Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 11 Jul 02 - 05:57 PM

Duh!

"O Brother, and Beyond"

And then copy edited together from all the great ideas above.

~S~

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Barbara Shaw
Date: 30 Jun 02 - 08:29 AM

Maybe it's the rhythm component that can tie all these types of music together, whether it's driven by a mandolin doing chops, a bodhran, a frailing banjo, a Gypsy violin, Cajun washboard, whatever. There's a strong rhythm basis in much world music, and it's the pulse that makes the music come alive.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Sorcha
Date: 29 Jun 02 - 02:41 PM

Let's try this on........Galicia is in Spain and is part of the Celtic fringe; the Moors invaded and ruled Spain (and most of the known world). Moors brought Arabic/Eastern tunes. Does that get us anywhere?

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: NicoleC
Date: 29 Jun 02 - 11:11 AM

Maybe we can tie Eastern Europe in through Germany? There were tons of early Palatine settlers in MD and VA, and a wee bit latter in PA. Lots of French influence, but certainly some Eastern European as well.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Les from Hull
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 02:27 PM

As an aside - I went to my first bluegrass session in the UK a couple of years ago. I've always enjoyed the music, but I would hardly say that I'm knowledgeable. Any road up, I joined in with what I had to hand (a D/G melodeon) and I was quite surprised to be offered a break. I rapidly invented a bluegrass melodeon style. So at least we can say that bluegrass is still evolving!

There was a old-timey stepper there as well who wanted to dance a few steps and the bluegrass players didn't know what to do. We soon found a few old-timey tunes that they knew, and asked the dancer to set a pace that we could all join in with. All in all, an interesting night.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 11:56 AM

The New Road to Alston turns out to be a modal form of Davy Davy Knick-Knack, which turns up under a variety of names in the USA as well as in England and Scotland, so you're not really off-topic at all.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 11:28 AM

Whether in a man'o'war, a prairie schooner, a vardo, a canoe, a box-car, a Model-T or just a pair of boots ....they all packed fiddles

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 11:19 AM

We've got a Cumbrian tune, the "New Road to Alston" that sounds amazingly kletzmerish, because it's in the Aeolian mode in Aminor, witha couple of quite notable F naturals.Nothing unusual about minor tunes here, but they are normally Dorian. Sorry, getting away from the subject, and not producing any usable copy.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 11:07 AM

"What is it that makes a hard working man (or woman) pick up his fiddle [or other instrument] at the end of a day, and play what he (she) plays?"

(THAT's what comes out in all this music.)

~S~

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Jim Krause
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 11:04 AM

Yeah, the E. Europe thing is a little problematic. Although our band did play Soldier's Joy in D minor on a couple of occasions. Sounded rather klezmerisch to me. The dancers thought it was pretty funny, too.
Jim

P. S.
WYS, there's a folklorist named Samuel P. Bayard who wrote a book called Dance to the Fiddle, March to the Fife: Instrumental Folk Tunes in Pennsylvania. You might wish to get a copy of it at a used bookstore. This guy has all kinds of research on instrumental folk music he collected in W. Pennsylvania. JK

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 10:55 AM

Doing my best, cant seem to get a good handle on the klezmer connection.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 10:48 AM

Officer's Doxies?

I have been offline for few days so I missed all this till now.

You guys are so smart! I dunno yet what I will DO with all of it but this is a great thread!

~Susan

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 04:02 AM

Jim, which is the tune that isn't Soldiers Joy?

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Jim Krause
Date: 28 Jun 02 - 12:06 AM

Greg, I couldn't agree with you more. I realize I tend to generalize a bit.
Jim

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 27 Jun 02 - 01:04 PM

Jim Krause, your list of tunes that all fiddler know is very interesting. Surprisingly narrow range of time and space where and when they comefrom. I know it's incredibly difficult and controversial to discuss the origins of folk material, but I doubt if many would disagree with guesses that Soldiers Joy, Fishers Hornpipe and the Sailors Hornpipe are English, that Miss mcleod's Reel is Scottish, and that the Devil's Dream is either English or Scottish. And that all those tunes first surfaced in the period 1750-1800. What is nice is that they are all very wellknown in Britain still, as well.
( Just to cover myself, yes I do know that the Fisher's Hornpipe was written by a German, but given that he was working as a musician, and writing in an English idiom for the English market, I think classifying the tune as English is reasonable in terms of usage).
Your list is a bit in conflict with the previous poster's analysis that the source tunes came from Scotland, Ireland Wales and Man. Certainly all those tunes became current in Ireland , Wales and Man. Of course it's technically possibly they all originated in the Isle of Man or Ireland or Wales but stylistically, and given the dates, I'd say England should certainly be included in the list.. .

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Jim Krause
Date: 27 Jun 02 - 12:31 PM

Oh, and by the way, I have a photocopy of a fife tune book originally published about the year 1780 which has a recognizable arrangement of Soldier's Joy. The book is Entire, New and Compleat Instructions for the Fife by Longman & Broderip.

There are only two fiddle tunes. The one is Soldier's Joy and the other one isn't.

Jim

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Jim Krause
Date: 27 Jun 02 - 12:05 PM

OK WYS, I'll give it a go. I'm going to ramble a bit, so I'll leave it to you to find the "snappy paragraph."

I've heard it said that bluegrass is simply folk music in overdrive. Back in the early days of radio, Bill Monroe and his brother Charlie had a duet called the Monroe Brothers. Being dissatisfied with their sound, Bill struck out on his own and formed the Blue Grass Boys in the late 1930s. But World War II came along, and rather disrupted things a bit.

After the war was over, to make a long story short, the classic version of the Blue Grass Boys was formed with Earl Scruggs on banjo, Lester Flatt on guitar and lead vocal, Chubby Wise on fiddle, and Cedric Rainwater on bass, with Bill on mandolin and singing tenor. Among the things that began to separate the new bluegrass sound from the earlier old-time string band sound was that Bill Monroe wrote much of his own material. Lester Flatt also composed a few songs, and Earl Scruggs of course composed "Foggy Mountain Breakdown" during this period.

With a few exceptions of Jimmie Rodgers, Charlie Poole and A.P. Carter, the older country groups had been content to arrange traditional folk material, or earlier material from the minstrel show stage, Tin Pan Alley, and Victorian parlor songs. Groups like the Bogtrotters from Galax VA, and the Skillet Lickers from GA had a large repertoire of traditional fiddle tunes that can be traced back as far a 18^th century Great Britain.

The music comes around full circle in the fiddle tune repertoire. Almost all bluegrass players know such tunes as Soldier's Joy, Miss McLeod's Reel, Fisher's Hornpipe, Sailor's Hornpipe, and Devil's Dream.

Perhaps I might insert a personal note here. I consider myself to be a practitioner of the old-time style of fiddling. Often I have requests "Do you play any Irish tunes?" My stock answer is, "I just did."

Well, WYS, I didn't read the whole thread. I hope this helps.
Jim

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From:
Date: 27 Jun 02 - 11:31 AM

OK! LEt me state that they are all the same.

1 - Gaelic song tradition, with the laments and such came to the US in the late 1700s through to the early 1900s. Each wave, from Scotland, Ireland, Man, Wales, brought forth more of the music, which we "classify" (however wrongly) as Celtic.

2 - These songs, tunes, and dances were brought over, along with the people, and they taught them to the people they found here, indigenes, black, yellow and other caucasians. Various groups embraced these forms, and enhanced them.

3 - The blacks and others took the Scottish/Irish step-dances and made it into the now famous American tap-dance standards. The same people took the tunes and songs of the Gaelic laments and blended them with the rhythms of their native lands, giving us the blues

4 - Country music is another "child" of the Gaelic song laments. If you took the themes of the Gaelic songs circa 1600/1700/1800, translated them, and added instrumental accompaniment, you would have the Country music.

5 - Out of the traditional music of the early 19th century, we find they grew into the "Folk" music, such as Appalachian, Ozark, and Arkansas regions have kept alive. Songs such as Red River Valley, and such have been found in the early 1800s. They are now part of the folk/country of today.

6 - The tunes, and uses of the OldTimey fiddle music comes out of the Scottish dance tradition, which again is part of what we now call "Celtic".

7 - Song tradition scholars have shown a definite relationship between the "recent" songs of the 19th and early 20th century, and songs/tunes from the British Isles or Europe, or even Africa. I am sure there are others with ties to the Mediterranean countries, or elsewhere. Would there not be music from Scandinavian countries in amongst those in Wisconsin? Probably.

 

This is just quickly off the top of my head. But I'm sure, with a little research, you can prove each and every one of the above statements, which I believe implicitly.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Mark Clark
Date: 27 Jun 02 - 12:18 AM

Great job, anahootz. Good information there. I know I'm being overly pedantic but the only thing I'd change is to say that Kentucky is the Blue Grass State, not the Bluegrass state and Bill's band was known as the Blue Grass Boys, not the Bluegrass boys. The term bluegrass as a name for the genre wasn't started by Monroe. Bill originally thought of himself and his band as playing his own brand of commercial country music designed to appeal to the musician as well as to the general country music audience.

      - Mark

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: NicoleC
Date: 26 Jun 02 - 10:59 PM

Nice article.

Although it's hard to tell how broad it's influence was on mountain music overall, the banjo existed in the Appalachian music of VA and WV for at least 200 years. The theory is that is was brought there by indentured servants, who were generally treated like slaves for their term of service, and ate, slept, worshipped with, and presumably played music with the African slaves. Early Appalachian settlers were rarely African, and even fewer people could afford to own slaves or had much of a need of them.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: GUEST,cookieless anahootz
Date: 26 Jun 02 - 02:02 AM

A Timeline

A Link to the above info, copied and pasted for your viewing pleasure.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: GUEST,cookieless anahootz
Date: 26 Jun 02 - 01:58 AM

Bluegrass "Fact" Sheet

Origins of Bluegrass

Father of Bluegrass: Bill Monroe, aka William Smith Monroe, born 1911 Rosine, Kentucky, youngest of large family, d. 1996

Bill Monroe's musical influences: Mother Melissa's side of family was musical, she played fiddle, as did Bill's favorite Uncle Pen, with whom he lived with after his parents died. Also Arnold Schultz, local African-American guitar player whose musical skills were highly revered but never recorded.

Original Bluegrass Band: Bill Monroe and His Bluegrass Boys, formed 1939, though the bluegrass sound was not clearly defined until Monroe's 1945-47 band.

Archetypal Bluegrass Band: Bill Monroe, mandolin; Earl Scruggs, banjo (3-finger style, or "Scruggs-style"); Lester Flatt, guitar; Chubby Wise, fiddle; Howard Watts, aka Cedric Rainwater, bass.

Sounds like...?: Bluegrass is a powerful, passionate music, often hard-driving but with plenty of room for jazz-like improvisation, and an emphasis on a singing style and vocal harmonies that make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up when it's done well. The subject matter of the songs encompass traditional country themes as well as a wide variety of contemporary concerns. Bluegrass music has been called "folk music in overdrive," although its two main music elements are: (1) the ballads, dance tunes, and religious music --- which evolved into old-time country music and "brother duet" vocal styles --- brought by immigrants from the British Isles; and (2) the evolving African-American styles of blues, jazz, gospel, and ragtime.

Source of Name: Kentucky known as Bluegrass State, Bill Monroe wanted to acknowledge his origins

Instruments of bluegrass: standard group includes mandolin, banjo, fiddle, guitar, upright bass. The banjo is of African origins, the mandolin is Italian, the guitar, Spanish, and both the fiddle (violin) and bass are descended from the Arab rebec, with techniques & manufacturing refined in Italy & Germany. The other common bluegrass instrument, the resophonic guitar or Dobro, originated in Czechoslovakia and was first used in Hawaiian music.

Musical sources of bluegrass: "Old time" country music, known at the time as "hillbilly" music was primarily from English, Irish and Scots origins, as handed down in Appalachian areas. African banjo music, as sped up and altered in the North Carolina area and brough to bluegrass by Earl Scruggs, Snuffy Jenkins and Don Reno; gospel / church music of the south (Baptist, Methodist and Holiness Churches), and African-derived tunes, harmonies and rhythmic influences were incorporated by Bill Monroe into a music that was sped up and the vocals were pushed up into higher registers, to create the "high lonesome sound." Influence of jazz and western swing is apparent: bluegrass song arrangements follow the convention whereby featured instruments take solo breaks, improvising on the melody. (In contrast to Old Time music, in which the typical arrangement is for the instruments to play mostly in unison.)

Bluegrass in Film, TV: While the use of bluegrass in film and TV tends to reinforce the "ignorant hillbilly" stereotypes, these mass media appearances do have the effect of introducing the music to urban audiences. Film: Bonnie & Clyde (Flatt & Scruggs & Foggy Mtn. Boys), Deliverance, and this year's O Brother, Where Art Thou (Coen Bros.). TV: Hee-Haw, Beverly Hillbillies, the Andy Griffith Show.

Bluegrass as "hillbilly" music: some old-time stringbands or jugbands preceeding bluegrass (in the tens and twenties, for example) played up the "hillbilly" image, wearing overalls and straw hats, carrying whiskey jugs, speaking with exaggerated country twangs, singing novelty songs about mules, etc. Radio and recording executives encouraged this image to categorize and sell the music to rural audiences and rural folk newly moved to the cities. Bill Monroe preferred the image of the gentleman farmer, insisted his sidemen wear suits and rejected the hillbilly label, comporting himself in a dignified, if aloof manner. An additional difference was that Monroe preferred to play his music at concerts, rather than for dances. Old time music was primarily dance music.

Bluegrass as "folk" music: in the 60s, bluegrass was promoted to urban, educated audiences as part of the Folk Music revival. It was warmly received, spawning a concert at Carnegie Hall by Flatt & Scruggs, college-circuit tours that supported many bluegrass musicians, and inspiring the careers of "second and third generation" bluegrass favorites like the New Lost City Ramblers, Ricky Skaggs, Tony Rice, Bela Fleck, Jerry Douglas, etc &.

Bluegrass as "white"music: although many southern states had laws actually requiring that record stores keep "race" records (recorded by African-American artists) separate from "hillbilly" or "country" records, there is no clear distinction between the music of white and black southerners. Like Hank Williams, one of Bill Monroes earliest musical teachers was an African-American guitarist, in Bill's case, Arnold Schultz. Bill hired African-American DeFord Bailey to tour with him for some time, despite the difficulty it caused when trying to find a boarding house that would take both "races." The banjo is originally a gourd instrument that came with West Africans who were forced into slavery here. The "blue notes" that differentiate bluegrass from old time country music are attributed to African musical influence. The shift in rythmic emphasis from the down beat (as in Irish music) to a punched back beat can be seen as another element of African musical influence on bluegrass.

Women in bluegrass: Bessie Lee Mauldin played bass and toured with early Bluegrass Boys, and Sally Ann Forrester played accordion and sang with the Bluegrass Boys during WWII. Women have become more present in bluegrass in recent decades: Alison Krauss, fiddler, bandleader, and best-selling artist in the history of the music; Allison Brown, banjo player, composer and band leader; Lynn Morris, guitarist and bandleader; San Francisco's own Good Old Persons, spawning award-winning musicians Sally Van Meter (Dobroist), Laurie Lewis (fiddler, singer, band leader, composer) and Kathy Kallick (guitarist, singer, bandleader, composer); and South Bay favorite Sidesaddle has a 20 year history as a majority-female band. More than half the bands in the SFBOT have women musicians. The NCBS, CBA and IBMA all have women board members, "Bluegrass Unlimited's" editor is a woman, and IBMA board member Murphy Henry publishes a quarterly "Women in Bluegrass" publication.

Monroe's Bluegrass Boys as farm team of the genre: Monroe was a demanding bandleader with a rigorous touring schedule and an ear for recruiting and developing young talent. For these and other reasons, the Bluegrass Boys had a fairly regular turnover, with many of Monroe's sidemen spinning off to form their own groups or anchor other "bluegrass" outfits in their home territory. Notable players and spin-off groups: Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs (Flatt & Scruggs & the Foggy Mtn. Boys), Jimmy Martin, self-proclaimed "King of Bluegrass" (Jimmy Martin & the Sunny Mtn. Boys), Carter Stanley (The Stanley Brothers), Peter Rowan (The Peter Rowan Band).

Bluegrass Institutions: Grand Ol' Opry, Nashville Tennessee; WSM (Monroe stronghold station that shared his initials); Martha White Flour sponsorship of Flatt & Scruggs; Bill Monroe's Bean Blossom Festival (Bean Blossom, Indiana); International Bluegrass Music Association; Bluegrass Unlimited magazine; Bluegrass Festivals across the US, i.e., the Bluegrass Classic in Ohio (now a children s cancer benefit), Father's Day Festival in Grass Valley, CA (26th year in 2001), etc.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Sorcha
Date: 26 Jun 02 - 12:25 AM

rangerroger--yes. Major to minor.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Leeder
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 11:24 PM

I think it'd be fair to say (although a gross oversimplification) that Bluegrass emphasizes the "individual" -- every performer expects to "take a break" and showcase him- or herself in a solo in every number, to the point of being competitive even with fellow band members. Old Time is more of a "collective" style -- often there are no solos, and an instrumental break will consist of everybody playing the melody at once.

As for the "Celtic" aspect, many of the settlers of Appalachia were Scots-Irish (Protestants descended from the Scots who had been transplanted into Northern Ireland, England's first colony) and brought both Scottish and Irish songs and tunes with them to America. Later admixtures of black and Eutopean musics were added. (The banjo came from Africa, the guitar from Spain.) This too is a gross oversimplification, but Celtic is one ancestor of Old Time, which was the main ancestor of Bluegrass.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: rangeroger
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 10:55 PM

A group of Bluegrass musicians that I used to play with would play Soldier's Joy through a couple of times and then drop every chord to its minor ( would that be changing the sharps to naturals? ).

We called it Dead Soldier's Joy.

rr

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 06:41 PM

bodhrans, banjoes and bar-mitzvahs

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 06:37 PM

Wow Sharon! Thanks!

I love this thread....

Wotta Mudcat!

~S~

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: GUEST,SharonG
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 06:11 PM

Big question here- You might check out an article I wrote for Folkworks about the fiddle, and fiddle styles. It isn't concise (2000 words) but may give you some help in organizing your own thoughts on this (May/June issue at www.Folkworks.org

But this is part of my take on it... Fiddle tunes from England, Scotland & Ireland came to this country with immigrants who settled here in the 17th-19th centuries. Depending on where the immigrants settled, the original music underwent changes. According to Bruce Molsky and others, old-time (Appalachian) music was heavily influenced by African polyrhythms and pretty much sticks to reels. New England fiddling traditions didn't abandon jigs and didn't mess with the rhythm but dropped most of the ornamentation found in Irish/Scottish/Cape Breton music. Bluegrass was invented by Bill Monroe, the Stanley brothers and their peers, but developed directly from the old-time string band music. In the instrumental realm of bluegrass, there are tunes, such as Bill Cheatum or Red-haired Boy that cross the generic line between bluegrass and old-time. Compared to old-time, Bluegrass employs a lot more improvisation, includes "blue notes", and vocally at least, a lot of harmony. It is more of a showy, performance oriented style that emphasizes individual players' virtuosity. Curiously, unlike its predecessors, bluegrass has no connection to dancing, but it is unquestionably a direct descendant of the traditional dance music of England, Scotland & Ireland.

Sharon

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 05:36 PM

Woah AMOS!!!! Foot stompin' accolades!

Top that, Catters, we're hot now!

~Susan

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Amos
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 05:26 PM

Bluegrass was born out of Appalachia, fathered by a series of strange encounters with jigs, reels, ballroom airs, drinking songs and ancient Childe Ballads; Bluegrass's ma was born out of all the threads that had Englad so mixed up between the 14th and 16th centuries, but her paw was an Irish dogie wrangler, or a black rail liner descended from neo-Christian slaves, or perhaps an itinerant Glasgow fisherman, washed over to North Amerikay by a gale, or carried on the back of a whale, depending on which paper you read.

To know bluegrass is to know several continents worth of heart, soul, and hard working people through their songs.

To cut your bluegrass off from its antecedents is to grow up not knowing who your mother was.

A

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Sorcha
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 05:24 PM

Way cool! I could do it alone, but my band won't syncopate. (Does that sound scatty?? grin)

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 05:22 PM

I actually have a band I want to book here that can play and demonstrate (in a workshop) ALL of that.

~S~

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Sorcha
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 05:16 PM

And if you change all the sharps to naturals you can call it Soldier's Sorrow; if you syncopate Sorrow just a bit, it will sound Klez/Rom.......

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Sorcha
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 05:07 PM

Entry for Soldier's Joy at Fiddler's Companion.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:57 PM

Lol, Greg

Not sure how you reconcile D7 with 'beauty' I could go with a G chord as been 'truth' though!

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:56 PM

You guys are OFF AND RUNNING! Go for it!

ALWAYS ask the Mudcat!

I love that "mission statement"!!!!

~Susan

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:41 PM

As John Keats said "G, C, D7: that is all you know on earth, and all you need to know"

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:37 PM

Yes I thought of that but I couldnt think of a common tune!! Alas. Where is Soldiers Joy called Kings Head, Sorcha? Didnt know that. Over on BBC4, BTW, the Finnish band is playing Jenny Lind Polka. That's a tune nearly eveybody in theworld knows.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:32 PM

Don't forget that we have to include Eastern European Klezmer traditions and gypsy music in our paragraph too! *grin*

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Sorcha
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:31 PM

Very good, greg. Excellent example. Also known as King's Head.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:30 PM

Did you know that "sean nos" was a recently coined term, a translation (or perhaps equivalent is the better term) of " old time". Not that that particularly helps in selling celtic or old time to bluegrass fans. Here's my mission statement: you can call it Irish, you can call it English, you can call it Scottish, you can call it Celtic, you can call it Oldtime,you can call it Bluegrass.....but they're all playing Soldiers Joy.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Sorcha
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:18 PM

LOL, greg! Too true, but LOTS of the Oldtime tunes have Irish roots. Lots of bluegrass tunes have Oldtime roots. How to say it succintly is the problem.......I'll retire with a brew and think about it while I finish putting pleats in the new drapes..........

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:15 PM

I think I'll start by saying Celtic doesnt exist.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: Les from Hull
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:04 PM

I think it may help to mention that in some ways celtic was a forerunner of old timey which was a forerunner of bluegrass.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: greg stephens
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 04:03 PM

this is a seriously tricky challenge! I think I shal retire with a cup of coffee and have a ponder. Not that I'll come up with anything useful...if I could write good handouts I'd have noticed by now.

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 03:53 PM

Let's see if that proves to be the case. We have some pretty good writers around here. If they know their stuff AND can write, they will be able to give the right level of detail to keep it short and accurate, and intrigue readers into wanting to know more.

~S~

Subject: RE: Help: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 03:49 PM

WYSIWYG,

This is a very complex question. To summarise it in a 'snappy paragraph' is quite impossible

Subject: Rel. of Bluegrass, Celtic, OldTimey, etc
From: wysiwyg
Date: 25 Jun 02 - 03:46 PM

Before you all tell me that the answers are obvious, or to go read the old threads, let me explain why I am asking about this.

I am working on building up the local folk music scene hereabouts. A whole LOT of the people scattered about our rural county have a primary fopcus on bluegrass, and there is a tacit bluegrass community. They don't necessarily think of themselves as folkies, although it would not surprise me to see them attend folk-type concerts of several sorts. But they do NOT see these linkages as obvious.

I need copy I can use in PR, as I publicize OTHER folk forms, that will help show the link between ALL these musics, and draw the bluegrass folks out a bit. I wanted to include Klez, gypsy, and eastern-Euro musics in my thread title, but there wasn't room! *G*

My focus at the moment is on the instrument side of the music-- because the people here are players more than singers, as far as I can tell now.

So I am looking not only for your opinions and historical perspectives-- I am looking for some snappy paragraphs to put in my press releases, and frankly I do not know enough to draft it, even by studying the old threads.

So-- can you help me out, those of you who know your stuff in this regard, and can I please have your permission to use your words in my PR?

~Susan