The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #119547 Message #2593629
Posted By: Jack Blandiver
20-Mar-09 - 05:36 PM
Thread Name: 1954 and All That - defining folk music
Subject: RE: 1954 and All That - defining folk music
More like "here comes the horseshit". Yet another thread designed only to flame.
If you'd bother read the OP, you'd see that this thread was designed to consider Folk Music in relation to what actually happens in designated Folk Contexts. What I'm proposing here is an inclusive definition of Folk Music based on the empirical evidence.
On an average night in our Folk Club (see HERE) we might hear Blues, Shanties, Kipling, Cicely Fox Smith, Musical Hall, George Formby, Pop, County, Dylan, Cohen, Cash, Medieval Latin, Beatles, Irish Jigs and Reels, Scottish Strathspeys, Gospel, Rock, Classical Guitar, Native American Chants, Operatic Arias and even the occasional Traditional Song and Ballad. We once had a floor singer who, in his own words, sang his own composition which he introduced with the Zen-like "...this is a folk song about rock 'n' roll...".
It all goes down am absolute storm, warmly welcomed and appreciated, irrespective of ability (don't worry, I'm not about raise any GEFF Ghosts here, even though I feel half the charm is in the shortfall between intention & result) and I'm sure we're not alone is this - a Folk Club being a place where people come to do pretty much what they like, but it remains, somehow Folk Music.