridge and moved to Tanfield. Tanfield's marginally nearer to Newcastle than to Durham, certainly, but, AFAIK, he spent his life in the *Durham* coalfields and so would qualify only marginally, if at all, as a "Newcassel" songwriter.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 10:45 AM

PEASANT: Its quite lost over here.

People dont generally learn songs from recordings, most dont they use them for further entertainment whilst remaining mindless.

try again

er, WHAT???!!!

What you'ved been saying is that people basically learn songs from listening to others sing them live.

Do you have ANY evidence that this is the case, or is this just another of your crass generalisations?

There are VERY few people I know who could pick up a song sufficiently well to reproduce it after one live hearing. Even after 4 or 5 hearings, they're unlikely to have it down pat.

These days, since recording media have become ubiquitous, I'd say the vast majority of people learn their songs from recordings, whether you gradually acquire the words after hearing repeated airplay in your car, or sit down with a CD or a YouTube clip with a definite "mission" to learn it.

You seem to just make up assertions to support your narrow-minded prejudices without feeling the need to back them up with ANY evidence.

You've been asked for evidence that most people don't learn songs from recordings, and you've been asked REPEATEDLY for a few named examples of these "jet setting folkies" who live by the pool, show disdain for their audiences, and work hard to limit the accessibility of folk music in order to keep their fees up.

So far, nada, because you have NO such evidence. We know it, you know it, and any passing lurker knows it.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Bettynh
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 10:24 AM

"Whenever I get a chance I push for the proper music whereever broon is sold. The company had no interest. I have also agressivly promoted the whiskey priests as they play up beat folk but although the people in the places liked the music when demmoed the owners favored rock....but I work on it."

On second reading (actually the 15th or so, you require careful translation), this sounds like a specific incident. Is this a translation to American English?:

You were drinking at a bar. You asked the bartender to play a cd you brought of music you remember fondly. S/he played it. No one liked it. You do this as often as you can afford (the beer). This is your idea of education.

If I got it wrong, forgive me. I'm not a professional storyteller. You are. Tell us a story, Conrad.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 10:23 AM

BEUK!

Here's my post from earlier:

Will - For the record, Conrad filched the title Beuk o' Newcassel Sangs from Joseph Crawhall's publication of 1888 (as published by Mawson, Swan and Morgan - who would later go on to form Morton Sound who produced your Jack Armstriong LP) along with many of Crawhall's singular woodcuts, which Conrad reproduces with little respect for their essence. Either way the title is ludicrous, as was Crawhall's intention as a well-heeled Antiquarian Novocastrian. To include Tommy Armstrong's songs in any collection of Newcassel Sangs is way off the mark anyway...

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 10:22 AM

gary miller of the priests is still at it
cutting edge of the development of the tradition of the North East
Conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Bettynh
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 10:08 AM

" I have also agressivly promoted the whiskey priests"

Are you talking about this band? As far as I can see, they were a hard-touring band that never left Europe and fizzled out 10 years ago. Are there any current performers you admire?

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Howard Jones
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 08:36 AM

Tootler, I wasn't suggesting that Tommy Armstrong's work is completely unknown in the NE - but, as you say, it's a minority interest. I would hazard a guess that if you were to stop random people in the streets of Newcastle or Durham only a handful would know who you're talking about, and even fewer would know any of the songs.

These days, most people in Newcastle work in public administration, with finance and real estate the next largest sector. What relevance have songs about mining disasters to their lives? Of course, for some there is the historical interest and link to a past culture, but they are a minority.

Conrad, it is you who keeps quoting the exceptions, and describing situations which the rest of us don't recognise as the norm. As we've told you repeatedly throughout this thread, all the things you are demanding are already happening. Just because some events don't meet your stringent requirements doesn't mean that they don't meet other people's, or that alternative events are not available - but if they're not, organise them yourself, since you tell us how easy it is.

...a link to a place where the history of the songs sung and lyrics can be found. At $13.85 a time? I don't think so.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: catspaw49
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 08:34 AM

Okay Cornhole.....If they stop citing specific examples, howabout YOUR DUMBASS STARTS GIVING SOME and STOP YOUR GENERALIZATIONS. Your arguments have no credence. Name some names Dickless.....Give us a lsit of BAD PROFESSIONALS who don't live up to your standards.

C'mon Bigmouth......or are you willing to admit you're nothing but the blowhard and asshole that you have repeatedly proven yourself to be in this thread?


Spaw

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 07:46 AM

#1 is not an exception to me. Madonna is for example better known than any folk where I have lived.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 07:36 AM

1. Yes there are exceptions, well done if that is the case, but dont cite exceptions and be aware that things are different elsewhere. In any location there is somewhat of a disconnect between the people and their music or any music that is part of their daily culture.

2. What is wrong with getting prices down- nothing. If a performer has a chance then why not stick to the cheaper places so that more can attend and be more comfortable?

3. Yes the problem is that so many are so remote from any form of oral or folk tradition that it is new to them. People however, can have their minds changed. Performers should consider working on that via encorporation of subtle educational techniques in their performances and providing listeners with a way to connect more deeply with the music. A handout or even cheaper a link to a place where the history of the songs sung and lyrics can be found. At least they then have a line on which to grasp. The last several folk concerts I attended its just thanks for coming, see you next time buy a cd. It would not be hard to do a bit more.

4. Smaller groups in performances are beneficial. Why always such large crowds. Perform a few more times and make the experience closer to your audience and reach them on a less mass produced level.

These things are simple. Why not do them?>
And no more citing exceptions yes pat yourself on the back if you are doing this already then convince another performer to do the same.

Conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 06:30 AM

If you have locked anyone out of your performance for any reason- financial, cultural whatever you are simply being selfish and greedy.

What about the reason being "they" are simply unable to relate to the music? Most players I know would be more than keen on perhaps lending a recording in a couple of cases a spare instrument to get others involved. I think the general way is to wish others can enjoy what you enjoy.

But you (at least I think so) can not force it. I (not that I'm close to this league) was once with an All Ireland Whistle player and more than adequate fiddler and we tried an informal small gathering. Only 3 sets and the locals wanted the juke box back on. Shame as the 2 players on this occasion were top class, but there is no way you can force (eg. "you must listen as I say these people are world class) on another.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Will Fly
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 06:26 AM

Thanks for the Tommy Armstrong info, Tootler.

There's no reason whatsoever why someone living in Maryland shouldn't enjoy the output of a Geordie pit poet, but to sell the songs/poems for $13.85 seems to be an inelegant ripoff to me. (I wonder what the Tommy Armstrong Society would think about it.) And, yes, I guessed the reasoning behind the "beuk" spelling - also rather naff, if you ask me.

Now, if Conrad's a fan of Bobby Thompson (The Little Waster), then I can forgive a lot. I've a couple of CDs of his live performances and they have me in tears of laughter every time I play them. There's a wonderful bit where the air-raid warning sounds when the Little Waster and his wife are in bed. He tells her to get to the air-raid shelter and tells he off when she's fumbling for her false teeth with the immortal phrase, "They're not droppin' pork sandwiches...". Priceless.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Tootler
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 06:18 AM

People dont generally learn songs from recordings

Bollocks!! I've learnt a lot of my songs from recordings. I may go to written sources to confirm words that I can't quite pick up, but the basic learning of the song is from the recording. I do also learn songs from written sources.

most dont they use them for further entertainment whilst remaining mindless.

Most people are not particularly interested in performing. Just because they simply wish to listen to the songs does not make them mindless. They will have other interests. It is surprising how many of these so called "mindless" people actually know the words to quite a number of songs and will sing them in informal settings.

Howard and Will,

I can assure you that Tommy Armstrongs songs are still sung here. Obviously, like folk music, they are a minority interest, but they are known generally well received. Bert Draycott has quite a repertoire of Tommy Armstrong songs and sings them well. The Trimdon Grange disaster is probably the most often sung. Trimdon is just up the road from here.

I'm sure you are aware that the spelling of the title of the "Beuk" is an attempt to capture the Geordie accent.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Will Fly
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 06:07 AM

No need to try again. There's no substance in your theories, and you've produced no factual evidence for them while simultaneously ignoring or evading some very pertinent questions.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 05:48 AM

Its quite lost over here.

People dont generally learn songs from recordings, most dont they use them for further entertainment whilst remaining mindless.

try again

Conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Howard Jones
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 05:01 AM

As someone's mentioned your classes on "Irish Culture", perhaps you could explain why the recommended listening includes Capercaillie's version of Both Sides the Tweed - a Scottish song by a Scottish band. The River Tweed forms part of the border between England and Scotland. It's a fine song, but nothing to do with Irish culture.

I wonder what the Irish think of you describing theirs as a "lost culture".

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 04:41 AM

Will - For the record, Conrad filched the title Beuk o' Newcassel Sangs from Joseph Crawhall's publication of 1888 (as published by Mawson, Swan and Morgan - who would later go on to form Morton Sound who produced your Jack Armstriong LP) along with many of Crawhall's singular woodcuts, which Conrad reproduces with little respect for their essence. Either way the title is ludicrous, as was Crawhall's intention as a well-heeled Antiquarian Novocastrian. To include Tommy Armstrong's songs in any collection of Newcassel Sangs is way off the mark anyway...

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Will Fly
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 04:11 AM

I get the impression that you are a somewhat rootless person who perhaps lacking a clearly identifiable tradition of his own has latched onto a number of different cultures and traditions and with the enthusiasm of a convert is trying to promote them, but has failed to understand them fully.

My impression too, Howard.

Conrad, as a person of Polish/Dutch origins with an interest in Irish culture and Oktoberfest drinking songs, may I suggest two experiments that you might care to try out when you have the time?

1. Stand in the middle of the O'Connell bridge in Dublin, stop everyone who passes you and tell them sincerely that they haven't a tune in their heads.

2. Stand in the middle of the Old Town Market Place in Warsaw - beautifully recreated by the Polish people after the WWII destruction - and sing a few Munich drinking songs in a loud voice.

See how long you last in either place.

Better still, go up to Newcastle and distribute free copies of the Tommy Armstrong "beuk". But please don't lecture us on the importance of folk culture in people's "lifeway", or on the impossibility of poor people having access to folk music because of the barriers placed by commercial entertainers - you just sound stupid.

And, by the way, why tout for donations towards the cost of your being online (which is what is on your website), or towards the cost of your computer? Just pay for them like we all do!

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Howard Jones
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 03:28 AM

The only public music that one can hear here is found in expensive places where one has to pay more than average for food and drink.

I wish that were the case here. Virtually every public space, and many shops and other premises, is playing music constantly. As for people having no music in their heads, these days most of them are permanently plugged into iPods. There are countless music radio stations, TV, and internet sites such as Spotify streaming music. People are perfectly capable of singing songs when they want to - it's just that most of them don't want to (when sober!), and most of it isn't folk music.

Can't you see the contradiction between criticising professional musicians for charging too much and not giving away song sheets, while at the same selling collections of songs yourself?

I get the impression that you are a somewhat rootless person who perhaps lacking a clearly identifiable tradition of his own has latched onto a number of different cultures and traditions and with the enthusiasm of a convert is trying to promote them, but has failed to understand them fully.

What you fail to understand is that the work of Tommy Armstrong, for example, has very little relevance today even to people in NE England, let alone those in NE USA.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 20 Oct 10 - 12:22 AM

"If you have not left a song in a persons head. . . ."

This is exactly what entertainers do, by singing songs to an audience in the first place.

". . . or the means to find and learn it. . . ."

Books and records containing these songs are readily available in almost any and every public library. Anyone with half a brain can figure this out. And if you remember a line or phrase from a song, you can google it, and almost all the time, you'll find it. Or look it up in Mudcat's "Digital Tradition" section (search box, top of this page, on the left).

One example among many:   Why do you think my television series back in 1959 was called "Ballads and Books?" The whole point was to let people who were interested in the songs I sang on the show could be found in songbooks and on records at their local library.

Don Firth

P. S. Fetch! Come on, Conrad, fetch!

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 09:32 PM

Sorry but bollocks, Conrad.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 08:56 PM

Will you live perhaps in a good neck of the woods but there is more to the body than the neck
You have not read the songs in the song beuk!

The only public music that one can hear here is found in expensive places where one has to pay more than average for food and drink. Explained above. One can purchase a cd for the cost of almost every concert even house concerts.

To be concerned with the future and spread of folk music you must hold music events in the most accessible places, and combine performance with education. What is wrong with that? Making money is not required for folk processes to work.

If you have not left a song in a persons head or the means to find and learn it you have not put the folk processes to work. If you have locked anyone out of your performance for any reason- financial, cultural whatever you are simply being selfish and greedy.

At the expense of the spread of the music one to another freely.

Conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 06:00 PM

Most people however have no music, little music hardly any music in their heads.

Possibly true when we think of folk music? And I don't have it but believe me, I know people with the thousand plus type repertoire and quite brilliant players to go with it too.

Possibly, while I too can get cynical, for the rest of us, we carry strange mixtures, eg. I might know Shall We Dance, The Trout Quintet a lovely Albeniz piece adapted for guitar - Granados - can't play any but it is amazing what we pick up.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Will Fly
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 05:40 PM

Most people however have no music, little music hardly any music in their heads.

Well, that may be the case in Linthicum, MD, but it's certainly not the case in my neck of the woods - and I'm not saying that because I happen to be a musician who lives in musical circles and has musician friends. You just can't generalise and say that most people have little or no music in their heads.

But tell me - why don't you just put the songs and tunes of Tommy Armstrong up on your web site for free? Why sell them? You already have lots of extracts of Irish writers and complete pieces by Irish writers in your website - which you advertise as part of your course in Irish culture. Just add Tommy Armstrong's stuff to it all.

As for your own culture of song - how does that (Irish & Geordie) then fit in with promoting traditional Maryland music to the Maryland lifeway of Maryland people. The music that is so important to their lifeway? You just don't add up, I'm afraid. And I repeat my question: Who are the rich folk pros who, through charging top dollar, are preventing your local people from enjoying the folk tradition of Maryland - or Ireland - or Newcastle upon Tyne?

There aren't any, of course, which is why you never answer the question!

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 05:08 PM

I am a specialist in a few areas. So that is what I do. I learned geordie music direct from the sources in durham and newcastle that is my musical home. The other is in Munich where I learned the songs at the oktoberfest- so yes from natives to me.

As far as our region we have some maritime music via annapolis and baltimore ports but regionally the area is close to bluegrass but also close to the music of west virginia

Most people however have no music, little music hardly any music in their heads.

I did not acquire folk music here but elsewhere. So I work with what is now my culture of song.

Whenever I get a chance I push for the proper music whereever broon is sold. The company had no interest. I have also agressivly promoted the whiskey priests as they play up beat folk but although the people in the places liked the music when demmoed the owners favored rock....but I work on it.

Conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 05:08 PM

"Dumbed down by entertainers and recordings!?"

Conrad, REALITY (since you can't seem to find it on your own) is not where you are.

Entertainers who sing folk songs do the MAIN job of spreading interest in folk music. And recordings are probably the best way of spreading the nuts and bolts (words and music) of folk music. The vast majority of songs I know—and the vast majority of songs that MOST singers of folk songs know and sing—are learned from recordings.

You hear a song once at a folk festival or a workshop (free or otherwise) and, even if you have the words on a song-sheet, hearing the tune only once is pretty tenuous. On a record, you can listen to the song over and over (while writing down the words, if they are not on the liner notes or an insert) drills the tune into your memory.

I have learned a lot of songs from song books and collections, like those of the Lomaxes, Cecil Sharp, and Carl Sandburg, but not everyone reads music, so the tunes are closed off to those people.

Recordings are one of the best methods of teaching people songs.

Oh! But of course! You don't want to buy CDs either!

Well, most public libraries have folk music CDs you can check out.

Things are fine here on Earth, Conrad. What planet are you on?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Will Fly
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 04:42 PM

I am not a native american (polish dutch) so they wont let me live on reservations and benefit from casinos.

You're purposely mis-reading my use of the word "native" - I mean folk music local to you, rather than Irish or Geordie. It still begs the question - what do you consider the music to be? The music that you say is so important it has to be part of a cultural lifeway? The music that poor people are prevented from having access to because of pool-hogging, hotel-hopping "folk pros"? Are the "folk pros" playing Oktoberfest music? Are they playing Irish music? Are they singing the songs of Tommy Armstrong, the Pitman Poet? These are what you're promoting on your website.

So what's "native", i.e. local to the tradition in and around Baltimore - or Maryland in general? As far as I'm aware, the folk tradition in that part of the US contains a wide variety of genres - why aren't you promoting them?

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 04:29 PM

Money gets in the way of the music when that happens. All of the music I have transcribed goes to mudcat. I cant think of anything that is not on the pages and the answer is yes and yes.

I am not a native american (polish dutch) so they wont let me live on reservations and benefit from casinos.

One man's trash is the rest of the world's treasure. My pages are free. And no lottery funds were used.

I am quite sure that most americans can not sing much more than happy birthday all the way through or even a few voices. That is because they have been dumbed down by entertainers and recordings.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Will Fly
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 11:28 AM

Folk music today is too much a business

Is that why you sell the songs and poems of the Newcastle pit poet Tommy Armstrong (ludicrously titled "The Beuk of Newcassel Sangs") from your website? Do you have copyright of these works or permission to publish them? Why not just publish them on your web pages? Are you affiliated to the Tommy Armstrong Society/?

Your website pleads for donations to keep your useless 'reference pages' online. Why should people who can read your pages, because they already pay for line charges, pay for your line charges? Your whole website - which includes stuff on Irish culture, Oktoberfest, the Battle of the Boyne and other things - contains not one iota of information or discussion of your own native American culture. It's one gigantic "buy this stuff" website.

I've no problem with you selling products and services on your website - even if I think the contents are trash - but do spare us the preaching about commercialism and money getting in the way of people enjoying folk music.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Bettynh
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 11:06 AM

"knowledge of the songs and tunes"
We've come to realize that you have your own hymnal of tunes and lyrics that you feel are sacred. What are they, exactly?

"When the lights go out what tunes will people be able to sing"
Your answer to your own question is overly pessimistic. Left to themselves, people will remember and even elaborate on music they know. Most Americans can sing without hesitation:

Happy Birthday
the national anthem
Row, row, row the boat
This Land is My Land
...and probably a hundred more

Some of the tunes hark back a few centuries in the above list and I just got started. Music happens. It's a human trait. Ceremonies, sermons, and lyric sheets are not needed.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 10:32 AM

Folk music today is too much a business and entertainment and not enough spreading active knowledge of the songs and tunes. When the lights go out what tunes will people be able to sing- answer hardly any.
And there wont be any amplification either.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 10:30 AM

If you only entertain you are not doing enough. Why not do both and yse some do but not many. Many of you while doing good dont realize that you are in the minority.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 19 Oct 10 - 05:55 AM

Jeez, is this still going?

I'm going to an Open Mic night tomorrow. They won't really be "folkies" there so I was planning to do "Breakfast Blues" and "Fishin' Blues" which I thought might be somewhat entertaining, as "Breakfast Blues" can be slightly funny if you haven't heard it before, and most of them'll know "Fishin' Blues", from the Taj Mahal vrsion if from nowhere else.

HOWEVER, now that I realise that my mission is to *educate* rather than to entertain, I think I'll give them all 13 unaccompanied verses of Golden Vanity, with lyrics sheet and a detailed run-down of the song's history, followed by a very extended version of "The Trees They Do Grow High, again unaccompanied, with notes explaining about all the different versions and the significance of certain individual verses.

I'll test them afterwards to see how much of each song is now safely "residing in their heads" rather than being unsafely committed to paper/ YouTube/ magnetic or optical media.

That should persuade most of the attendees to come along to the next acoustic singaround!!!

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 18 Oct 10 - 08:28 PM

"If professionals dont put music in the minds of people and simply entertain they are waisting our time and the result will be less folk music."

"waisting?"

What did you say your degree was in, Conrad? Honestly, have you even actually gone beyond the sixth grade?

Okay, enough of this lovemaking.

People listened to "folk music" in the early 1960s because The Kingston Trio, The Limeliters, Peter Paul and Mary, The New Crusty Nostrils, and the other hyper-pop "folk" groups were quite entertaining, even though, to a large degree, they lacked substance. It was a popular thing in the early 1960s, but going the way of all popular music fads, they were easily replaced in the mid-1960s during "the British Invasion" by such groups as The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Gary and the Pacemakers, Herman's Hermits, and the others. People turned to them for their entertainment.

But—SOME people saw beyond the entertainment value of folk music and realized that the songs themselves had substance to them beyond "mere entertainment." When the Great Folk Scare of the late Fifties and early Sixties went into decline, it left a pretty fair residue of people who took an interest in the music itself—because they found it not only entertaining, but contained many other values as well, and decided they wanted to do it themselves.   

They never would have discovered this if they hadn't FIRST found the songs ENTERTAINING.

Just the way I did when I first heard the very entertaining Walt Robertson in the very early Fifties, and decided that I wanted to do what he did. Sing songs like THAT!

The BEST way to spread an interest in folk music is to make it sufficiently entertaining that people take an interest in the songs themselves.

And like it or not, this requires people who sing reasonably well and are generally good entertainers.

I have known people who were completely turned off when they heard some bozo drone on for thirty verses of Lord Randal, last will and testament and all, singing by rote and not conveying the story itself in a gripping and entertaining manner. "You sing folk songs, Firth!?? I'm sorry, but all that 'possum up a gum stump' stuff is boring as shit! No thanks!!" THAT is the result of their having been introduced to folk music by someone who WASN'T entertaining!

So anyone who doesn't think entertainment isn't important to creating interest in folk music simply has his head up someplace where it's very dark.

But just remember:   no matter how entranced WE are with traditional songs and no matter how entertaining we may be in performing them, it is not going to appeal to everyone. People's tastes differ. Fact of life. Get used to it!

After all, Conrad, you seem to have forgotten that the reason our forefathers and mothers sang what we now call "folk songs" was (fasten your seat belt!!) for ENTERTAINMENT.

One guaranteed method of turning people off on anything is to insist that it's their DUTY!

Don Firth

P. S. I fully realize that getting even simple concepts through to Conrad is like trying to tell your pet rock to "fetch!"

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: catspaw49
Date: 18 Oct 10 - 07:23 PM

That is "Stupidassconrad Argument #28" which has already been shot full of holes on multiple occasions. You could instead name some names of these low-life, money grubbing, venue stealing, professionals who only bother to entertain that you keep on carping about.

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 18 Oct 10 - 07:08 PM

If professionals dont put music in the minds of people and simply entertain they are waisting our time and the result will be less folk music.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Tootler
Date: 18 Oct 10 - 04:21 PM

Change is often resisted by old farts who think things are just fine as they drive off the cliff.

OTOH, some people never grow up and learn to....

Oh Heck! Why bother!!!!!???????

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: catspaw49
Date: 18 Oct 10 - 04:57 AM

So Corny.....NOW I see where/how you have developed the strange notion which makes Bladeyworld so well and truly fucked up. Traditions are things which remain the same so perhaps you can understand why the rest of us (and the world) carry on traditions by NOT changing.

Of course the tradititons in Bladetworld are ever changing.....according to you, THAT makes sense. I see it now.......................all makes perfect sense if one views it from the angle of a moron.............

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 Oct 10 - 10:56 PM

And a lot of people who THINK they have a better way to do something would drive it off a cliff if their cockamammie ideas were adopted.

Fortunately, cooler heads usually prevail. Especially over the wiggy schemes of self-proclaimed "visionary artists."

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 Oct 10 - 10:14 PM

Change is often resisted by old farts who think things are just fine as they drive off the cliff.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 16 Oct 10 - 06:28 PM

45 pound turkey?

Might want to be a little careful, there!

CLICKY.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 16 Oct 10 - 09:45 AM

Hastings Borough Bonfire is meeting tonight; all Bonfire Boys attending have been advised to stay away from the pier. The Society in its present form has existed since 1995; the original Society ended immediately after the Second World War.

The Cliffe boys in the Lewes video are actively discouraging the presence of turkeys as the fireworks you will observe them merrily lighting at their torches and dropping at each other's feet, kicking into the path of a friend, and so on, are sold as agricultural bird-scarers. (The other prominent fireworks being used to good effect are hand-held yacht flares and Chinese crackers.)

Valmai (Cliffe Bonfire Society, Lewes)