The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #95495 Message #1860354
Posted By: treewind
16-Oct-06 - 11:08 AM
Thread Name: So what is *Traditional* Folk Music?
Subject: RE: So what is 'TRADITIONAL' Folk Music ?
The trouble with definitions is that we try to separate tunes and songs into those that are traditional and those that aren't, and that kind of definition falls apart all over the place, for a good reason.
"Traditional" isn't a type of song, it's a PROCESS that happens to a song, a way of passing it on.
Not knowing the identity of the author of the song is a side effect of that process, but if you thought a song was traditional and then you suddenly learn that somebody (whether still alive or not) wrote it, the song doesn't lose its traditional status, because it never had it in the first place. All it means is that you originally learnt the song through that traditional process (i.e. hearing someone else sing it).
Of course the traditional process has a lot of other side effects that we attribute to "traditional" songs, like evolving and changing with time and thus being found in many versions with different tunes and variations on words.
As for relevance, many traditional songs deal with human emotions and predicaments that are timeless. It doesn't matter if the details of the song are out of date (sailing ships, swords, horses, greedy millers, milkmaids and ploughboys etc.) the real issues (love gained and lost, jealousy, greed, exploitation, success, failure, friendship, war, revenge) are all very much still with us and a good song illuminates the associated feelings with a clarity that makes people want to learn the song and pass it on.
A comment on compemporary songwriting - there seem to be two sorts, the ones that are in a "traditional" style and the ones that imitate pop music. There is a useful distinction to be made here. Pop songs are created as an instrumental arrangement created in the recording studio, of which the vocal part often doesn't stand up an a song by itself; modern folk songs of the more traditional style have a coherent tune and lyrics that make sense by themsleves. It's not surprising the latter style is easier to learn, take away and perform to someone else - in other words the song is compatible with the "folk process".