"Just what folk song does Ewan McColl's "Dirty Old Town" sound like?"
Ewan adapted the tune from Isla Cameron's 'Waters of Tyne' - the two were working together on the play the song was written for when it was composed
MacColl's technique was to choose a tune and spend hours humming it through, making changes until he was satisfied with it
I was lodging with them when he was working on a new song - it drove the household nearly insane !
Some of Ewan's early tunes were unchanged lifts of traditional ones - but I can think of only a few he did this with later
The most successful exception was his beautiful 'Joy of Living' which he picked up from Sicilian singers while he and Peggy were on holiday
Jim Carroll