Why I like folk music

Subject: RE: Why I like folk music
From: Big Mick
Date: 13 Dec 98 - 09:58 AM

For me, it is because it reminds of what I must try to do before I die. What I mean by that is that it shows me how little I really know of my fellow travellers on the planet. I am free forming here, neighbors, so bear with me. I think the essence of a person is at its best when it is attempting to be empathic towards others, to feel what they feel, and understand what drives them. When people focus on others, in an attempt at understanding, it propels us forward in an evolutionary sense. It causes us to help foster understanding between us, and tolerance of other view points. Just about the time I feel as though I have a pretty good view of it all, I hear another song, or read another thread, that sends me down a whole new path of exploration. "Folk" music is the tool used by humans to cause and learn about other peoples perspectives, experiences and feelings. As bards of the modern era, we are privileged to have this opportunity, and should take our obligation seriously. And we should revel in it, and take great enjoyment from it. Enough rambling.

Subject: RE: Why I like folk music
From: McMusic
Date: 12 Dec 98 - 11:05 PM

I like folkmusic--any traditional music, really--because it is "real" (God, that sounds so cliche-ish). But it is about people and feelings, ups, downs, in betweens--but not in the over-blown, loud and raucous fashion that rock has degenerated into--all snarl and posture, no soul. Does any of this make sense? Anyway, another reason I like folk music is that it doesn't stain my teeth (all six of 'em).

Subject: RE: Why I like folk music
From: Ritchie
Date: 12 Dec 98 - 07:36 AM

What puzzled me was the thought of different people throughout the world singing the same song in their own environment...you know what I mean,and because they liked the same music, did this mean that they dressed in the same way as say they person who perhaps originally brought it to their attention ? sort of peer pressure ?

f'rinstance. folk music in England was synonomous with knitted jumpers and/or fishermans clothing with the singers singing with a finger in their ear.

folk music in Scotland conjured up the performer wearing 'traditional' costume ,kilt etc.

thoughts of folk music from America put a picture of dungarees into my mind .

Jazz musicians all had a little goatee beard.

As for the blues well.....

Have those days gone or should I order matching jumpers or a pair of dungarees for christmas ?

But really ,I like folk music because it's music.

love & happiness

Ritchie

Subject: RE: Why I like folk music
From: The Shambles
Date: 11 Dec 98 - 01:59 PM

It has always puzzled me why the music comming (back?) over to the UK from the USA was more atractive to me (and others) than our own. I have been exposed to more of it (English) over the years and it still dosen't excite me in the same way.

Subject: RE: Why I like folk music
From: MissMac
Date: 11 Dec 98 - 11:19 AM

Why like folk? Because it is singable and does not require musical perfection ie. being note perfect. I am a new comer to the folk scene the listening folk scene and I am starting to learn to sing it. Reading through the threads I am discovering how little I know. I just love the sound. This is a great place to find lyrics.

Miss Mac

Subject: RE: Why I like folk music
From: Steve Parkes
Date: 11 Dec 98 - 08:04 AM

It was all different on this side of the Pond, Murray. I won't talk about the first folk revival led by Cecil Sharp et al; I'll leave that to the experts since I wasn't around at the time.

We had a revival in the 50's too. There was a lot going on then. (I was born in '51, so I don't claim to have had much to do with it!) There was, for instance, the Copper family of Sussex, who were 'discovered' by the BBC and made a lot of radio appearances. (We didn't have any independant local stations like you have in the States, it was everywhere, or not at all.) Then there were the black people coming in from the West Indies, who brought a completely new kind of music to Britain. The Spinners were one of the new bands which sprang up from people who liked the trad style, but weren't necessarily part of the Tradition themselves. There was also something called skiffle, which was (very loosely) based on American skiffle (whatever that was; I've never been able to find any to listen to),

Lonnie Donegan was the best-known of these. He was a banjo and guitar player with a professional jazz band, who started off by doing a few numbers in the break. He took songs by Leadbelly, like Rock Island Line, altered them slightly, and recorded them with the credit 'new words and new music: Donegan'. A lot of the successful skiffle musicians went into mainstream pop or Country & Western in the end; a few went into Rock'n'roll.

By the 60's things had moved on; electric folk had arrived, Julie Felix was on tv, and so on and so forth. And in 1969 I made my first public appearance ...

Well, I'd better rest my fingers now, so they'll be in tip-top pickin' form. Let's hear from the rest of you!

Steve

Subject: Why I like folk music
From:
Date: 11 Dec 98 - 06:25 AM

Art's posting in the "Why I hate folk Music" thread (click here to read it.) got me to thinking. There seems to have been three strands to the folk revival in the 50s. First there were the songs "the folk" were singing. These were presented by such diverse personalities as Burl Ives and Leadbelly. Then there were the topical songs presented by Woody Guthrie and Molly Jackson. Finally there were the "non mainstream" records made for non-rural audiences. This is presented by a host of people, but it seems Harry Smith brought it to the attention of the folk revivalists.

Folk music seems to be a wonderful distillation of these three ingredients. Of course, I realize the strands were not completely independent. Woody Guthrie knew and used the tunes recorded by the Carter Family. Maybelle Carter was influenced by a local blues musician, etc.

Murray