"If I have made a 'hames' then I shall be glad to have it explained to me. However, I based what I said on an example given by Peggy Seeger. "
You said it was Sandra - neither would have made such an error
Using Laban, MacColl divided voice production into its three elements, speed, weight and direction
Different combination of these elements produce different effects which MacColl described by using Laban's term, "efforts"
The most common effort used by singers is;
The Press - slow, heavy and direct.
Change the speed and you get;
The thrust - fast, heavy and direct. - often used in work songs, particularly shanties
Change the direction and you get:
The slash - fast, heavy and indirect, again a feature of work songs

Further useble combinations produce
The glide - slow, direct and light
The float - slow, indirect and light
The wring - slow, indirect and heavy

It is not possible to combine some elements of singing, these are the ones mainly examined
Experimenting with sound production in this way makes the voice more flexible and heelps the singer to understand how the voice is produced - labeling efforts in this way is a shortcut for the group is assisting the singer being worked with - "try lightening you press" or "try pressing a litle harder" for instance - the technique worked perfectly, as the recordings of the meetings show

Similar work was done in experimenting with tones, but nowhere near as detailed as this
None of this has anything to do with melody, Peggy, as someone who could sight-read and play numerous musical instruments, played a major part in that side of things

By the way, there was nothing wrong with Harker discussing macColl's politics in a biography - that's what biographies are for
The problem was that he got so much wrong and appeared to have ignored the people who knew Ewan far better than he did
Your own intervention here has taken that even further and have sunk it to the sensationalist tabloid level
Jim Carroll