Kim
"I'm a storyteller. I just happen to tell the stories in songs."
That is exactly what every singer we have asked has said to us.
This was highlighted for us while we were recording a couple of elderly brothers thirty-odd years ago in North Clare.
Between them they gave us a dozen or so songs, Child Ballads, narrative and lyrical songs, Anglo and native Irish.
Around half a dozen of them were sung to the same tune, which was obviously regarded as a vehicle for telling the story.
It is interesting to compare this with the tendency nowadays (here in Ireland at least) for the song to be regarded as a means to display musical skill.
A couple of years ago I sang at a session during a week-end gathering.
The son of a friend came over when I had finished the song 'Ranter Parson' and said rather bemusedly - "That's a story, isn't it"?
Jim Carroll