Can a pop song become traditional?

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: The Sandman
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 04:33 PM

Jim has been very helpful in the past in providing me and others with versions of traditional songs, which I appreciate.
But performance of traditional songs is about interpretation and entertainment, it is not just about remembering words, and it should not be forgotten that all the singers I mentioned have done the business many times., and have continued to get re booked, so they do know about performance. I am not sure and have no evidence that Jim Carroll does, although he is clearly knowledgeable about tradtional song.
Jim, for your info,I saw Fred Jordan say exactly the same thing as Davenport to a singer[but without the f word], so Daven port is not alone in having done that. Personally, I would never interrupt anyone, I find background info interesting, although I cannot see the point of telling the story beforehand if you are going to sing it.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 04:09 PM

Here we go, here we go, here we go!

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: The Sandman
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 03:38 PM

Your opinion of my singing is of no interest to me,Jim.
I have enjoyed performances by Bob Davenport Jim Bainbridge and Brian Peters.
Jim Carroll gives his opinions, has anyone heard him sing?, can he entertain an audience for a couple of hours, as Davenport ,Bainbridge or Peters have done.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 02:56 PM

"or anyone else on this forum thinks of my singing and playing, or the feckin 1954 definition or any other crap, "
Doesn't stop us having an opinion of it Dick
You think 1954 iws crap - fine - you now my opinion of your singing - we're quits.
The problem with all of these arguments us that if I insisted that everybody must share my level of interest in folk or like the same things I like (I never have) there would be howls of "folk police" from the north to the south pole, yet, if I express an interest beyond just singing it or listening to it I am regularly met with much of the abuse present here "finger in ear", "purist", "intransigent", "narrow minded" and much, more more, sometime far worse.
What makes one attitude acceptable and the other not.   
Jim Bainbridge tells this story about Bob Davenport as if it was clever or even acceptable.
"First time I heard Bob Davenport in 1964(he's well known for plain speaking) a floor singer got up and spent fully 3 minutes explaining the song he was about to sing. Bob stood up and shouted from the back- 'Sing the fucking song man, stop talking about it'"
I saw behave like this a few years ago in the Musical Traditions Club, in this case, towards a young woman singer from The Aran Islands who had taken the trouble to give a brief explanation of her Irish language songs.
That is not "plain speaking" - it is downright folk fascism.
Again, why should Bob's behaviour be acceptable and the woman singer's not - Bob's a folkie star, I suppose?
There seems to be a graet deal of double standards afoot in today's folk world.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 02:28 PM

I agree with you Good Soldier Schweik. We go to a folk club for no other reason than we like the sound of the artist's voice, the quality of playing and the songs performed.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: The Sandman
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 01:58 PM

I have had a very enjoyable day singing and playing traditional songs and music.
i do not care what Jim Carroll or anyone else on this forum thinks of my singing and playing, or the feckin 1954 definition or any other crap, I sing tradtional and occasional contemporary songs cos i like them, Iwould say that was probably Fred Jordans and most other tradtional singers reason for singing them too

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Brian Peters
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 11:19 AM

OK Jim B, truce.

I've shared a few dreich ballads in recent years with Kathy Hobkirk (short clip only but good). You might have come across her at Whitby?

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 11:18 AM

Sorry Jim - didn't quite finish.
There is an arrogance among some singers that, because they are not interested in doing anything more than standing up and singing once a week, the rest of us should be as shallow.
We have to put up a great deal of stick because we do.
If it wasn't for the collectors and researchers we wouldn't have folk clubs or anything to sing in them; we'd all still be warbling about pink and blue toothbrushes.
May please some.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 11:13 AM

"Can anyone explain why it matters?"
To repeat
"It is cultural vandalism to attempt to destroy the identification of the artistic creation of an entire social group/class, in this case the largely agricultural working people.
I grew up being told that people like me never produced anything worthwhile, and we had to go to our betters for our music, our literature, our theatre, paintings...
It turns out that that was not the case; my forbears produced a body of song, music, oral literature that spanned centuries - something to be proud of - not made "irrelevant" at a whim."
Not important to you maybe but, as a working class lad who left school (Secondary Modern) having been told after being late for a maths class because a kindly music teacher tried to help me understand the scales, "What do you need that for - do you intend to earn you wages singing in the street" - he went on "All you need to be able to do when you leave here is to tot up your wage packet at the end of the week" - the fact that working people have created a unique musical culture of their own is bloody important to me and worth defending and passing on.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 09:29 AM

Nobody's telling you what you ought to sing Brian- we're all capable of deciding for ourselves what we like- you've gained great respect with the choices you've made, so if it works for you......!

Not sure if you WOULD do Oasis songs down your local, but I've always tried, with some exceptions mainly due to reducing attention spans in 2015, to do much the same in my local as I do at folk clubs/festivals.

Living in Ireland probably makes that a bit easier maybe, although as communication is important in music (however defined!), I've never sung any Tommy Armstrong songs in Co Leitrim.

Also I did accept earlier that listening live to source singers may have made me intolerant of anything less..... you probably hear more attempts at 'dreich' ballads than I do, as an infrequent UK visitor, but I'd take some convincing about your assertions in that area, especially when coming from younger folk celebrites (no names, have upset enough people already!)

Am sure you all enjoy discussing the 54 definition, whatever that is, am sorry to say it doesn't interest me- logical really, when I have no interest in pigeon holes, which is the original aim of this thread- to paraphrase that.........' is it folk?'

Can anyone explain why it matters?

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 18 Nov 15 - 04:11 AM

"There's nothing wrong with the 1954 definition if it floats your boat.   It is irrelevant otherwise."
Nope - wrong again - until someone comes up with a new one it's what we've got to explain a unique music
You want another - come up with one, persuade others that it is "relevant" and document it - that's what we have had to do.
No definition is "irrelevant" - that's crass.
This music represents the artistic creation of an entire people - centuries of it.
If we are unable to discuss it because a tiny group of folkies can't be arsed to come up with a description for what they do - bit of a shame really, doncha think?
You claim that we are in the minority - wrong again - you have no definable definition, we have, you have no definition, we have, you have no track record, we have - centuries of it, you have no literature, we have - libraries full.
You don't have agreement among yourselves.
It is cultural vandalism to attempt to destroy the identification of the artistic creation of an entire social group/class, in this case the largely agricultural working people.
I grew up being told that people like me never produced anything worthwhile, and we had to go to our betters for our music, our literature, our theatre, paintings...
It turns out that that was not the case; my forbears produced a body of song, music, oral literature that spanned centuries - something to be proud of - not made "irrelevant" at a whim.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 05:30 PM

There's nothing wrong with the 1954 definition if it floats your boat.

It is irrelevant otherwise. I dare say 99.9% of people who enjoy folk music have never heard of it and would have a quiet chuckle if they read it. It describes a view, and just like Jim's dismissal of Child ballads sung for wider audience, based on subjective and arbitrary taste.

Anyway, I saw Robert Plant in concert last year. Looks like an old man to me.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 02:48 PM

"There is nothing wrong with the 54 definition. "
It certainly needs revisiting.
"However the word has now taken on a much wider meaning not totally unrelated to 54"
If it has, it is only to a miniscle number of people who apparently can't agree among themselves enough to cobble together an explanation of what they men by "folk" other than it means what I want it to mean" - just like Humpty Dumpty.
If it has come to mean something else, what is that something else, and who else agrees with your definition? Language- communication relies on consensus, otherwise we might as well keep it all to ourselves.
Until someone comes up with a new definition, the old one stands, warts and all.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 01:32 PM

Agreed, Jim.
There is nothing wrong with the 54 definition. It describes very well the music we love and respect.

However the word has now taken on a much wider meaning not totally unrelated to 54. I have no problem using qualifiers like 'traditional', 'vernacular' when in the company of the millions who use the term in a wider sense.

If you mixed with people on a daily basis who only knew this wider meaning you would find it very tedious continually having to explain that you only accept the 54 definition and then having to repeat it all.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 01:21 PM

"Jim, on this one you'll be pleased to note you are decidedly wrong"
I do hope so so Steve, but I've got a little tired with a situation where it is virtually impossible to discuss the subject because of people who seem to be arguing that the existing definition is rubbish, but are unable to offer one of their own.
As usual, this discussion has degenerated into one of taste rather than definition - somehow I regard that as a sign of dislike - If I like it, it's folk/traditional.
I've also become tired of scurrilous attacks on old singers because they don't sound like Peter' Paul and Mary, or, in this case Led Zepplin.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 12:58 PM

"Can a pop song become traditional?"

yeah... maybe... possibly.. eventually.....???



I vote for "Wig Wam Bam" and "Little Willy" by the Sweet.

Shame Gary Glitter turned out the way he did and buggered all chances for "I'm the Leader of the Gang (I Am)"... 😜

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 12:38 PM

A point I endeavour to make every time this for some reason so widespread solecism occurs

Whatever point they may be urging, it is surely reasonable to expect contributors to this forum to be able to spell the name of Cecil Sharp correctly.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 12:13 PM

So the usual Jim reckons people who don't like folk used the term for their own unrelated songs.

Says it all really. I doubt those of us out there in clubs and venues keeping it alive and kicking, fascinated and thrilled by the high profile these days with young musicians could ever be so insular, precious or plain wrong.

Folk is folk. If only folk songs are folk, what name do we give to folk songs?

Quoting dead men had no relevance to alive young people. Being around many years ago is no more relevant than being a teenager. Folk is a living tradition so old views become irrelevant as new views take to the field. New views feed off the old but living folk music is more related to rock than warbling. Just as a starter, hear the many interpretations of known songs by young artistes on the BBC Folk Awards albums. Tell me that folk isn't that? Get your 1/4" reels out and enjoy them Jim. They are part of the provenance of what the rest of the world calls folk.

Cecil Sharpe would have said the same about melodeons playing Morris tunes.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Brian Peters
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 11:11 AM

"I can't take lectures from you Brian about context"

I'm not lecturing anyone - just asking what happens to 'context' when a traditional singer finds him- or herself in the dreaded folk club room upstairs with all those Child ballad droners. The singers themselves seem to have been perfectly happy about it - Jeff Wesley is a regular at Northampton Folk Club, Thomas McCarthy used to frequent clubs in London.

"none of them made any distinction as to the category a song fitted into"

Not my fight - you should discuss that one with the other Jim.

"And while Tam Lin & Lord Bateman are wonderful tales & of great value, it takes a real talent to communicate orally such material in 2015. It seems to be a lost art"

Says who? I've heard some great renditions of both those and many others in the last few years, and I've been in some memorable dreich ballad sessions too. Some of the most enthusiastic comments I've ever had for the ballads I sing has been from non-folkies or new-to-it folkies. I wouldn't do them in the local pub, but then again I wouldn't be encouraged to sing anything there unless I took a microphone and played Oasis covers (and my local is unusual in tolerating live music at all). Even the romantic picture of a sozzled 'Lily of Laguna' in the public bar is a museum piece, treasured in the memory like Wicketts Richardson and Cyril Poacher, but gone forever.

The reason I jumped into this thread again is that I really get cross with the attitude (expressed in the original Reg Hall quote) that old ballads should be allowed to die with the likes of the Stewarts and Lizzie Higgins, because later generations of singers are somehow unworthy. No! They are some of the most thrilling and cathartic songs ever made, and will be enjoyed and rediscovered long after 'Lily' has been forgotten.

You sing the songs you like, Jim (I really enjoy your stuff, for what it's worth), but lay off telling me what I should and shouldn't be singing!

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 09:40 AM

Am flattered that I am now considered to be the 'right' Jim- told you I was right (addressed politely to the 'wrong Jim')

Seriously though, I can't take lectures from you Brian about context- I knew personally many of the folk you mentioned- none of them made any distinction as to the category a song fitted into- except when guided by some song collector with his own agenda. And while Tam Lin & Lord Bateman are wonderful tales & of great value, it takes a real talent to communicate orally such material in 2015.
It seems to be a lost art- or maybe I'm spoilt by years of listening to the Stewarts and their ilk. They knew their contexts, and chose their songs accordingly. Surely we all do? At an after- folk club late-night session, surely no- one would launch into a set of 'dreich' ballads?- or maybe some would?

It's obvious that we all have different tastes and can certainly reject a song purely on that basis, but I still can't see why all this pigeon-holing is so important to people!
I note there is a parallel discussion on whether a 'folk' song can become a 'trad' song- equally pointless...

A reviewer once said of a CD of mine- 'Jim only sings the songs he likes'   I think I know what he meant & maybe you can work it out, but there isn't really any alternative to that, is there?
               signed the right Jim

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 09:08 AM

'very different from the UK where they can't tell the difference between a ballad and a ballet.'

Jim, on this one you'll be pleased to note you are decidedly wrong.

There are plenty of young people here now who know the provenance of the ballads, the people who sang them, and who are treating the material in a very respectful way. They are even going out collecting themselves and are organising clubs and conferences themselves. I see all of this as very healthy. Many are second and third generation folkies but by no means all of them.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST,Desi C
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 08:57 AM

Can S.h.i.t.e ever be called chocolate!

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Lighter
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 08:47 AM

The versions on this thread strengthen the claim that "My Brudda Sylvest'" has indeed become "Traditional":

thread.cfm?threadid=350

In other words, long history, oral (besides printed) tradition, practical anonymity, variant versions.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 07:16 AM

"You see, language, definition, millions of people and reality tend to concur with me, "
No they don't I'm afraid - the vast majority of people have neither interest in nor knowledge of folk song of any shape, form or description and the tiny few who profess or have an interest can't even even agree with each other - leaving you in a minority of a minority.
Folk song had been de-defined, not redefined
Would those figures were different, but creating smokescreens around what folk song is isn't going to improve things one iota - the Irish experience of what has happened to traditional music here, with many thousands of youngsters flocking to play traditional music because they know what it is and where to find in - very different from the UK where they can't tell the difference between a ballad and a ballet.      
Sorry 'bout that - and for the loss of your cookie - hope she returns to bake you a nice pie before too long
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Lighter
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 07:03 AM

> people who don't actually like folk/traditional song but for some inexplicable reason, want to use the title for their own, unrelated songs.

You nailed it, Jim.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 06:55 AM

Well bugger me. Wrong Jim.

Sorry for that.

But not sorry for the other observations, not one bit. You see, language, definition, millions of people and reality tend to concur with me, or at least what I am putting here.

My cookie buggered up. Sorry. Hopefully this one is signed in.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 05:37 AM

"You're addressing the wrong Jim,"
Thanks for that Brian, saves me the trouble
Far from Child ballads being the domain of academics, some of our finest and most important Child ballads have come from Travellers, mainly Irish and Scots - right upto th latter half of the 20th century.
Hamish Hederson called them as the Muckle (big) songs and MacColl who breathed life back into 137 of them, described them as "the high-watermark of the tradition and compared them to the best of Shakespeare.   
"You have no concept whatsoever of the evolution of traditional song, it's integration into the fashions of the day, "
Neither does anybody else to a great extent as very few people have ever bothered to ask the singers about them to any great extent; but those of us who are interested in them, who actually like them and who have got up off our arses to try and find out about them are entitled to make an educated guess based on the information we manage to glean.
(poor use of the apostrophe there by the way!!)
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Brian Peters
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 04:20 AM

"why say only academics should have anything to do with Child ballads?"

You're addressing the wrong Jim, 'Guest'. Be nice to know your name, btw - we're all signing ours!

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: The Sandman
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 03:58 AM

As far as I am concerned he was King Cunt, like most of the other Kings Of England,he would have been better employed making sure his fellow countrymen were better looked after instead of getting his followers to take him to paddle around in the tide.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 03:47 AM

If it isn't about personal taste, why say only academics should have anything to do with Child ballads?

You have no concept whatsoever of the evolution of traditional song, it's integration into the fashions of the day, as exampled over hundreds of years or even, judging by your posts, an appreciation of music.

A useful librarian but no author or indeed reader.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 03:34 AM

"Anais Mitchell and Jefferson Hamer"
Somebody loaned me a copy of their Child ballad album earlier this year - I got three tracks in and gave it back - dreadful schmaltz!
As I said, diff'rent strokes for diff'rent folks.
This should not be about personal taste, which is, as the label said, 'personal' and has nothing whatever to do with definition, which, once challenged, is avoided like the plague by people who don't actually like folk/traditional song but for some inexplicable reason, want to use the title for their own, unrelated songs.
MacColl once said in an interview we did with him that folk songs have served people for many centuries and have managed to survive true to their own utterance and in different forms throughout that time, but they will never survive if they fall into the hands of people who don't like them - that statement is beginning to make sense to me.
I've always been disturbed by those who described the old singers who were generous enough to give us our beautiful repertoire of songs with phrases such as "old man crooning out of tune into a cheap microphone entertainment" - ungracious, to say the least.
No - folk is not taste - you silly man - you cannot 'like' a genre of music into existence, any more than you can dislike it out of existence - it is what it is whether we like it or not (otherwise, there would be no Wagner, as afr as my tastes go!!)
I am appalled that a racist such as Bozo-no-Brain (the poster who described the ten Travellers recently burned to death in a tragic fire here in Ireland as "thieving Gyppos". when the news of their death was announced), should renew his attacks on Travellers on this thread - please go away.   
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 03:06 AM

"I think Led Zeppelin are noisy inarticulate shit, devoid of content" - surprising statement from someone who insists that gypsies be called travellers or was it the other way round!!!

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Nov 15 - 02:56 AM

Interestingly, some of the Child ballads have been recorded as beautiful music by Anais Mitchell and Jefferson Hamer. It's a good job real people don't share Jim Carroll's insular views. The album has, I believe, had over a million downloads on iTunes, who knows how many on Amazon and tracks appear on many compilations, including an extra session they did for The BBC.

Folk is taste you silly old man. It's a word we use in the same way as rock, pop or classical to denote a wide genre. The people at the tail end of a romanticised oral tradition are merely part of it. They captured the imagination of people who then turned it into music for a c20 audience. Provenance and to your particular taste, acceptable. To my taste, nostalgic for a folk club circuit that doesn't quite exist but if it's all the same to you, raw material in an artistic sense.

I gave a lift to someone the other day and happened to be listening to John Eliot Gardner's excellent interpretation of Vivaldi's Gloria. "Oh, you like your classical music then?" He said. "Yes" I said. Far better than trying to make pedantic irrelevant points by trying to say Vivaldi is baroque not classical.

The rewording of Jeff Beck's Hi Ho Silver Lining sung by twenty five thousand fans at the match last Saturday answers the original question. If that isn't an example of evolving in the oral tradition I fail to see what is.

I sing many child ballads but am not an academic in the subject. Why are people clapping at the end Jim? (Possibly because I've stopped singing, before anybody else says it.)

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 08:31 PM

"old man crooning out of tune into a cheap microphone entertainment"
Meant to add that the public recordings of Harry Cox were made by the BBC, by Alan Lomax and Ewan MacColl, by Charles Parker and Phillip Donellan - all of whom used high quality, expensive microphones.
It appears you didn't get too much right in your posting Guest
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 03:46 PM

Oh! Could have sworn I copied the Levy copy before I got my original. Can easily scan it for you if you're interested. I think I got it from Ebay.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Lighter
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 03:35 PM

Steve, I see the Lasky/Fischer song is called "My Brudda Sylvest."

The sheet music is not viewable due to "copyright restrictions."

It was copyrighted at the Library of Congress on May 16,1908.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 03:23 PM

"I don't exactly call an old man crooning out of tune into a cheap microphone entertainment"
You are talking about personal taste again - nothing top do with definition
Harry, despite his age and all the problems that brings managed to convey the feeling of the songs to all who cared to listen - as did his contemporaries - fairly rare in most modern singing.
Singing with guitar' finger in ear - if you are going to denigrate a music you obviously don't like - the British tradition is largely an unaccompanied one - the traditional singers almost universally sang unaccompanied.
Nobody sings with "his finger in his ear" that would be stupid.
However the act of cupping the hand over the ear in order to stay in tune is centuries (possibly millenia) old - particularly useful to street singers and ballad sellers in the open air
Try to get it right
This thread has become overloaded with personal taste from people who neither like nor appear to understand folk song - somewhat arrogant to pontificate in those circumstances eh- what.
Personally, I think Led Zeppelin are noisy inarticulate shit, devoid of content - but I wouldn't put it forward as an argument that my music is better and it would be extremely arrogant of me to do so.
If you don't like the goods, don't muck 'em abaht.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 02:37 PM

I'm sorry to send you on a wild goose chase, Jon. I didn't mean to. I have the original sheet music and a cylinder recording of the original singer. They're not difficult to come by.
Words by Jesse Laske and music by Fred Fischer, published in 1908 so your Morning Oregonian was referring to a song just out. I think there's a copy of the sheet music on Lester Levy site as well.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Brian Peters
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 12:10 PM

"Just concurring with the views of Reg Hall, an early stalwart of the tradition- re- 'Lily of Laguna', the views I mentioned were expressed 50 years ago- if it's a good song, who cares if it is traditional or not- you lot can't even define it and PLEASE DON'T TRY!!!"

Defining what is traditional or not was precisely what Reg Hall was doing in that statement made fifty years ago - it's just that he was defining it purely by context and not at all by musical and lyrical content. My first reaction to his words (especially regarding the phrase 'interesting and meaningful' to describe the performance rather than plain 'enjoyable') was that they reeked of an elitism of their own. The perspective of a sociologist rather than a listener.

The problem with a 'context is everything' approach is that it means that Fred Jordan was 'authentic' when singing in the Church Inn in Ludlow, but not when at the National Folk Festival. You could say the same for Lizzie Higgins, or Willie Scott, or any traditional singer who ever performed for a 'folk scene' audience.

"the Child ballads are an important body of work but the chances of anyone giving a meaningful and sympathetic delivery of a Child ballad in 2015 are slim (at least 50 years ago there was a real possibility of hearing ballads in a social context)
There's always an exception of course delivered vibrantly to what is after all a tiny minority of the population- ie folkies)...
but such material is far better left to the academics these days I think."

We're all entitled to our differing tastes, Jim, but I do find that statement staggering. Why can no singer be expected to give a meaningful delivery of an old ballad in 2015? Are you saying that modern singers lack the imagination and empathy to find and communicate the excitement and emotional depth of material from two or three hundred years ago? Or is it just that it wouldn't go down well in the taproom of your local pub, so is therefore of no value? The material is valid as long as there is an audience ready to listen to it - who's entitled to decide what is an appropriate 'social context'?

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Lighter
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 11:59 AM

Getting back to "My Brother Sylvest'," the earliest reference I've found is in The Morning Oregonian (Portland), Sept. 28, 1908, p.8. Sung in a comedy called "Coming through the Rye," it is described as a "more or less well known...dainty little Dago ditty."

The magazine Our Navy (September, 1915), p. 42, mentions "Brother Sylvest'" as one of several "Famous Italians" along with "Chris Columbus...Garabaldi...Marconi."

Sorry, no lyrics.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 11:50 AM

According to Jim Carroll, if you buy a tin of salmon etc...

Well, if you have been listening to folk music for years and years and you then buy an album expecting folk music but you get folk music instead?

I shall happily listen to Dave Burland with his guitar and silky voice singing A Sailor Cut Down in His Prime, and I call it entertainment but whilst acknowledging the contribution Harry Cox made in ensuring the song has a new audience, I don't exactly call an old man crooning out of tune into a cheap microphone entertainment. Provenance yes, but we all have our particular ideas.

Led Zeppelin singing Gallows Pole is rock. An old traditional song can be rock then. Just as a Vin Garbutt song written last year can be folk.

It isn't difficult. They are all music. A folk style? Quite a few of those to go at. Warbling into a guitar c/w harmonica, mumbling with your finger in your ear, guitars, bass and drums, fiddles, bodhran and pipes, even banjo if you must stretch a point.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 11:38 AM

"I've never gone out of my way to upset purists ear-fingerers or anyone really"
Sorry Jim, but I find "inviting vitriol from purists" pretty offensive - the term itself is pretty offensive - sort of like calling the man who asks for salmon and is given butterbeans a pedant -after all, it's all food!!
Nobody "rejects" any form of music - our collection ranges from Maria Callas to Frank Sinatra, some opera, blues, jazz 1930s swing, music hall... an extremely catholic collection.   
The fact that we don't accept a type of music as traditional doesn't mean we don't listen to it or like it.
I actively don't like modern pop for all sorts of reasons not relevant here, but that's about it.
THere is nothing whatever blinkered about either not counting music as traditional or even disliking some music - that's called "taste" and it is somewhat arrogant to suggest that there is something wrong with us because we all don't like that same things.
One of the best singers we ever recorded was a blind Irish Travelling woman with a repertoire of somewhere between 100 and 200 traditional songs (never managed to record them all)
She could have doubled the number of songs she gave us with her Country and Western songs but despite our requests for her to sing them, she refused saying "they're not what you want - I only ing them 'cause they're what the lads ask for down the pub".
In the five years we knew her she refused to sing one of them, though it was very much a part of what we did to have recorded them.
Sharp may have missed some, but what he got was a treasure trove and we can only speculate what he missed.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 11:19 AM

Of course, King Cnut didn't want the tide to go back. What he was actually doing was demonstrating to his flattering courtiers the limitations of even a king's power, by making them get their feet wet -- an exemplar of rightness rather than of vanity. My late first wife Valerie put it rather well in one of her books: she wrote, "History has given Canute the wrong footnote."

So I agree with Steve's analogy. We are, alas, not going to stop them saying "folk" so promiscuously about things that we know are nothing of the sort, much as we would love to do.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 11:17 AM

sorry- firing blanks again....

My question really was about whether a definition is necessary- we all think we know what folk/traditional music is & while we can try & define it, my feeling is that it's a style rather than a repertoire- I remember a recording of travellers at a campfire singing 'I'll never forget my blue eyes' long before I heard Johnny Cash singing it, and Jack Elliott's. brother Reece was singing 'Sylvest' at the Birtley club in the mid-sixties.

I I've never gone out of my way to upset purists ear-fingerers or anyone really but if otherwise perceptive people reject a song because it's not 'folk' or 'traditional' they are missing a hell of a lot, just like Cecil Sharp, who rejected material for different, but equally blinkered reasons....

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 11:03 AM

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Lighter
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 09:59 AM

> I can live with this.

Me too. The issue, however, is that some people not only insist that the term "folk music" has no real meaning; they also want us to believe them.

The ballgame analogy is an excellent one. Not perfect, but excellent.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 09:43 AM

Jim,
I like your answer to my question about 'Sylvest'. Respect.

I am with you 99% of the way for what it's worth. Almost all of us interested in any way in traditional folk music know pretty precisely what we are talking about when we discuss it and your 'definition' of this would probably fit my definition like a glove.

BUT it didn't do King Cnut any good telling the tide to go back. 'Folk Music' has come to have a much wider accepted meaning over the last 50 years and this doesn't need to have a definition. Like other genres of music it is a broad umbrella. I can live with this.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 08:20 AM

"as relevant as pocket lint"
I assume you have come up with an alternative of your own - or somebody else s?
I await with interest.
If not, I'll stick with what I've got.
You calypso analogy is fairly irrelevant
That the pop industry was prepared not to include calypso to sell their product is surely the point - commercial enterprises do that sort of thing all the time
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: GUEST,Phil
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 08:02 AM

"If you paid £30 or £40 pound to see a football match would you be just as happy if 13 or 15 lads came out with an oval ball?"

"If I bought a tin labeled 'salmon' and go home to find it was full of butterbeans because John Wests had decided salmon wasn't making enough profit, I would be entitled to go back and complain and, if doing so had caused me time and expense, some recompense (after all, the word "salmon" isn't copyrighted
If they persisted, I would be entitled to sue them.

'I think I know what folk/traditional song is - have spent over half a century trying to come to terms with it."

There is damn little traditional "calypso" on history's first and only million seller calypso album (Calypso, Belafonte, RCA LPM-1248, 1957.) And there were hundreds of other artists and songs from around the globe that self-defined as "calypso." Yet I don't know a single university professor of West Indian music who doesn't insist on hewing to a rigid, dictionary definition of calypso as Trinidadian folk.

In the half-century of my own research I've found academic, textbook and/or Mudcat definitions are about as relevant as pocket lint to the overwhelming majority of music makers and consumers (and fwiw, the true history of caribbean pop/folk music.) No refund, no return.

Subject: RE: Can a pop song become traditional?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 16 Nov 15 - 05:37 AM

"Sadly, nobody has the copyright on the word folk"
Probably the least convincing and irrational argument of all times
Language is what it is because of usage and track record - it's how we communicate.
If I bought a tin labeled 'salmon' and go home to find it was full of butterbeans because John Wests had decided salmon wasn't making enough profit, I would be entitled to go back and complain and, if doing so had caused me time and expense, some recompense (after all, the word "salmon" isn't copyrighted
If they persisted, I would be entitled to sue them.
The misuse of existing words is usually down to ignorance and often stupidity.
The deliberate use of words in order to push your own interest or product is simply dishonest and often dealt with through the Trades Description Act.
If you have something to give or sell you are morally obliged to describe accurately what it is.
Your argument is simply dishonest cultural vandalism - "I will call my music "folk music" because it suits me to do so - it doesn't matter how it affects the recipient.
Jim Carroll