Al: I thought I was the support act!
Keith: get yerself over to the White Lion in Swinton on 5th August!
Thanks Al and Keith for the supportive comments. It's those that keep me going.
Incidentally, Al is another who is getting ignored by the folk clubs. Writes witty songs, has a very nice guitar style, and a friendly way with an audience. I don't seem to hear Keith's name as much as he deserves either. Singer, multi-instrumentalist and witty entertainer. And of course there's Al's friend and mine, Jack Hudson. One of the Voices of the folk world, writes good songs, one of which I'm thinking about having a go at myself, and almost completely ignored, to the folk world's eternal shame. And there are others. But we just seem to hear the same couple of dozen names ad nauseam.
The point has been made more than once about tuning, and it's a complaint I hear quite frequently. Many folk guitarists, myself included, tend to use a variety of different tunings. For the non-guitarist, I would point out that this is not a cheat, to make things easier. On the contrary; you are effectively having to re-learn the instrument for each tuning. But different tunings give different possibilities and diierent effects. I try to keep the re-tuning to a minimum, by doing a couuple of songs in the same tuning in the first half, and re-tuning in the interval, or having a couple of songs in the same half with perhaps only one string having to be re-tuned. But then I've got the harmonium and other things, so I'm not using the guitar so much. Of course, if the guitar is your only instrument, it's a bit problematical; some guitarists get around this by lugging three guitars around. That's if they can afford three guitars - good guitars ain't cheap, you know! The other problem, which is the curse of the string player generally, is keeping the thing in tune. Sometimes one particular string may be problematical. But often the problem is changes of atmosphere or temperature. Just because you tuned up before you came on stage, it doesn't mean that the instrument will stay in tune while you're there. And that doesn't necessarily mean that the instrument is at fault. It has to be admitted, however, that some guitarists in particular overdo it; whether from nervousness, or it's a delaying tactic while they think what to sing next, or remember how the song starts, or it's just a pose...I dunno. In some cultures, of course, tuning is part of the performance. maybe we're too impatient in the West.
John Kelly