The Concept of FREED Folkmusic

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 02:45 PM

The turkey is food but a necessity as that is how we can have a bonfire. The fire has to be put in a pit that is used for cooking. A code requirement.

Turkey is an authentic UK food.

Actually bonfire is a cobbled together tradition made from bits and pieces over the centuries. If people do not find it important for several reasons remove the one reason that retains them and it fails.
Too much emphasis on fireworks for example and not enough emphasis on the national values it represents. We always do a sermon and while digging the turkey up we tell the story of the plot. Keep all dimensions equally interesting and accessible.

Conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 03:14 PM

News flash, Conrad:    The turkey (Meleagris gallopavo), is large bird indigenous to the North American continent. A slightly different species is also found on the Yucatan Peninsula.

The British Isles? I don't think so!

And blowing up Parliament is a time-honored tradition in the United Kingdom, eagerly anticipated by Ministers of Parliament, especially the House of Lords, all the citizens, and even the Royal Family, who, on November 5th of each year, all sit down to a lavish banquet of turkey roasted in a pit and wash it down with many cups of tea—gunpowder tea, of course. Then, they all go out, dance around a bonfire (Prince Charles and his mother, the queen, usually dance the English National Dance, the tango, around the fire, much to the delight of all assembled), then they all rush off and blow up the House of Parliament. It's been an annual tradition since 1605.

Yes indeed! A grand old American Tradition!

Flunked both geography and history then, did you, Conrad?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 03:16 PM

Gawd! It just gets better and better!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 04:38 PM

Ok don there have been turkeys in Britain for hundreds of years. They are older than some of the so called folk music.

Don you reveal a general lack of knowledge of the celebration and the historical events. It was celebrated in east coast seaports before and after the revolution. I could go on and on and on.

We do not celebrate the plot but its discovery one of the most important deliverance of the English People. We celebrate the fact that the discovery of the plot enabled the Parliament to continue and absolutism to be set back. Get a copy of my multi volume set on the topic when it comes out. I will probably start with the introductory volume and "Faux" Music next year.

Conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 05:14 PM

Any book you have written, Conrad, I'm sure would be very amusing. But I'm afraid I DO know the history of Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot quite well.

I'm quite sure they do have turkeys in England, perhaps in the same way that they have potatoes in Ireland, but both came from the Western Hemisphere and did not exist in the British Isles until they were imported from the Americas.

As to roast turkey being a traditional English celebratory meal, I have serious doubts, but I will leave the verification or refutation of that to our English confreres who would most certainly know.

Don Firth

P. S. How long to roast a turkey? Simple way to tell. Stuff if with unpopped popcorn. When it's ass explodes, it's done!

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Seamus Kennedy
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 05:33 PM

You guys are keeping this thread going out of cruelty to the rest of us, aren't you?

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 05:48 PM

So little you know Don

From Dickens, Christmas Carol (1843, England)
   'It's Christmas Day!' said Scrooge to himself. 'I haven't missed it. The Spirits have done it all in one night. They can do anything they like. Of course they can. Of course they can. Hallo, my fine fellow!'

   'Hallo!' returned the boy.

   'Do you know the Poulterer's, in the next street but one, at the corner?' Scrooge inquired.

   'I should hope I did,' replied the lad.

   'An intelligent boy!' said Scrooge. 'A remarkable boy! Do you know whether they've sold the prize Turkey that was hanging up there? -- Not the little prize Turkey: the big one?'

   'What, the one as big as me?' returned the boy.

   'What a delightful boy!' said Scrooge. 'It's a pleasure to talk to him. Yes, my buck!'

   'It's hanging there now,' replied the boy.

   'Is it?' said Scrooge. 'Go and buy it.'

   'Walk-er!' exclaimed the boy.

   'No, no,' said Scrooge, 'I am in earnest. Go and buy it, and tell them to bring it here, that I may give them the direction where to take it. Come back with the man, and I'll give you a shilling. Come back with him in less than five minutes and I'll give you half-a-crown!'

   The boy was off like a shot. He must have had a steady hand at a trigger who could have got a shot off half so fast.

   'I'll send it to Bob Cratchit's.' whispered Scrooge, rubbing his hands, and splitting with a laugh.

As for much you write what you have written on the gunpowder plot and your ignorance of the celebration is over generalized and simplistic

Conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 06:07 PM

Not really, Seamus. I'm finding this whole thing endlessly amusing—in a perverted sort of way, I must admit.

####

In the United Kingdom, there are several foods that are traditionally consumed on Guy Fawkes Night:

Bangers and Mash
Black treacle goods such as bonfire toffee and parkin
Toffee apples
Baked potatoes – more commonly referred to as "jacket potatoes" – which are wrapped in aluminium foil and cooked in the bonfire or its embers
Black peas with vinegar
Potato pie with pickled red cabbage
Groaty pudding specifically in the Black Country

[Turkey? Where's the flamin' turkey!!???]

North America

Bermuda

In the aftermath of the Boer War, Anna Maria Outerbridge – a leader of a "Boer Relief Committee" well known for trying to assist Boer POWs in escaping – was so unpopular with the British that on Guy Fawkes Night an effigy of her was burned, rather than of Guy Fawkes.

Canada

Bonfire Night/Guy Fawkes Night is largely unheard of in most provinces, although it is still celebrated in a few places. The tradition was planted along with other cultural practices of British colonists in the 19th century. However practices have been modified over two centuries since arriving from the United Kingdom as the following reveals:

The night is also still celebrated in Nanaimo, British Columbia. The custom was brought over by British coal miners that came to Nanaimo in the mid 1800s. They built very tall bonfires – often 40 feet (12 metres) or taller, sometimes from "spare" railroad ties that they'd come across. Over the years in Nanaimo, by the 1960s the effigy of Guy Fawkes had disappeared, and so had the name – it's just called "Bonfire Night" by the local children. Now (2006), the tradition has largely been lost altogether, and the few remaining celebrations that are held are mostly in private backyards.[28]
Guy Fawkes bonfires are still burnt in many parts of the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. In 2005 the celebrations were widespread enough to merit mention by the provincial Minister of Environment and Conservation. Tom Osborne, Minister of Environment and Conservation, today asked the general public to keep safety and the environment in mind when holding bonfires this weekend to celebrate Guy Fawkes night.

"Holding bonfires on Guy Fawkes night is still a tradition in many areas of our province and we are asking those participating in a bonfire this year to ensure they clean up their area, especially our beaches, when the festivities are over ... We should always be mindful of the importance of our environment and do our part to keep it clean at all times, including events like Guy Fawkes night."

Every year, in the quadrangle of Trinity College at the University of Toronto an effigy of Guy Fawkes is hung by a noose. The students of the col,lege will often don their academic gowns as they observe the effigy burn.

Caribbean

In the Caribbean nation of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, the night is celebrated in the town of Barrouallie, on the leeward side of the main island of Saint Vincent. The town's field comes ablaze as people come to see all of the traditional pyrotechnics.

In Antigua and Barbuda, Guy Fawkes Night was popular until the 1990s, when a ban on fireworks made it almost non-existent.

In the Bahamas, Guy Fawkes Day is celebrated in the Fox Hill area of New Providence, the main island. Other islands have smaller celebrations for their residents.

On the twin island nation of St.Kitts and Nevis, the night is still celebrated throughout the country.

Colonial America

This day was celebrated in the Colonies and was called "Pope's Day". It was the high point of "anti-popery" (in the term of the times) in New England. In the 1730s or earlier, Boston's artisans commemorated the day with a parade and performances which mocked Catholicism and the Catholic Stuart pretender. It was also the day when the youth and the lower class ruled. They went door to door collecting money from the affluent to finance feasting and drinking. George Washington forbade the celebration of the day among his troops due to its anti-Catholic and pro-British purpose.

That pretty well wraps it up. Other than Conrad's, I can't find any instances of celebrating Guy Fawkes Night in the United States, or how it is celebrated.

Now, Conrad, you were saying. . . ?

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 06:15 PM

Quoting Dickens about a turkey on Christmas? Pretty thin evidence for roast turkey being a traditional meal on Guy Fawkes Night, Conrad.

Perhaps one of our English folk will verify this one way or the other.

You see, Conrad, I'm willing to take the word of someone who knows, and all things considered, I seriously doubt that that is you.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Will Fly
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 06:44 PM

The main English bird for Christmas in Dickens' day was generally a goose, and if Conrad had bothered to read "A Christmas Carol" further he would have noted that the Cratchit family actually had a small goose for their Christmas Day meal.

As for Conrad's idea of a "Fawkesian" celebration - "chants"? Where the hell do "chants" come from? Not from us in the UK. Where does the idea of roasting a 45lb turkey in earth come from? Not from us. The concepts are ludicrous.

The whole idea is as weird as English people celebrating Thanksgiving - it has no meaning for most of us whatsoever. Nothing wrong with Thanksgiving, I'm sure - but it's essentially an American custom.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 06:50 PM

Turkey on bonfire night is not an English tradition, never has been.

Unlike pope burning.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:01 PM

"Baked potatoes – more commonly referred to as "jacket potatoes" – which are wrapped in aluminium foil and cooked in the bonfire or its embers"

I can remember just putting them in the embers as a kid - before that stuff became easily and cheaply available.

QUOTE
So little you know Don

From Dickens, Christmas Carol (1843, England)
   'It's Christmas Day!' said Scrooge to himself. 'I haven't missed it. The Spirits have done it all in one night. They can do anything they like. Of course they can. Of course they can. Hallo, my fine fellow!'

   'Hallo!' returned the boy.

   'Do you know the Poulterer's, in the next street but one, at the corner?' Scrooge inquired.

   'I should hope I did,' replied the lad.

   'An intelligent boy!' said Scrooge. 'A remarkable boy! Do you know whether they've sold the prize Turkey that was hanging up there? -- Not the little prize Turkey: the big one?'
UNQUOTE

No problem about turkeys - ooo, that' SO good a straight line, but I will resist! - but the documentation of turkeys at Xmas is irrelevant to Turkeys on GF Night. I hope you didn't write your thesis like that ....

QUOTE
Stuff if with unpopped popcorn. When it's ass explodes, it's done!
UNQUOTE

You could give people ideas, Don...

QUOTE
Ok don there have been turkeys in Britain for hundreds of years. They are older than some of the so called folk music.
UNQUOTE

Hey! What happened to 'the last several thousand years of folk music'? Does this mean now I can't get the folk music from the Last Supper?


"We always do a sermon and while digging the turkey up"

The Fooles Troupe can't top that ... bye for for now ...

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:04 PM

"The main English bird for Christmas in Dickens' day was generally a goose, and ... Conrad"

The Fooles Troupe applaud a master of wit .....

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Melissa
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:06 PM

Where do you find a 45 pound turkey, Conrad?

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:36 PM

"Where do you find a 45 pound turkey, Conrad? "

You guys are good! Keep this up, and The Fooles Troupe will have to leave town - too much competition....

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:38 PM

there have been turkeys in Britain for hundreds of years. They are older than some of the so called folk music.

Some of them are the size of carthorses - they keep them hidden away at Balmoral in Scotland.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:39 PM

Apparently they do happen from time to time, Melissa. But when one does, they sometimes make the news. They're roughly the size of a small Tyrannosaurus Rex.

When tractor-trailer driver Jim Caldwell headed down Highway 107 through Washington County, TN Tuesday, he got the surprise of a lifetime.

"It sounded like a dead body hit the window," Caldwell said from his North Carolina home.

Around eight o'clock Tuesday morning, a wild turkey flew into Caldwell's windshield, breaking both panes of glass and nearly scaring him to death, but this was not your average wild turkey. It weighed an estimated 45 pounds. Luckily, the driver did not suffer any injuries.

"29 years of driving, that's the first time I've ever had anything like that happen," Caldwell said.

Deputy Eric Stanton thought he'd seen everything during his last 13 years on the job, but that was before the massive turkey decided to play chicken with the tractor-trailer.

"The thing that was most surprising to me was the size of the turkey," Stanton said. "It was the biggest turkey I've seen in my life and I've seen a lot of turkey. It was huge."

It will soon be part of one huge dinner. Since the turkey died on impact, Frank Coffie, who lives just down the road, helped skin and clean the animal.

"It's the biggest turkey, wild turkey I've ever seen," Coffie said. "It's cleaned up and ready to eat."

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:44 PM

No comment.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Melissa
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:54 PM

You mean they're real?!

My great-grandpa used to tell stories about his crackpot uncle that used draft turkeys when there was a horse shortage. I always thought he was pulling my leg and now it's too late to apologize.

darn, now I feel terrible

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 07:58 PM

It's true.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Melissa
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:02 PM

Do domestic turkeys have beards?

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Tootler
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:05 PM

Conrad,

Short lesson in English history:

Guy Fawkes was one of a group of conspirators who plotted to blow up the Houses of Parliament when the King (James I) was formally opening parliament, thus killing the king and much of the English aristocracy. The plot was a failure as the conspirators were pretty incompetent and the authorities came to hear of the plot and caught Guy Fawkes with a large quantity of gunpowder in the crypt of the Houses of Parliament on Nov 5th, 1605.

The bonfire and fireworks were originally in celebration of the foiling of the plot and it later became customary to burn an effigy, called "The Guy" on the bonfire though the original effigy was of the pope as the plot was aimed at killing the protestant king and replacing him with a catholic.

Don Firth has correctly listed up the things we eat on Guy Fawkes night.

You can get more info on the gunpowder plot, as it is known in Wikipedia which provides a pretty good summary of the main events.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:06 PM

Only the more traditionally inclined ones.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Tootler
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:15 PM

Well yes, but I think the traditional things were what was needed here.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:16 PM

Sorry Tootler, I was replying to turkeys with beards..

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:17 PM

Look out!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Melissa
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:25 PM

not having beards would make it a lot easier to harness them up for field work..dang, I can't believe I didn't believe my great-grandpa. Those domestic draft birds look like they could work a lot of ground if a fella could keep them from getting distracted.

Is the other guy (in the pic) holding a long-stemmed mic?
Don't tell me my great-aunt wasn't pulling my leg about turkey bands performing at community celebrations..I couldn't bear the guilt of knowing!

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:25 PM

All-Britain champion turkey wrestler Euphemia Gristle (85) with last month's loser.

Click

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Tootler
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:27 PM

Sorry to interrupt this levity with something a little more serious. I have a bad habit of doing that.

It seems the turkey has been in England longer than I thought.

According to this site, the turkey was brought to England by merchants trading in the Eastern Mediterranean about 1530. The bird was called a turkey because its immediate source was the Ottoman Empire, though it was thought to have arrived there from N. America about 10 years earlier.

Its popularity increased rapidly - probably because though it was about the same size as a goose, it had more meat on it. By the mid 1550s it was already being associated with Christmas, though it doesn't seem to have fully replaced the goose until the 20th century.

However it has never been traditionally associated with Guy Fawkes.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:35 PM

You can serve Coca-cola at a medieval feast reenactment, it just isn't 'period', and should not be on open display. (ex-member SCA)

So you can cook turkey at a Guy Fawkes night if you want to feed people - just don't pretend it is 'genuine period food'.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:55 PM

Actually don I was quite clear
The turkey is food but a necessity as that is how we can have a bonfire. The fire has to be put in a pit that is used for cooking. A code requirement.

The turkey is a traditional food for British Celebrations however, not for guy fawkes. Nothing trad for guy fawkes could be cooked in an earth oven successfully. So it is an exception. The growth of tradition is acceptable. Our tradition for about 24 years.

We do have all of the other recipes represented each year without exception. Even the Caribbean one.

We still have one good turkey farm and that is the largest size.

Of course the goose was important- however, Dickens showing the generosity of Schrooge at the end of the book has him send out for a turkey. Who knows why.

In addition to the turkey we also cook and serve a huge christmas pudding. We do this because we can burn it and because after november 5 we look toward christmas. We always read the unmolding of the pudding passage from the christmas carol. Just our own additions. Just so the additions are not overwealming as they are with certain fusion musicians and singer songwiters then I think of it as comfortable accretion.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 08:58 PM

"the unmolding of the pudding passage"?

Sorry, but that sounds truely revolting..

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 09:05 PM

Chants = bonfire prayers - variants on remember, remember the fifth of november. see my publication the first comprehensive collection of these in print.

Tootler way ahead of you. The first effigies were of the devil and the young pretender. Popes came later. The concept of effigy burning is founded in old testament and early british theology the idea is to send up a reminder to god that the evil deed was remembered and never intended to harm anyones soul.

For a comprehensive history of celebration and the plot see my gunpowder plot web pages.....note especially the american version.

No dont pretend it is period food but documentation is that it came before 1605 so fawkes and co could have dined on turkey....

Just finished the torches today. Absolutely traditional learned from Hastings Borough Bonfire. They will burn their bonfire this weekend and in it will be a good sized piece of american oak from my woodpile.
We will receive on from theirs.

conrad

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 09:11 PM

Conrad, your knowledge of British history is probably unparalleled..

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 09:18 PM

"Conrad, your knowledge of British history is probably unparalleled.. "

That is not necessarily a compliment... Auditions for The Fooles Troupe are Closed! :-P

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Don Firth
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 09:44 PM

For some strange reason, this thread reminds me a lot of the one in which Wavy Davy insisted that if I wanted to be really true to American folk traditions, I should drop the English ballads, songs from the Southern Appalachians, fishing, lumbering and cowboy songs and such, and limit myself strictly to Native American chanting and drumming.

Me, whose great-grandfather came over from Scotland and my mother's parents emigrated from Sweden. Yup! Native American chanting and drumming. Makes a lot of sense. . . .

Don Firth

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: catspaw49
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 10:46 PM

Ya' know............There I was......Happy as the proverbial clam, make that a 45 pound clam, because I had successfully captured #1100 and it seemed to have finally killed this thread which has long been heavily laden and sinking from the weight of Conradshit. But now I arrive back to find even more shit piling up!!!

My gawd, it IS impressissive!

Now that everyone but Conrad the Dumbass has been well educated in turkey lore, I suggest we all feast on these 45 pound birds which at that size I would figure to be tougher than a brickbat. If we can down a few of these things we will then need to have access to some really big fuckin' hedges to hold the massive amounts of shit produced.

Conrad, you seem to be soliciting votes for your election to the glorious honor of being named "Dumbest Ass in Four Countries." Since you have no real conception of REAL traditions and seem hell bent on making your own, why not go on with the tough turkey eating and make it symbolic of you personally eating out Maggie Thatcher's ass.

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 11:01 PM

"Our tradition for about 24 years."

When I was in the SCA there was a saying about doing it once it was fun, doing it twice was coincidence, doing it 3 times became a tradition....

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 11:08 PM

You mean her 'pudding passage'?

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 11:22 PM

I suppose Smokey will want to give his opinion on 'Folking Music' next...

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 11:28 PM

First, we have to define 'Folking Music'..

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Oct 10 - 11:38 PM

In what dialect? Some people pronounce it "Fook Music"...

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Smokey.
Date: 15 Oct 10 - 12:10 AM

It's 'Fork Music' in parts of Yorkshire.

I don't know about dialects though - weren't they from Skaro?

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 15 Oct 10 - 12:50 AM

I can play the forks - a bit like the spoons ...

My grandad taught me to play the knives too - you jam then into the crack under the top on the edge of the table and flick them ....

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: catspaw49
Date: 15 Oct 10 - 12:54 AM

I bet Conrad has some wonderful old tradition of playing plastic sporks!

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Howard Jones
Date: 15 Oct 10 - 05:23 AM

Conrad, what puzzles me is that you are very critical of singer-songwriters for undermining real traditional music, but you are quite happy to cobble together made-up traditions for your own purposes. Can't you see that this is just the same?

If your local laws require you to cook food on the bonfire, then sausages and baked potatoes are the traditional foods cooked this way. Roast turkey and Christmas Pudding are "traditional" only at Christmas.

Bonfire Night was not a celebration of the safeguarding of parliamentary freedom and democracy (neither of which really existed at the time) but of the preservation of the Protestant monarchy against an attempt to restore Catholicism.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: catspaw49
Date: 15 Oct 10 - 06:26 AM

There you go Howard.......Clouding the thread with actual facts.

Although I will say that your post is just about right as Conrad can use it as a springboard to additional explanations of the new and improved traditions in Pissant World. Sometimes the longer posts elicit responses from him which are so disjointed and rambling that it becomes hard to tell where Fuckwit Conrad ends and Lunatic Pissant begins!

Spaw

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: Surreysinger
Date: 15 Oct 10 - 07:36 AM

Howard said "Roast turkey and Christmas Pudding are "traditional" only at Christmas. "

Obviously talking about UK tradition there, but even then ,as far as the pudding goes, that tradition only goes back as far as the nineteenth century. And "traditional" turkey at Christmas for the general populace probably only goes back to the twentieth century from all that I've read (notwithstanding Mr Dickens' references to the bird). (As far as I recall, in our family we didn't have turkey as a rule until I was in my early teens -it was too expensive),
As far as our own Bonfire Night/Guy Fawkes Night celebrations went roast bird of any description didn't feature in any that we had. Bonfire in the garden,smoke everywhere, fireworks, and the occasional toffee apple and baked potato yes ... but 46 lb turkeys? Never featured in any tradition for the night that I ever heard of.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 15 Oct 10 - 08:34 AM

The turkey is a traditional food for British Celebrations however, not for guy fawkes. Nothing trad for guy fawkes could be cooked in an earth oven successfully.

The Turkey is only vaguely traditional in terms of Xmas Cliche & related overspill, such as Boxing Day leftovers. Other times of the year it exists in reconstituted form (Golden Drummers etc.) but never for celebrations and rarely even on Sundays when if fowl is on the menu, it will invariably be chicken.

In the rural colliery villages of North Durham (Craghead, Marley Hill, Dipton, Quaking Houses, Chopwell, High Spen etc.) turkeys were eaten at Guy Fawkes, but first they were stuffed alive into larger than life-size grotesque wattle effigies various known as wadgers or creel feggas which were then smeared over with heavy daub (a mixure of horsehair, mud and cow shit). These were then topped off with carved neep heeds (or snammy lanthorns) before being paraded through the streets and muddy lanes to general rough music which excited the entombed turkeys to a hysterical frenzy, thus bringing alive these spectral scultures which would, at last, be hurled into the fire and the turkeys effectively, roasted alive in the process. Any escaping bird would be pursued into the fields by boys with flaming torches and and hung from a tree by its legs by means of hemp cord and, in an echo of wassailing rites, summarily blasted with shotguns to loud cheers and the chanting of psalms. A recent revival (1994) was boycotted by animal rights protesters and eventually banned outright by the RSPCA, though, like badger baiting and other savage rural pastimes, it is suspected the wadger tradition still takes place in the more remote communities.

Subject: RE: The Concept of FREED Folkmusic
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 15 Oct 10 - 08:49 AM

"Nothing trad for guy fawkes could be cooked in an earth oven successfully."

You learn something new every day! Not necessarily based on fact, however ...

There are many 'trad foods' that work well in an earth oven .... especially 'UK style trad foods'

Turkey is a big American thing - but never caught on the the same degree in Australia (compared with our trad chicken, turkey is dry and tasteless, exceedingly relatively expensive, and too big to fit in our trad sized ovens anyway - it was only for conspicuous consumers anyway), or as I've been able to find out, the UK (we picked up most of our traditions from the UK, before the Yanks cheap recycled TV shows saturated here in the 1960s) - Dickens was just using hyperbole as Scrooge, wanting to now flout his wealth, rather than miser it, just wanted to buy the biggest, most expensive thing he could find.

Exactly the same as Halloween - but the commercial interests now recycle the left over US Halloween junk here in Australia the next year...