2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)

Subject: Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 11 Jan 26 - 01:26 PM

I don't have details, but a report on Facebook says that Tim died within the last week. Can anyone fill us in?
He was very knowledgeable, and a really good guy. May he rest in peace.

Subject: RE: Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Nick Dow
Date: 11 Jan 26 - 06:59 PM

So sorry to hear this. He was involved in Southern Songster with me Steve, and Cohen, and I saw him regularly on Zoom. I am so sad he has left us. He was a brilliant singer. RIP Tim.

Subject: RE: Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 Jan 26 - 08:49 PM

Tim Radford on Facebook. From that page yesterday: "Tim passed away peacefully in hospital last night, in the wee hours of January 10, 2026. Everything is different now."

From January 7, 2026:

Thanks to everyone who sent lovely messages, both for Tim's birthday a few days back and replying to his note about surgery & recovery some weeks ago.

The radio silence on our end might have offered an indication that things were not as well as they seemed. Sadly, there was no stopping this rare and aggressive cancer. Since recuperating at home for a few days in Nov., Tim's been in multiple hospitals and rehabs, slowly deteriorating until he is now ready for in-home hospice care. He will be transferred home tomorrow (Jan. 8, 2026). I'll be looking after him with help from his son Mikey, and VNA nurses will be on call 24/7. He is lucid and can see and hear (though not speak) so I'm reading him all your messages and will continue to do so. Please spare a good wish for my sweet man as he makes this impossible yet inevitable journey.
With thanks, love, and admiration,

Jan

On November 3, 2925 Tim wrote:

The time has come to let everyone know what is in my Immediate future …On November 11th I am go into a Boston Hospital to have a Cancerous Tumor removed from my Bladder…and all that this entails…I will lose my Bladder.

I will be in hospital for 4 or 5 days…and then recovery at home for an undefined time.

I am told it should be a very positive outcome, as a seems No other organs are effected…

I am being very positive about the future and hope you can wish me well.

Thanks and best to all – Tim R.

Subject: RE: Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: rich-joy
Date: 11 Jan 26 - 09:48 PM

Sad to hear this news.
Vale, Tim.

R-J (Down Under)

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 03:43 AM

A good singer, who gvAe a lot of people pleasure with his singing.RIP condolences to family and friends

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 04:43 AM

Tim crossed the bar on 1/10/25, leaving a large hole in our folk community of shanty singers and Morris dancers..

An erudite gentleman who leaves a fine legacy that includes this

https://www.mit.edu/~jcb/Red_Herring/dances/Sherborne.html (Sherborne Village Morris Dances by Tim Radford)

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: MoorleyMan
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 07:51 AM

Another tragic loss to our folk community. Tim was indeed highly erudite, with a gift for readily and generously sharing his knowledge. And let's not forget, he was also an uncommonly fine singer - and a really nice guy. Sympathies and condolences to Jan, Mikey and his enormous body of friends. RIP, Tim.

Joe - please change the date on the thread title to 2026? Ta!

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Waddon Pete
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 10:53 AM

Sad news indeed. His loss will be widely felt within the folk world. I have added his name to the "In Memoriam" thread and send my condolences to all those who know and love him. RIP

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Helen
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 11:34 AM

This is confusing. The dates are all over the place but the copy of Tim's post on Facebook, as posted here by SRS was on January 7, 2026 letting people know that he has serious medical issues and the prognosis is not good.

The heading of this thread shows 2015, but the most optimistic date posted is by Tim on Facebook "November 3, 2925" so another 900 years to go. Well done, Tim! :-)

My thoughts and prayers are with Tim and his family in this sad time and celebrations for a life well-lived.

Helen

---

Visualize a double-typo: putting up 2025 instead of 2026, and then missing part of that by one character. Fixed now. ---mudelf

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 02:17 PM

Not sure if I ever met Tim, but we frequently swapped info on here and by email. A very sad loss. He will be sorely missed. There should be a full obit somewhere that details his life story and contributions to FS scholarship, in the FSJ perhaps. My condolences to friends and family.

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Lighter
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 04:59 PM

Sad to hear this. We never met, but Tim's posts were always pleasant and well-informed.

My condolences to his family and friends.

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Helen
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 05:14 PM

Thanks mudelf. Please feel free to delete my post of 12 Jan 26 - 11:34 AM.

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Helen
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 05:15 PM

My thoughts and prayers are with Tim's family in this sad time and celebrations for a life well-lived.

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 09:02 PM

Since photos don't appear here at Mudcat the Facebook page is a good annex for that. Here is a link to photos shared on the page by the page Ships and Songs (Charlie Ipcar, correct? In an alter-ego that FB hasn't blocked.)

https://www.facebook.com/groups/mudcat/posts/10162920849288577/

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Joe Offer
Date: 12 Jan 26 - 11:02 PM

I'm really glad I got a chance to meet Tim at the Getaway. We've corresponded for years, but meeting him in person made our correspondence more meaningful. He was a gentle Englishman living in Woods Hole, Massachusetts - one or the more remarkable places in the United States. Good singer, good scholar, and good person.

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 13 Jan 26 - 03:01 AM

For those who only communicated with Tim on Mudcat but did not meet in person, let me confirm your suspicions: He was a goddamn MENSCH!

R.I.P., Tim.

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 13 Jan 26 - 04:12 AM

I knew Tim only alightly through some Zoom sessions. I had not connected him with RTim on here.

Could someone please remind me how to find his posts here.

Condolences to all who knew him more closely.

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Helen
Date: 13 Jan 26 - 04:46 AM

Richard, the easy way - usually - is to click on the person's name in the top of one of their posted comments. So to see your posts click on your name after the word "From" and the search results will be shown.

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Richard Mellish - PM

Because this thread is about RTim that method would not work unless you found a thread with a post by him.

Here is the link to search for his posts:

RTim's posts on Mudcat

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Jan 26 - 10:57 AM

Helen, thank you for that. I usually pull up those results early in an obit thread. Here are his Guest posts. Clearly he was a Mudcatter who didn't lose track of his password and mostly logged on to post. :)

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Bupkes
Date: 13 Jan 26 - 12:15 PM

These biographical notes, transcribed from Tim Radford’s album “Home From Home” [2005], may help people know more about him, until a more complete obituary comes out:
«Tim Radford was born in Hampshire, England [on January 4, 1947], on the edge of The New Forest. His family had for generations all lived within 50 miles of where he was born. Singing has always had an impact on his life. He can remember from the earliest years his father singing at many work socials and revue shows.
    At school Tim was part of the choir and also took part in the Gilbert & Sullivan productions. As a teenager in the 1960s he sang the vocals in a local Youth Club band called “The Ravons” (featuring Ravin’ Mad Radford)! However, it was not until the late 1960s that folk music became part of his life. His first collaboration was with guitarist friend John Ode, with whom he auditioned for Hughie Green's talent show “Opportunity Knocks”. Later Tim and John formed the Folk Group “Breckenridge”, which won the Hampshire Youth Club's Folk competition. Most of their material was influenced by popular British and American folk music.
    While singing with Breckenridge Tim met Dave Williams, a well-known and highly respected folk performer in the South of England. Dave introduced Tim to unaccompanied singing, playing him the recordings of traditional singer Harry Cox and bringing to his attention the local folk song collections of George Gardiner from Hampshire and The Hammond Brothers from Dorset. This lit a fire of enthusiasm under Tim, who began to sing solo at folk clubs across southern Hampshire.
    At the same time, Tim began country dancing and morris dancing again (he had done both as a 9-year-old at school, but not seriously). The folk dancing took place at a biweekly barn dance at The Haywain Inn in Cadnam, where he would also occasionally sing a song at the break. Through this activity he met Alf and Helen Woodall; Helen later became Tim's regular harmony singing partner, while Alf joined him in founding The Twynham Morris Men of Christchurch.
    Dave Williams also persuaded Tim to go to the weekly folk club held at The Bay Tree Inn in Southampton — the still famous “Foc's'le Folk Music Club” where he soon became a resident singer with Dave, Steve & Cheryl Jordan, and Geoff Jerram. Before Tim moved to Oxfordshire in 1973, these five regular Foc's'le singers were recorded by Forest Tracks on an album of songs from the George Gardiner collection called “Folk Songs From Hampshire”.
    This proved to be such a success that it was later followed with “Folk Songs From Dorset”, songs from the Hammond Brothers collection.
    These two vinyl recordings, plus some additional newly recorded tracks, are to be reissued as a double CD by Forest Tracks in June 2005. [(www . forest-tracks . co . uk), link not active]
    The move to Oxfordshire saw some changes in Tim's folk life. Although singing still continued, morris dancing became a more central preoccupation, first with Oxford City Morris and then, after meeting John & Chris Leslie, Bryan Sheppard and others, with the newly revived Adderbury Morris Men.
   For a while Tim sang regularly at The Prince of Wales Folk Club, which later became the Banbury Folk Club. However, morris began to take more and more of his time and eventually became his only folk activity. By 1981, when the Banbury Folk Club ended, Tim was only singing at morris events or occasionally in the local pub. At this time he also began dancing with the revived Kirtlington Morris, a team he had originally taught, and with the occasional touring team Duns Tew Morris. In addition he helped in the formation of Bloxham Morris, primarily for his daughter Catherine, after his son Michael joined the Adderbury Morris Men.
   In 1990, Kirtlington Morris visited the USA and danced at The Marlboro Morris Ale, the premier morris event in North America. This resulted in a big change in Tim's life when he met musician and dancer Jan Elliott, founder of Ha'penny Morris of Boston. Visits to North America increased, including trips to Pinewoods Camp in Plymouth, Massachusetts where Tim sang and taught morris.
   All this finally culminated in Tim's moving to Woods Hole, MA in 1997. Once there he joined the Boston-based Pinewoods Morris Men and, through Jan, became involved with Thames Valley International of London, Ontario, Canada. He and Jan also formed the third incarnation of a morris team in Woods Hole called “Woods Hole Village Morris.” However, age and hard pavements finally put an end to his active dancing days, so to stay involved Tim has now come back to singing.
   While settling in his new home Tim sang briefly in a band called “First Light” with Jan on concertina and fiddler Jacquie Fehon. He now sings and plays percussion with “Beggar's Description”, a band specializing in music of the British Isles and Celtic countries. The group includes Jan
on English concertina, recorder, pennywhistle, and crumhorn, and former Woods Hole Village Morris cohorts Barbara Blair on fiddle and Ron Geering on Anglo concertina, hurdy gurdy, and hammered dulcimer.
   The solo album “Home From Home” came about from Tim's desire to sing more, having sprung from a discussion on the subject with morris dancer, singer and songwriter Ian Robb, who owns the recording label “Fallen Angle Music” [https://www.ianrobb.com].
Ian is a superb singer who performs with the Canadian harmony group “Finest Kind” as well as “JIIG,” a five-piece band from Ottawa, which also includes “Home From Home” sound engineer and multi-instrumentalist James Stephens. These two friends have been of invaluable assistance in turning Tim's CD project into a reality, and they deserve special thanks, along with the graphic designer Paul Brierley.
   When not singing, Tim spends most of his time either on the golf course or in the kitchen, where Regional Italian is a specialty.»

https://web.archive.org/web/20231202175842/http://timradford.com/index.html

— Marty Stock

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Jeri
Date: 13 Jan 26 - 01:56 PM

We'll miss his voice here in New Hampshire.
And his whole self!

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 13 Jan 26 - 02:01 PM

What Jeri said.

I'm pretty sure I first met Tim when he came to one of our monthly foc's'l ballad and shanty sings at the Press Room (Portsmouth, NH) some years ago.

He also, more recently, performed at the Portsmouth Maritime Folk Festival in Portsmouth, NH.

He is and will continue to be very much missed.

Linn

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 13 Jan 26 - 03:43 PM

Tim performed at the Portsmouth [NH] Maritime Folk Festival in 2016 and in 2017.

I'll post some photos in the Mudcat Café Facebook group.

Linn

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: Charley Noble
Date: 14 Jan 26 - 09:47 AM

Stilly River Sage,

Thanks for posting the link to the set of Tim Radford's photos on Facebook Mudcat Forum. We probably have dozens more but these were some favorites.

Those were taken by myself and my wife Judy Barrows.

Charlie Ipcar (aka "Ships & Songs" on Facebook).

Subject: RE: 2026 Obit: Tim Radford (RTim)
From: GUEST,Guest Jeff Blake
Date: 14 Jan 26 - 11:32 AM

Tim was a highly valued contributor to Zoomchild, a monthly ballad session. He was always worth hearing, both for his fine voice and for the breadth of his repertoire. Nearly always he gave us versions we had not heard before, introducing us, for example, to the songs of Colleen and Jim Cleveland. He was also very knowledgable when (as often happens) we discussed ballads, other folk songs, and folklore in general. A notable singer, a delightful man to know, and one who will be greatly missed by us.

Our condolences go to his family and his many friends and fellow singers and dancers.