The 'pop group' [that dates me, don't it ?] for which I played bass guitar started doing a couple of P P & M numbers, and they went down well. There was a 'Folk Cellar' literally in the basement of the

Conservative Club, and the beer was Robinson's. It was for me a short step from P P & M to traddy music.

That said - we didn't know, at this time, that there WAS any English trad. music.

What went on was mostly Irish - including the 'rebel' songs - and American.

Shortly after, the three-chord wonders in the denim caps, writing navel-gazing songs on shit-paper in the interval, started infesting the clubs. This might have been one reason for my tastes to crystallise as a

"hard-line Traddie".


(Do not misunderstand - there are many songs sung in the 'Folk Scene' by known writers, which I like, but probably would not sing, if I were still singing !)

It took the likes of Martin Carthy, Nic Jones, the Watersons, Alex Campbell, the Ian Campbell Group, inter alia, to "ground" the likes of me, described in a local Folk magazine, produced by Jack and Lynn Taylor as

"minuscule minded traddies" by some writer or other. The same issue had Harry Boardman (RIP - memory eternal !) spelling Mr Zimmerman's change of name as "Bob Dillon".

My mother and father were singers, as was my grandfather, so I guess my interest in trad. music comes with the gene-pool.

Moreover, there were people around who were extremely knowledgable about trational music at this time, not least Jim Carroll, who posts occasionally on the 'Cat. These people gave of their time and their

knowledge without stint. These, living and otherwise, I thank without reserve.