Hi all,

Again, thanks for all these responses, this is just brilliant and more than I could have hoped for. I'm trying to make a list of everything to follow up on. Haven't got an account here just yet but I'm working my way through emailing everyone who has left details.

On Lomax, I've been in touch with the Cultural Equity people a bit, as well as with his archivist in the Library of Congress (couldn't be nicer people, either of them). I've made one research trip to the Lomax Family Archive in the LoC, but unfortunately it was a little while ago, and before the focus of my project changed considerably, so perhaps I didn't do the best research I could have. Since then I've been trying to look through some of the digitised stuff, and while there's a huge amount online, it's somewhat difficult to find exactly what you need.

On the Scottish left, it's certainly an important angle, but I'm ashamed to say I don't know much about it. The links with, for example, Hamish Henderson seem very important so I really appreciate the direction there.

Jack Campin: You're quite right to ask the question of whether it's all about the more well known artists. The answer is, hopefully no, but they have been my starting point for two reasons. Firstly, that's usually what information is retained and made easiest to access. For example, there are many recordings of the Clancy Brothers available online, and you can watch things like their 60s PBS special very easily. Much more difficult to find info on more obscure figures. The second is that I'm interested in seeing what sort of music like this broke through into the popular consciousness. I'm a historian firstly, so I have to try to link it to wider societal movements at the time. That said, trying to find those musicians who as you say, would play at rallies, marches etc is a large part of the reason I'm here. Their role needs preserving, too! On talking to political people, what has surprised me the most is that most of them seem to have been very indiscriminate in the sorts of music they loved. The period I'm studying, there seems to be little care in the political people's minds whether they were listening to American folk or Irish ballads or rock and roll.

On the Clancys specifically, one of the reasons I find them so interesting is exactly what a few people have said, their early enthusiasm for rebel songs/republican ballads and later distance from them. In the middle of all that you have Tommy Makem performing Four Green Fields in the bogside in 1969. There's a turning point there somewhere that I'm trying to tease out.

Jim Bainbridge - That play sounds absolutely fascinating, I'd be really interested in anything you had on that. Behan is a really central figure in this, as he's one of the only people who meets nearly everyone involved from the 50s through the 70s (and feuds with a few of them too).

My email, by the way, is sheehaj2(at)tcd.ie if anyone would prefer to exchange info that way.