The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #65102   Message #1796134
Posted By: Sandra in Sydney
29-Jul-06 - 09:07 AM
Thread Name: Is it really Folk?
Subject: RE: Is it really Folk?
But (and I'm sure, in this erudite gathering, that if I'm wrong someone will correct me) I think that many of the source singers who have inspired many of our best revival singers had repertoires that ranged from the "old" traditional songs to far more recently acquired ones, so not much changes. Except the names and faces of the people debating whether or not it's folk music!
............

Australian traditional singers Carrie Milliner & Maysie Tucker sang everything from traditional ballads to advertising jingles & everything in between. They have been collected by researchers from the National Library Oral History & Folklore collections

In the 20's Carrie & her siblings learnt songs from family members - alive & dead. Some songs went back to the mid 19th century & had been passed on from great grandfather. Her archive has been mined by a number of current performers, especially Jason & Chloe Roweth (Sleepers - a snapshot of songs collected from traditional, unaccompanied singer Carrie Milliner - traditional ballads, early country songs, musical hall humour, heart songs)

Maysie has contributed around 600 songs, and I'm sure she's still remembering stuff as she was doing so at Easter when I last saw her.

Both Carrie & Maysie sometime had trouble remembering their family version of a song when later singers had popularised another version.

Folk lives!

sandra