Folk Songs to Ditch

Subject: RE: Folk Songs to Ditch
From: Jack Campin
Date: 22 Jul 15 - 05:59 AM

I quite like Highland Cathedral. Not at all Scottish but I don't think it's trying to be.

But Sonny, please go away.

Subject: RE: Folk Songs to Ditch
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 Jul 15 - 05:15 AM

more important to sing songs. also young people should be organising folk events

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 22 Jul 15 - 05:04 AM

ofcourse you're right Will.

however to assuage the smart arses perhaps we ought to make attending a folk club a degree only profession.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Will Fly
Date: 22 Jul 15 - 04:11 AM

Al, if you go right back to the opening posts in this thread, it's quite clear that they were written with tongue firmly in cheek.

today the loudest voices on mudcat are full of self righteous certainty that certain things aren't folk music.

Yes, but it's just Mudcat, isn't it? It's one of thousands of forums on the internet, even a major one, perhaps, but it's not the real world.

In the real world, people go out and play and perform just what they want to play and perform - and, if lucky, they find the venues where they can play their music - just like you and I have done for the last (in my case) 50 years. Fashions and tastes come and go - I've seen rock'n roll reinvented at least twice over the years. Only the other day a lass in her twenties was enjoying singing "Maids When You're Young Never Wed An Old Man" at a session. She'd heard it just recently for the first time and thought it was great - and was amazed when I mentioned that it was one of the first songs I'd ever heard at a folk club back in the mid-'60s!

What goes around comes around - play what you want to where you can and, if you work at it, someone will always want your music. There may be ups and downs in it all, and you have to live with them.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 22 Jul 15 - 01:42 AM

disgraceful thread!

the recent death of Theodore Bikel reminds me that he was the act immediately preceding Koerner, Ray and Glover at the time of their breakthrough gig at Newport. how inclusive and beautiful the scene was in those days.!

today the loudest voices on mudcat are full of self righteous certainty that certain things aren't folk music.

so many of the songs herein mentioned have enchanted audiences. have elicited a creative response from musicians. have enabled musicians to earn a living - and that has given them the money to dedicate the rest of their existence to more esoteric forms of folk music.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: LadyJean
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 11:53 PM

"Don't Laugh At Me", number one on my hate parade. "Imperfect" people with disabilities, deserve respect, not pity.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,Rossey
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 11:15 PM

Not a folk song, but has had words set to it. The tune Highland bloody Catherdral!   Bombastic, overblown and dreary and that's just without the words.   I truly hate this allegedly anthemic dirge!   But every piper loves the thing and it's ubiquitous. Heck, I wish I'd written it for the royalty payments - when it's not stolen as trad. Apologies to the writers.

A folk song to ditch... the Riddle song. Why?   If anybody watches the party scene in National Lampoon's Animal House, it makes sense.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,HiLo
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 10:17 PM

Maries bloody wedding.i do wish she had stayed single and left us in peace.i also wish to hear The Wild Rover again......no nay never!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,Olddude
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 04:44 PM

Thanks Joe i never heard that version I will look it up

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,just a-passin' through
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 04:30 PM

How about songs like "This Land Is Your Land" and other songs with political and/or otherwise radical lyrics that people don't sing? The songbook publishers when we were in school always left out the people starving, the sign that was one-sided, etc.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Joe_F
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 03:16 PM

Olddude: You might prefer "Where have all the flowers gone" as Pete Seeger originally wrote it, before it was extended into a cycle of posies by Joe Hickerson. It is short, it has a point, and there is even a variation in the tune. Look it up.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,Olddude
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 02:17 PM

Where have all the flowers gone. The song lasts two years with the endless verses and same monotonous melody

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Mr Happy
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 01:50 PM

The Sick Note!!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Mr Happy
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 01:50 PM

The Sick Note!!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Mr Happy
Date: 21 Jul 15 - 01:50 PM

The Sick Note!!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 Sep 00 - 01:57 PM

"humourous songs done more than three times" - three times a night>? three times in a lifetime?

There are funny songs, and there are humourous songs. Most humourous songs aren't actually funny, they get by on novelty, and that wears out pretty quickly.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: sophocleese
Date: 01 Sep 00 - 10:24 PM

Well first time I've sat down and read this whole thread. Interesting stuff.

First of all in defence of pipers around the world; a lot of them don't like playing Amazing Grace but, astonishingly enough, many people request it. A few years ago I saw a documentary on the song and was surprised that in all the different times they showed people singing and playing the song not once did they show it being played by a piper(it was an American documentary).

I am torn between my love of finding a new (to me) version of a song and my delight in having people sing along with me. So I try to make a mix of songs when I'm singing.

Folk Songs to ditch? How about a category: humourous songs done more than three times. However hilarious a song is when you first hear it it loses its humour far faster than a decent song with a good melody loses its charm. People are still singing Two Sisters and Little Musgrave because tragedy endures but humour is ephemeral and spontaneous.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Sep 00 - 10:18 PM

Ah...good to know...thanks!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: simon-pierre
Date: 01 Sep 00 - 10:05 PM

I don't know exactly what is a "little pig pen", but "cochonnerie" may be translated by "bullsh*t" or any other lovely word. I'm from Qu‚bec city.

(how did I made that encircled R?...)

SP

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Sep 00 - 09:54 PM

simon-pierre - does that mean "little pig"? Or "little pig pen"? Where are you located? Are you in France?

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: simon-pierre
Date: 01 Sep 00 - 09:09 PM

There's a song on the Harry Smith Anthology I can't absolutely stand and makes me wish I'll never have a better english. I don't have it near me, but I think it's called ®Single girl, married girl¯; I've read that the criminals who sang that end their carreer by singing in Disneyland. No need to tell more. Here's your new french word for today, qualifying things like this: cochonnerie.

SP

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Little Hawk
Date: 01 Sep 00 - 09:00 PM

One of the first songs I ever learned to play on the guitar was the early Dylan song "He Was A Friend Of Mine", a lament about a penniless friend who dies on the street. I got tired of it after awhile, especially in the light of about 300 other Dylan songs that were immeasureably better than that one. I can fairly much do without it.

One thing about this song...the lyrics can be pretty repetitive (unusual for Dylan), so it's important if you do play it to introduce some lyrical variety, which can and has been done. I'll be glad to supply tips on that.

Take note, flattop. Ya-ha-ha!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 01 Sep 00 - 08:30 PM

Bottom line is, as Dick Greenhaus has pointed out, no songs should ever be ditched, and none ever will from the DT.

Somewhere in my head is a list of songs I am likely to sing in the near future, and songs I am likely to avoid singing. Everyone else has an equivalent list. Thank God they aren't all the same list.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,Aidan Crossey
Date: 01 Sep 00 - 05:08 AM

And while we're on the subject any sentimental song about parents (A Mother's Love's A Blessing, Mother Mo Chroi, SIlver Haired Daddy Of Mine, Gentle Mother) or dying children (Put My Little Shoes Away, Jeannie's Afraid Of The Dark) or kindly folks explaining a parent's death to a small child (Mother Went A-Walking Son).

Fetch me a bucket!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,Aidan Crossey
Date: 31 Aug 00 - 09:36 AM

Hard to disagree with anyone's rants in the above. Glad to see that The Fields of Athenry got a mention. If I ever hear that song again ...

Glad to see also that The Wild Rover has been trashed a number of times. Reminds me of a time when I used to attend what was billed as a folk session in Camden Town, North London. In fact the "session" was an opportunity for a pretty loose confederation of musicians to play as a band for half an hour or so and then invite others to take the floor and play two or three numbers to the assembled miserable buggers who'd paid two or three quid to witness the sorry debacle. (The effect was so surreal that I used to go regularly and treat it as a bit of a comedy event.)

Anyway the "band" used to round off the evening with a few tunes to which they invited members of the audience to contribute. One of the tunes was always "The W*** R****" and till the day I die I'll never forget the band's guitarist peering over his glasses to his songbook for the chords and, even then, having to halt progress from time to time to get back on track. (And, if memory serves me right, they played the tune in F! Who in their right minds ....)

Another song which they massacred was "Sweet Betsy From Pike". I don't want to come within ten miles of that ditty again!

And while we're on the subject their stop-start version of "Bill Bailey" was a hoot!

Perhaps this "band" ought to log on to this thread, vaguely learn all of the songs which people would like to ditch, and host a nightmarish evening where they play them all really badly!

While they're at it they could include in their repertoire some of my other all time least favourite songs such as:

Ride On (a low point in Christy's career) Star of the County Down ( ... such a coaxin' elf, indeed!) Boys from the County Armagh (I'm from the place myself and therefore on my infrequent visits home have to be subjected to the song down the local pub ... Oh God!) Kevin Barry (especially when "crooned" by some red-faced drunk to whom the whole bar has to "give a bit of order") Any "funny" song sung by the likes of Val Doonican such as Paddy McGinty's Goat or Phil the Fluter's Ball (believe it or not I have heard such songs sung in public ...) "The Rose of Mooncoin", "The Banks of My Own Lovely Lee", "Limerick, You're a Lady", "Slievenamon", "Avondale", "The Bard of Armagh" And finally I'd like to be able to pass sentence on the person responsible for reviving "Living Next Door to Alice" and making it a staple at every Irish "singalong"!

.... Aidan Crossey

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Ely
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 02:58 PM

Rock and roll, nothing--we should be so lucky. It's just POP music with cowboy hats.

Anybody else from Texas? Remember the Dixie Chicks way back when?

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Bernard
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 02:45 PM

Worronearth happened to the formatting? I put line breaks in, honest!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Bernard
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 02:37 PM

Songs to ditch? Each to their own, really. I must admit songs like 'The Fields of Athenry' make me feel nauseous.

I can't quite put my finger on why, but the sentiment doesn't quite ring true. The words are somewhat contrived...

Okay, words of songs need to be contrived to make them fit a tune/metre, but there is a point where the song becomes more important than the sentiment.

On a different tack, has anyone got the words for Ted Edwards' parody on Waltzing Maltilda/Rochester? I think the first verse went:

Once a jolly swagman camped by a Goolagong A long way from Rochester, I'm sure you'll agree, And he sang as he watched and waited, squeezing Billy's boil Who'll come a waltzing Matilda with me?

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Kim C
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 01:50 PM

That's a good question, Burke, and the answer is, I don't really know. I guess we sing the more common modern version because it's what everyone knows. Did they sing it to Gilligan's Island in the 19th c?!?

Great, just what I need - another research project! :)

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Burke
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:20 PM

Oops! Make that 3 parts. They did not believe in altos at the time.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Burke
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 12:17 PM

Kim C, I bet Rock of Ages was lots more popular than AG in the 19th century as well.

Do your re-enactors a favor & insist on the 19th century version of AG instead of the one we all seem to know that's from @1909. And leave off 10,000 years that's also a late addition.

Here's New Britain in 4 parts as first published.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Kim C
Date: 30 Aug 00 - 11:45 AM

Well, since Music City doesn't have any song circles or pub sessions that I know of, I don't generally get tired of some of these songs y'all are talking about 'cause I never hear them. But from the standpoint of a living history musician, I am sick to death of The Only Hymn Ever Written - Amazing Grace. Yes, I love the song. I really do. And I love the story behind it. But for cryin out loud, can we not do Rock of Ages or There is a Fountain Filled With Blood or Something Else PLEASE?!??!! There were a lot of other hymns besides Amazing Grace in the 18th-19th centuries. And if I ever hear it on the bugpeeps again I think I'm gonna HURL.

Londonderry Air is one of my favorite melodies ever. Since we can't sing the words for reenacting purposes (since Danny Boy wasn't written until AFTER the Civil War), we will sometimes play it as an instrumental. The tune all by itself is very moving.

We also have begun leaving Dixie out of our set, except when the SCV or UDC ask us to play at their functions. We'll do it for them because they expect it. But we've pretty much cut it out because any idiot can sing Dixie. If we include Southern patriotic songs, we're more likely to do Bonnie Blue Flag or Southern Soldier Boy.

If we could get more gigs up Nawth, we'd include some Yankee songs too. :)

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST, Banjo Johnny
Date: 29 Aug 00 - 01:25 PM

There is no more Country & Western.

There is just rock-n-roll with cowboy hats.

== Johnny in Oklahoma City

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,Airto
Date: 29 Aug 00 - 12:40 PM

I'd be happy to ditch all that clumpy, predictable and simplistic Germanic alpenstuff. I'd drown all those bierkeller bands in pils.

And as I did so I'd like to sing Hi diddle ha ha ha

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Serf
Date: 28 Aug 00 - 11:47 PM

Maybe i am lucky.. i am getting exposed to enough new singer songwriters.. acoustically inclined.. that the occasional time an old folk standard is revived.. it is with a bit of pleasure... especially if the version has a nice twist to it.. None of this sentimental grace is extended to.. John Denver tunes.. but then no one has dared.... Lightfoot.. ( as a Canadian.. we get more exposure) If I could walk 500 miles.. i would have ..just to escape that song. Toronto friends on their honeymoon cruise had a New York couple as table mates.. who chose a night of rough weather to suggest that my friends must be used to stormed tossed seas.. seeing as you come from the country that gave us.. the SINKING OF THE ELLA FITZGERALD : ) sadly true.. as i picture her going under ... scat singing...

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Ely
Date: 28 Aug 00 - 11:23 PM

Thank God "Rocky Top" isn's a folk song (Felice and Boudleaux Bryant, 1967?)

I've never liked "Old Joe Clark", "The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face", or that one about the Goodnight-Loving Trail, which doesn't really make much sense. "Home on the Range" can go and so can "Ground-Hog".

I like the Hedy West version of "500 Miles", with the plucky banjo accompaniment (not my favorite method of banjo-playing by any means, but it has more life and less self-pity than some other versions).

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Troll
Date: 27 Aug 00 - 11:28 PM

When me rambling days they are over,

And the next of the rovers has come,

He'll take the old songs and he'll sing them again,

To the beat of a different drum.

The Roving Dies Hard by The Battlefield Band

Matt and Jo and anyone else; learn 'em, sing 'em and the

world be damned. If you genuinely like a song, sing it

because you may have a different take on it than anyone

else. But do it your own way. I, too, have become a litle

jaded with the Joan Baez version of Matty Groves.

troll

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Mbo
Date: 27 Aug 00 - 07:56 PM

Jo, I thought the exact same thing the last time we had a thread like this "Songs Banned at Your Folkclub". It made me made that all the old folks were dissing songs as overplayed, and I had only just learned them, or never even heard of them! And the same goes for the pop songs as well!

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Aug 00 - 07:48 PM

Don't pay any heed to the smartarse bastards, jayohjo. Songs don't wear out, they get better as they get older. That's what's supposed to happen to people, but it doesn't always seem to work for the first few decades anyway.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: jayohjo
Date: 27 Aug 00 - 07:20 PM

A lot of objections seem to be to songs that have been hugely overdone - a VERY fair point. However, as an 18 yr old, it's not always obvious what songs were overdone 20-30 yrs ago, and thus are now 'unacceptable' or at best laughable. I hear a song that i like, learn it because to me it is fresh new and most of all a good song - but i sing it in public and its not ok.

ho hum, that's the way it goes i suppose!

jayohjo XX

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,Rich(stupidbodhranplayerwhodoesn'tknowbetter
Date: 27 Aug 00 - 03:46 PM

Most of my answers have already been taken.
The Unicorn
Rocky Top
Tell me ma
Danny Boy (note to Jerry who defended the Londonderry Air; It's a beautiful Irish harp tune, but the lounge act song set to it was written by an Englishman living in Chicago.)
If I could submit a tune it would have to be The Irish Washerwoman (Hollywood's soundtrack tro nearly every pub scene!)
And while I like the Wabash Cannonball, I'd like it more if I heard it less!

Rich

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Aug 00 - 01:34 PM

"a song circle of folkies where there is no alcohol on hand" - is such a thing possible?

I've only skimmed this thread. But most of the songs I've seen mentioned are great songs, it's just that they get sung all the time by people who bounce along on the service and don't think about what they are singing.

It's the distinction between singalong and a singing circle. The singalong approach is about novelty and having a jolly time and that. A singing circle is about bringing out songs that mean something to you, and sharing that with other people.

Hearing that done with a song you thought was hackneyed and dead can raise the hairs on your neck. And it's nothing to do with the musical quality of the voice of the person singing it eiter, it can happen when some shy person with a minimal voice suddenly opens up and sings a song you thought you hated, and you realise you'd never really listened to it before.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,Meadow Muskrat
Date: 26 Aug 00 - 11:40 PM

My friend Pete used to give out the Annual Wayne Newton Song award-that level from which you can sink no lower.Some winners included Tighten Up by Archie Bell and the Drells,Everyday People by Sly Stone,Groovin by the Young Rascals, and two time winner You just keep me hanging on by the Supremes and Vanilla Fudge.I'm not sure which version was worse-Diana Ross's speeded up high pitched voice or the melodramatic cover by Vanilla Fudge.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Little Hawk
Date: 25 Aug 00 - 10:59 AM

Oh, my. Ain't that sad, though. There's a lesson to be learned here somewhere.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: LR Mole
Date: 25 Aug 00 - 10:38 AM

Yeah...a stray quote from O. Wilde just surfaced in my stew, here. He said it about parents but it's just as true of songs, especially those that toouched us: At first we adore them; then we despise them. Rarely, if ever, do we forgive them.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Rincon Roy
Date: 25 Aug 00 - 10:12 AM

Just remembering the first time I heard a straight, non-parodied, non-apologetic version of Home on the Range, Pennies from Heaven (with full intro strain), Melancholy Baby, even Ry Cooder's version of Maria Elena...

I couldn't believe they were the same songs/tunes as the tired old hackneyed worn-out, ragged and torn versions I'd always heard. Finally understood why they have lasted all these years.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: GUEST,mickeymeboy
Date: 25 Aug 00 - 02:07 AM

ANYTHING from Peter Paul & Mary

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Mbo
Date: 24 Aug 00 - 11:02 AM

Definately, "I'll Tell Me Ma". I'm still convinced that the obscure lyrics are really a strange cover, waiting to be pierced to discover the true meaning. Maybe Prof. Freud could help. BTW CB, you didn't seem to object to me singing country music last night on HearMe.

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: celticblues5
Date: 24 Aug 00 - 10:52 AM

Ben -
I'd agree with any Irish song sung in CW style, but I'd have to expand it a bit - to ANY song sung in CW style, including CW songs. ;-)

But, sorry, still love Maids When You're Young, Wild Rover (yes! - done wistfully), Broom of the Cowdenowes, Wild Mountain Thyme, & Wild Colonial Boy - guess I just don't get to hear them as often as some (honey, I live in IOWA - I don't get to do much of ANYthing as often as some).

Have to agree with hating Waltzing Matilda, Bottles of Beer on the Wall, Teach the World to Sing, Wedding Song, & Happy Wanderer.
Don't know of anyone who ever sang Green Berets SERIOUSLY (just the circles I run in, I guess).
I am kind of sick of Mattie Groves - but I think that's because everyone I ever heard sing it in person learned it from the Joan Baez songbook, & it's just the same old thing again & again, and no one would DARE CHANGE ONE WORD. By contrast, I could listen to Christy Moore's version (Little Musgrave) over & over & over.....(what a difference the right version/right voice makes!)

I don't think The Unicorn is a terrible song - I just got personally sick of it after, having sung it ONCE to cousins I was babysitting, being forced to re-sing it about a google times every time I sat with them. I don't know any kid who doesn't love it.

Agree with ditching those maudlin, supposedly Irish things like When Irish Eyes Are Smiling & all those ditties about "me auld mither."

Subject: RE: FOLK SONGS TO DITCH
From: Little Hawk
Date: 24 Aug 00 - 12:44 AM

You're singing it for the wrong audience, Rollo. You had best do it at a song circle of folkies where there is no alcohol on hand, methinks.