Collapse of the Folk Clubs

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Dave Earl
Date: 24 May 07 - 10:46 AM

It is perhaps worth noting that there are two clubs in Lewes.

Ours at the Lewes Arms on Saturdays and Thursdays at the Royal Oak.

The Snail and I only attend at the Royal Oak and have no involvement with the running thereof. They are however a club that also has top quality guests as well as residents and floor singers.

The Royal Oak club is run slightly differently from the Lewes Arms but included all the same elements and is just as successful.

Therefore there is no "Collapse" in our part of the world Q.E.D.

Dave

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Folkiedave
Date: 24 May 07 - 10:15 AM

Seems like he might have been practising!!

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST,mad jock
Date: 24 May 07 - 10:05 AM

we are a broad church are we not so listen to british blues guitarist KEVIN BROWN for some real masterly of the guitar. his latest cd by the way is TIN CHURCH.

www.thekevinbrown.org

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Folkiedave
Date: 24 May 07 - 10:01 AM

As for people listening to each other - whilst I do not deny there is a place for this - ....
But it hardly does a lot for folk music IMHO.

IMHO it IS folk music.

Let's put this into context again.

I argued that folk clubs collapsed because far too many of them were of the "anything is good enough for folk music" school of thought. By accepting my Goth band you seem to be of this school too and you argued as above "it is folk music".

Lewes Folk Club - which is clearly well-run, successful and good luck to it - is successful because as far as I can see because it has week after week of well-practised professionals. Many of your professionals run workshop classes, an excellent idea - more of the remaining folk clubs should do it IMHO.

But it seems from what I read it is not a club full of unpractised people listening to each other, it is a place where you have residents and where you do your best to raise standards which I am in very much in favour of. Hardly a place where people are simply listening to each other playing their own teenage diaries, which is what I originally objected to and you supported.

But since I have not been there it is a bit hard to comment fully - I can only go on what the website tells me.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: TheSnail
Date: 24 May 07 - 09:13 AM

Folkiedave
Sorry I thought you were arguing earlier that folk music was not about well-paid guests but about anyone at all - no matter how bad - being allowed to play.

No, I was arguing that it was both. Where do you think those well-paid guests learnt their trade? Some who did floorspots with us are now on the top list at festivals.
In the scenario you painted of your band from hell, I was genuine in my reply. I may say, it has never happened. Some of our regular visitors are less than star quality and always will be but even they improve in an inclusive and encouraging environment. Most of our floorspots are very good indeed.

Which one do you think contributes most to the success of your folk club? I note that the weeks with very high profile guests tend to be sell-outs. Of course it could just be a coincidence.

Big names pull in the crowds; hardly surprising. Attendance varies in strange and unpredictable ways but we genarally have a good crowd.

Here is a simple experiment you could try.
Drop the professional guests, drop the residents that I note you have, stick to allowing anyone to play anything they like and come back on here and tell us what a success it has been.

Can't see the point when we appear to have a winning formula. We do have what Sandra calls a "family hold back" policy. Residents will drop out to allow time for the floor spots.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Folkiedave
Date: 24 May 07 - 08:14 AM

Would you like to take a look at our guest list? In the past, Tom McConville, Martin Carthy, John Kirkpatrick, Pete Coe and many others including a good few Mudcatters have seemed to enjoy performing here.


I took a look at your guest list and it is indeed most impressive.

Sorry I thought you were arguing earlier that folk music was not about well-paid guests but about anyone at all - no matter how bad - being allowed to play.

Which one do you think contributes most to the success of your folk club? I note that the weeks with very high profile guests tend to be sell-outs. Of course it could just be a coincidence.

Here is a simple experiment you could try.

Drop the professional guests, drop the residents that I note you have, stick to allowing anyone to play anything they like and come back on here and tell us what a success it has been.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST,edthefolkie
Date: 24 May 07 - 07:52 AM

Last night I experienced just about the perfect paradigm of

(a) why the clubs can be a great experience and (b) why the clubs can be terrible.

a) The guest singer was a true professional, with his own PA & monitor, therefore could be heard properly both by the audience and himself over Milan v Liverpool downstairs. He had obviously been doing this all over the world for a long time, didn't spend ages tuning up, gave just the right inter song chat.

However...

b) One chap, obviously there every week, decided to sing a certain very rude "traditional" song in a floor spot. Full marks for chutzpah. Needless to say he forgot the words - didn't matter, he was too old to sing 'em anyway. Frankly he sounded like a dirty old g*t. God alone knows what the few younger people present thought - I know exactly what my 19 year old son would have said!

Just an anecdote, and I've honestly tried not to be personal - but I think that club could be contributing to its own demise. And it's sad.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 24 May 07 - 07:49 AM

Don't be sad about starting the thread, Les. Im sure it was well meant and if some people used it to spout bile - that's their problem.

It IS terribly sad - I think a whole generation of young musicians were expecting to make a living in what seemed a wonderful artistic movement - genuinely from the people.

It didn't turn out the way some of us hoped, but I suppose it worked out to some folks' satisfaction and enrichment, and isn't that the way of the world. Things can't be perfect, because we're not.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: TheSnail
Date: 24 May 07 - 07:47 AM

Jim Carroll
If the attitude expressed by the Snail is a prevalent one, the clubs have no more significance than karaoke sessions and the sooner they stop calling themselves folk clubs, the better.

Would you like to take a look at our guest list? In the past, Tom McConville, Martin Carthy, John Kirkpatrick, Pete Coe and many others including a good few Mudcatters have seemed to enjoy performing here.

Coming up twenty years and we haven't collapsed yet. We must be getting something right and can't be that much of a cringe-worthy embarrassment.

Thanks for the positive feedback from Les, Breton Cap and Richard. See you at Chippers Dave and some others?

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 May 07 - 07:18 AM

Hi JB

There is a meaning for "Folk". If we mean something else perhaps we should say so.

As you know, I may prefer to play "Folk" but I think I do do it in a reasonably exploratory an innovative way...

And I may also throw in the occasional thing that is not "Folk" but is done as if it is, just to be cussed.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 24 May 07 - 07:06 AM

Sorry I started this.

"In the late '60s through to the late 70's thousands and thousands of Folk Clubs existed. Almost every town and city and lots of vil-lages had clubs.

Then they started to close - many never to re-open. Why did the Folk Club scene collapse?

It may not have collapsed to the same extent everywhere but ........... quite honestly I think this thread said all their was to say ans some things that were unpleasant and irrelevant a long time ago.

Best wishes

Les

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: The Sandman
Date: 24 May 07 - 06:54 AM

what COLLAPSE OF folk clubs.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: The Barden of England
Date: 24 May 07 - 06:30 AM

I think people are mixing 'Traditional' with 'Folk', and therein (in my eyes)lies the problem. I don't believe that 'Folk' means traditional at all - but there you go.
John Barden

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 24 May 07 - 05:19 AM

Captain Ginger....perhaps you should have read the whole thread...your head is too far up your own ....to see where most other peoples are.
What has developed into the folk scene in Lincolnshire over the years is quite satisfactory and well attended. There is a wealth of good local talent both in the singing and songwriting genres and whereas we acknowledge that the sixties was the boom time for Folk Clubs.....all is well here in its developed form with no signs of collapse...as yet.
Best wishes, Mike.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 24 May 07 - 04:45 AM

... and whatever you don't mention the cloths!

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 May 07 - 04:14 AM

When the majority go line-dancing I will be proud to be in a minority.

I am very tempted to go to the Lewes club - it sounds just what it should be, an inclusive place where people will be encouraged and welcomed, and there will be some fine music but no-one is pushed out. Well said Snail. Shame it's so far.

BTW, I don't think I'm wonderful, and quite frequently, while it is nice to hear people who are wonderful, it is a pain in the arse to hear people who only think they are wonderful.

I can think of at least one very good guitarist I would go out of my way to avoid listening to for precisely that reason.

I'm getting that flavour here from some people. How wonderful do you think you are, Captain Ginger?

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Captain Ginger
Date: 24 May 07 - 03:37 AM

I can't be arsed to read the whole thread, but I have to agree with countess richard, Jim Carroll and Joe Offer. There does seem to be a rather pathetic, head-in-the-sand defence of the mediocre by people who aren't embarrassed to be called 'folkies.'
One of the reason folk clubs have declined (to add to the many valid reasons already given) is the number of what one might call 'special people' who frequent them.
I very rarely go to any clubs when I'm in England these days, but when I lived there I used sometimes to take friends to clubs, and I would constantly have to explain or make excuses for the odd behaviour of some of the regulars. Let's face it, trad music attracts odd people. I don't know why, but it does. Some of those odd people are very good in a Glenn Gould sense, but too many are terrible and would be laughed off the stage anywhere else. Where else outside the NHS would people who can't hold a note or remember a song be encouraged to stand up and sing?
What publican in his right mind would want to fill his pub with people like that - the sort who make the regular punters snigger and walk away?
Folk clubs are declining because too many of them became cringe-worthy embarrassments. Someone above commented on a club where there were 16 Mudcatters in the audience. That should tell you something. The number of people who go to clubs in the UK is tiny. More people go fucking line-dancing! The club as a mass phenomenon is dying. Some will survive, the way Ronnie Scott's the 606, the King's Head and the 100 Club represent just about all that's left of jazz in the UK. The rest will die off.
So, to dinosaurs like The Vilan and Georgiansilver, get your heads of the the sand and learn to adapt

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Dave Earl
Date: 24 May 07 - 02:51 AM

The Thread is about the failure of Folk Clubs but.......

What The Snail says about our club in Lewes shows that down here we feel that there should be a place for everybody (strong and weak singers/musicians alike)and that attitude is part of what makes The Lewes Arms Club the ongoing success that it is.

See you and (the other Parts) at Chippers Bryan

Dave

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Ian Burdon
Date: 24 May 07 - 02:47 AM

Nick wrote: "It's quite a small pub that we play in and the rare times that we put people on we rather leave it to them. Next month we have Hissyfit visiting and will have a PA there in case. It can get quite noisy with 40 + people in a smallish area (I know that everyone should listen etc) and my view is that it is fairer to a performer to let them be heard rather than have to battle people and I would guess that is also the view of the people who have come and brought PA's in the past".

Last year, at the invitation of a local, two or three of us did an evening of Jake Thackray songs in Flaxton.    First up, I really liked the pub and the audience and enjoyed the evening.   And the absence of PA in the room was fine as it should just have been a matter of adjusting my delivery and repitching the songs.   What I hadn't counted on was the effect of cigarette smoke in such a small room and as the evening went on I was having quite consciously to battle the effect of this on my voice - and wished we'd had some degree of amplification to avoid the ensuing strain.

This won't be an issue shortly of course, but in that case my preference for amplification was not due to consideration of aesthetics.

Ian

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 24 May 07 - 02:34 AM

Jim, whilst I agree with much of what you say I am a bit bothered about this:

"I believe that it lies within the abilities of all but a very few people to sing well. "

The difficult word is "well". How well? I guess it depends on the context? Well enough for a small sing around? Well enough for a floor spot, well enough for a ................. Who enjoys Opera singers singing folk songs, I would leave the room? Who enjoys classical arrangements of folk songs? Of course it does not actually matter. They are well sung and played but how do they relate to the songs as they have been kept by Source Singers?

The songs have survived. The will continue to survive and be available in paper or digital libraries.

Will they be sung? Who knows? Some "Source Singers" had fine voices and brought much out of the songs that they sang. Some had voices once and some were not very good singers but we have been pleased that they kept the songs alive.

Who presents and who represents folk / traditional music? Well it looks to me as if anyone can. Nobody owns it - that surely is one essentail difference between these songs and those we write.

Why the hell would anybody want to listen to badly performed crap?

Fair enoughski, but what is the entry level for singing the songs we like? We may think we are giving first timers helpful advice but I bet it feels much more like patronising criticism to the singer.

I have sung in dozens of folk clubs but don't sing much at festival events because I find them threatening. I took my Mandola to that club at Cecil Sharp House and felt theatened but in the end people were very friendly and it was ok. Singing to others in public is a challenge but I know that almost everybody can sing - we just need the right song and the right context.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST
Date: 24 May 07 - 01:55 AM

Sorry, being old enough to remember when Lewes had the reputation of being a good club, I found the The Snail's Q&A thoroughly depressing and confirming all my worst fears about what has happened to the clubs. Why the hell would anybody want to listen to badly performed crap? Club organisers who promote such attitudes under the banner of folk song have rung the death knell of live performances; as far as I am concerned it shows a deep contempt for the songs and for the people who kept them alive down the centuries, also for all those revival singers, club organisers, collectors and researchers who have put in the effort to make songs available to as wide an audience as possible in a form that can be appreciated.
For me, the only way for the songs to survive is for them to be treated with the respect they merit; to expect anything but competent, thoughtful performances (at the very least) from those who sing in public is a total sell-out.
I believe that it lies within the abilities of all but a very few people to sing well. Some do so with ease, others have to work that much harder at it, but every singer who wants to make a half-decent job of singing has to put in time and effort to make the songs their own. Once the work has been done and the problems, technical and interpretive, have been solved, there is no greater pleasure than to have the song work, both for the singer and for the audience. If performers can't be bothered to do the work, let them stay at home and watch The Bill!
If the attitude expressed by the Snail is a prevalent one, the clubs have no more significance than karaoke sessions and the sooner they stop calling themselves folk clubs, the better.
Jim Carroll
PS No, to my knowledge the Beatles were not banned from folk clubs in Liverpool. They did perform occasionally in the interval at The Cavern when it was a jazz club and, on the couple of occasions I saw them, were treated with the polite indifference they merited.
Had they turned up at folk clubs, any organisers worth their salt would have shown them the door (unless they had come to listen).

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: TheSnail
Date: 23 May 07 - 02:38 PM

Folkiedave
If I turned up with a couple of mates at Lewes Folk Club and asked to sing it would be OK?

Yes.

If I had a guitar, a mate with an acoustic bass and another with a bodhran and and we played goth and punk that would be OK too?

Yes.

And if I then sang out of key and it was pretty obvious that the guitarist knew one chord, the bass player hadn't ever played before and the bodhran player had no sense of rhythm, (not unusual in my experience of bodhran players) that would be OK too?

Yes.

If I then said we came to the folk club because no-one else would let us play anywhere in Sussex and its environs because we were so awful - would you let us back next week?

Yes.

1) You'd only be on for a few minutes; we like to pack in as many floor spots as we can.
2) It's handy for people to have an opportunity to go to the bog/bar.
3) Exposure to the many excellent floor singers/players we have might encourage you to practice and get better. Watching new performers develop is one of the joys of being a folk club resident.

Drop in sometime, you'll be made welcome. We've got an open night this Saturday but I'll be away (Chippenham). June 2nd (Boden & Spiers) and June 9th (Tommy Peoples) are ticket only and are close to sold out. Obviously not all visitors will be able to get a floorspot those nights.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 23 May 07 - 02:33 PM

Wasn't it the Beatles who got banned from folk lcubs in Liverpool because they were awful?

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST,Spidey Bobe
Date: 23 May 07 - 02:32 PM

Went to Dartford Folk Club earlier this year to see Rainbow Chasers and the "residents" who performed were little short of dire!

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST
Date: 23 May 07 - 02:25 PM

Thank you Cap'n; had a great holiday, but it's nice to be back in the thick of it - 'thick' being the operative word in some cases!
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 23 May 07 - 02:11 PM

Well, thanks for all your contributions. It looks like this might roll on a while.

You really have given me a lot to think about. You may have noticed from another thread that Folk goes on in Chorlton, Manchester. A club happens every Thursday at the Cricket Club and attracts an eclectic collection of singers and musicians, some amazing and some about as crap as me. What we don't hear much is folk songs, by some deffinition or other.

We had a one of session, with no entrance fee, as part of the Arts Festival with Madcap, a Ceilidh Band, Keth Hancock, much celebrated singer song writer and lots of the rest of us - mostly but not exclusively traditional music. about 90 people turned up to sit on about 50 chairs and we had a great night.

The question is - how, if at all, do we move forward?

The classic "Folk Club" looks fraught with difficulties but will looser arrangements work any better?

When I have thought a bit more I will start another thread

Thanks again

Les

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Folkiedave
Date: 23 May 07 - 01:28 PM

I am not suggesting you should have to pass an audition to join a session. I happen to think performing in public whatever genre of music it is happens to be demands a certain level of competence.

If I turned up with a couple of mates at Lewes Folk Club and asked to sing it would be OK?

If I had a guitar, a mate with an acoustic bass and another with a bodhran and and we played goth and punk that would be OK too?

And if I then sang out of key and it was pretty obvious that the guitarist knew one chord, the bass player hadn't ever played before and the bodhran player had no sense of rhythm, (not unusual in my experience of bodhran players) that would be OK too?

If I then said we came to the folk club because no-one else would let us play anywhere in Sussex and its environs because we were so awful - would you let us back next week?

And if the answer is no, then you and your folk club (correctly IMHO) have some standards when it comes to people performing and so do I.

They just happen to be different.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: TheSnail
Date: 23 May 07 - 12:57 PM

Folkiedave, "Dogs are four legged animals" doesn't mean "Four legged animals are dogs".

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: TheSnail
Date: 23 May 07 - 12:49 PM

The Lewes Arms Folk Club hasn't collapsed yet (just coming up to 20 years) and we do everything from Come-All-Ye/session nights to top artists (and we've never used PA). As I said earlier "opposite ends of a spectrum". It's all folk. It's all fun. I go to festivals and I go to the concerts but I've never had to pass an audition before joining in a session. I thought they were open to anyone who wanted to join in.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Folkiedave
Date: 23 May 07 - 12:30 PM

Please remember this is in the context of "Collapse of the Folk Clubs". Not the "Collapse of Folk Music" which IMHO is flourishing.

I do not believe that singers and musicians arrive fully formed - nor do I think people should practise in public. Most festival have workshops. Go and learn there.

If there is a singing session at a pub then you can get up and do a song or two. Eventually you will get better known and find other sessions where you are invited to sing and more. And good luck to you. Go to Mudcat meetings where this sort of thing is popular I am told.

The people I referred to were not "gaining experience" they were playing to themselves for fun because that is what they wanted to do. Their privilege and good luck to them I am not knocking it per se. I am saying is does not do much for folk music whilst the other correspondent believes it IS folk music.

I don't.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Nick
Date: 23 May 07 - 12:14 PM

I still haven't really worked out whether we run a folk club or not (but that's by the by) but we have put on some acts over the last 4 1/2 years as an addition or alternative to our weekly singaround (which has 20 to 40 people who come together and sing and play each week).

On amplification...

When Last Nights Fun came and played they bought a PA system and mixer; Kieran Halpin also came with PA; Marie Little didn't; Jacqueline MacDonald (of Jacqui and Bridie fame).

It's quite a small pub that we play in and the rare times that we put people on we rather leave it to them. Next month we have Hissyfit visiting and will have a PA there in case. It can get quite noisy with 40 + people in a smallish area (I know that everyone should listen etc) and my view is that it is fairer to a performer to let them be heard rather than have to battle people and I would guess that is also the view of the people who have come and brought PA's in the past.

I don't think we are collapsing at the moment as we seem to be seeing the attendance gradually increasing. There are currently a group of German students/parents/teachers visiting in the area and half a dozen of them came last week (and two of them joined in and sang); they go back on Thursday and were asked by one of their hosts where they would like to go out on their final night in the area - they decided that the pub and the singing was the thing that attracted them most so that's what they are doing.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 23 May 07 - 12:07 PM

So how do musicians who 'lack talent' become 'accomplished' then, Folkiedave?

Do you really mean 'lack talent', or should that be 'inexperienced'? How do you know the difference?

And if 'inexperienced' how does a musician get experience?

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Folkiedave
Date: 23 May 07 - 11:42 AM

If people playing music to each other (often despite their lack of talent) is IYHO "folk music" then it is hardly surprising folk clubs collapsed.

And how come hundreds turn up to festivals - like Shepley where I was last weekend? Within the festivals there are sessions but usually by accomplished musicians and singers.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 May 07 - 10:04 AM

Jim Carroll. I hope youhad a pleasant holiday.I agree with you.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST,tom bliss
Date: 23 May 07 - 09:35 AM

- yes in terms of open mic nights I do tend to agree. I think the PA's just part of the performance fantasy for many people. If there's no mic it isn't a proper gig - they think. Of course if you've only ever addressed a room through a mic you've never learned to project properly, and learn, as you say, that the best way to drown out chatter and get people's attention is to sing or play quieter (though you have to start loud or they nver notice)!

Hmm, yes - I'd agree that amplification could well have been a factor in the collapse of the clubs - specially once PAs became commonplace for pub gigs. Anyone from that scene trying to do a club 'commando' would have been in trouble.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: TheSnail
Date: 23 May 07 - 09:16 AM

countess richard
This thread is slipping back into confusion between tune sessions and venues with paid performers and paying punters. These are entirely different beasts.

I don't think there is a sharp divide between these two extremes; they are just opposite ends of a spectrum. I regularly attend two clubs and occasionally visit three or four others all putting on paid guests with a charge on the door. None of them use PA.

It's a bit odd to be Luddite about 'amplification and electronics' when, used properly, they are simply an aid to better performance.

In a concert, that's true; they are part of the performance. In a small venue, where they are just used to be louder and drown out background noise, they are a barrier between performer and audience.
Valmai Goodyear and I aka Droolin' Concertinas (we needed a name quickly) have been to a couple of "Open Mic" clubs. At the first, the sound man set us up and promptly legged it to satisfy some bodily need leaving us with collapsing microphones and ear splitting feedback. At the second we told them we could manage very well without, thank you. The audience continued their habitual chatter the first time through the tune then, as we went pianissimo for the second time through, actually shut up and listened (except for the soundman who talked all the way through).
We haven't been back to either.

Folkiedave
As for people listening to each other - whilst I do not deny there is a place for this - ....
But it hardly does a lot for folk music IMHO.

IMHO it IS folk music. (Well, not sure about the twenty-nine guitar players.)

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Folkiedave
Date: 23 May 07 - 07:39 AM

Folk clubs are about people listening to each other

My orginal comments were not designed to alter the discussion but were designed to give some sort of historical perspective to the "Collapse of Folk Clubs".

In the great days of the sixties and early seventies - folk clubs did not have to compete with sessions - there weren't all that many apart from within the Irish community. Not all that many people played instruments. We had the odd singing session at festivals for example, but it was mostly chorus songs so everyone could join in, not as you suggest people listening to each other. They were often led by two or three people only.

As for people listening to each other - whilst I do not deny there is a place for this - I have been to such sessions. I went to one of around 40 people in a room there were twenty-nine guitar players, that people were given two songs whether they could sing or not and most were not very good. Since they were singing to each other and that was what they wanted to do fine and I have no complaints.

But it hardly does a lot for folk music IMHO.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 23 May 07 - 07:20 AM

OK, cancel that. Tom says it better.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 23 May 07 - 07:17 AM

This thread is slipping back into confusion between tune sessions and venues with paid performers and paying punters. These are entirely different beasts.

Bands can now go to gigs with PA in their pockets and can thus achieve the balance between instruments far more readily. And a singer on the road for weeks on end can save their vocal chords.

It's a bit odd to be Luddite about 'amplification and electronics' when, used properly, they are simply an aid to better performance.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 23 May 07 - 07:12 AM

The thing about amplification in clubs is that some rooms do need it. Noise from other bars (games machines, pool tables, sky sports) can leak through, and that didn't used to happen in the old days. Also, the acoustics of many club rooms are not great. One common problem that guests face is that some organisers only ever do a short spot, so never realise how much strain their room can place on a singer's voice over a whole evening. Yes, we can sing quietly, but if you do songs where the words matter, you have to think of the people at the back - many of whom may not hear as well as they did.

If you get a few of these rooms on the trot it gets harder and harder each night.

Ideally clubs with this problem will provide a PA, and many do. The trouble is that PAs are not always terribly good, and singing through them can actually makes the job more difficult. Also as soon as you set up front of house speakers, you need to consider monitors. This is because you only get the low/mid frequencies out of the back and side of the cabs, and this makes it harder to pitch - so you tend to oversing to compensate. Monitors should solve the problem, but only if they are good ones, and it's all more work for club and artist.

I carry a small PA for these emergencies, and I'm happy to set it up. But if the club overruns - and many do - there's always the problem of packing it away, when the organisers are standing at the door and the landlord's jangling his keys. Plus you know a that lot of people feel like TheSnail, and you don't want to offend them with your horrible roack and roall black boxes. So the PA doesn't get used as often as it should.

Tom

(PS Any organisers reading this who haven't joined the folkclubs discussion eList, please do! To join the group send an email saying who you are to [e-mail]. Thanks)

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Pilgrim
Date: 23 May 07 - 07:02 AM

Daresay that this has been discussed ad nauseum elsewhere, but I don't imagine amplification and electrics are the way forward. We had an electronic session called "Pling What You Bring" locally. It very quickly became a stand up comedy night instead. And this in an area that quite easily supports four quality accoustic sessions in an area of a square mile. Not intending to rain on your parade, FolkieDave. Any suggestions as to how we can get more people in, and singing / playing, are better than none.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: TheSnail
Date: 23 May 07 - 06:44 AM

Now here is a thought - with modern equipment, miniature and not so bulky and expensive and clearly judging by the numbers of people who come to festivals, maybe clubs will grow again!!

Or maybe it will be the final squeeze that chokes the life out of them. I would never go to a club that regularly used amplification and certainly not to one that expected me to use it. Folk clubs are about people listening to each other.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST
Date: 23 May 07 - 05:39 AM

Here's an idea to help stave off collapse: we all start inviting friends to come along now and then, especially younger ones, with the idea that jsut a few will start to join in on their own.

The word club says a lot: those who come a lot feel welcome, whatever the rules about membership, whereas for those who aren't part of the regular audience at that club, it can feel less easy than buying a ticket in some more anonymous venue.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Folkiedave
Date: 23 May 07 - 05:15 AM

Can I offer a further bit of analysis which I don't think has so far been mentioned?

When folk rock came in around 1970 - bands suddenly needed amplifying. Then - everyone needed amplifying.

I went to hear (amplified) Frankie Gavin and Tim Edey last week in a room which I can remember as unamplified when it was used as a regular folk club. (They were magic by the way!)

So bands had to travel with their own gear - or the club had to supply it. Most clubs didn't/wouldn't as artists began wanting amplification.

In other words once folk clubs needed amplification - they gradually folded - well at least many of them did.

Now here is a thought - with modern equipment, miniature and not so bulky and expensive and clearly judging by the numbers of people who come to festivals, maybe clubs will grow again!!

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST
Date: 22 May 07 - 02:30 PM

Having had enough time to think more about this question while on holiday I was intending to re-open this thread, but I would have done so anyway to respond to Wordy's pearls of wisdom.
"It's fair to say that the separation of folk music from folk clubs is a good one"
I doubt if I have ever come across such a crassly arrogant statement in all the time I have been involved in folk music.
So I am to give up all the bawdy and erotic songs, the transportation and poaching songs, those about soldiers, sailors, farmworkers, miners, mill workers, the highwaymen and hanging ballads, the songs about the press-gangs and recruiting parties, the love songs, the historical, supernatural, tragic and comic ballads that go to make up the Child canon, and all the other beautiful songs and ballads that have kept me enthralled and entertained over the last forty odd years, and which are inextricably tied up with our history and culture – and for what?
I assume you are referring to the Charles Rice Diaries 'Tavern Singing in Early Victorian London' (1840 and 1850).
Are you seriously suggesting that we jettison our traditional repertoire for those dreadful glees, rounds and catches that were performed mainly by lower middle-class urban gentlemen in establishments contemporarily described as 'places where one could go to drink, smoke, sing and escape the ladies'. The songs that were performed in these establishments, with such inspiring title as 'The Nigger Ball', 'Don't I Love My Mother', 'Nix My Dolly' and 'Cat's Head Apples' were not even considered entertaining or important enough to make it into the 20th century – if you don't believe me, thumb through the thousands of songs in such collections as 'The Universal Songster' and see how many you recognise, or how many are in any way singable.
To 'separate folk music from folk clubs' sounds to me suspiciously like one of those dreadful 'Irishman' or 'Kerryman', jokes – tell us you're only ''avin' a larf" Wordy.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: melodeonboy
Date: 14 May 07 - 11:59 AM

"Community musician"? Mmmm.... sounds very New Labour.

Or perhaps I should play under the heading of "box squeezing solutions"!

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 13 May 07 - 10:33 PM

"Yes Karen defused a very difficult situation, and very discreetly, but it was a dispute between friends and nothing to do with the music except that one spoilt person expected total silence in a pub (or so I understand it as I was outside). Perhaps that one should try playing in a pub session where a darts team is playing and football is on the TV)"

You are right to admire Karen (although her ejection and banning of teh offender was overt and public and in no way discreet). As for the rest you are so full of shit you could fertilise most of the farms in England.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: GUEST,FiddlyTee
Date: 13 May 07 - 08:43 PM

re Rochester

Richard - the session in the Vic & Bull was Irish (billed as such), we had played there all afternoon, and still had a few different tunes to get out of our systems!
John's session was well attended and you got the chance to play one tune every hour and a half!
And we played inside as well afterwards.

Yes Karen defused a very difficult situation, and very discreetly, but it was a dispute between friends and nothing to do with the music except that one spoilt person expected total silence in a pub (or so I understand it as I was outside). Perhaps that one should try playing in a pub session where a darts team is playing and football is on the TV)

But yes, John runs a "tight" session and all respect to him.

Sorry your daughter was upset, but if she's over 18 she will know that in pubs disagreements and inappropriate behaviour fuelled by alchohol, will occur. Its up to you as a parent to help her deal with it, rather than being condemnatory of others.


dave folkie
Rochester is basically a dance (morris) rather than "folk" music festival. Us (we) musos are pretty well just camp followers.


In olden times there were no motor cars, and people travelled long distances by boat.
If you look at the map you will see the ferry routes between Scandinavia, Scotland and N Ireland (Yes I know Dublin is a Viking town as well), and between Spain and Southern Ireland, and between Cornwall and Britanny. These have been links for trade and culture for several thousand years, and partly explain cultural similarities.

*
*

Yes perhaps we should avoid the term "folkies". In modern parlance we are "community musicians, singers, dancers and actors". The traditional music that we are rightly associated with was once new, the "pop" music of its time, and so there is no reason why
we should avoid new non-commercial compositions. Indeed, until recently a musician was expected to compose and improvise.

Yes there is a great difference between a folk club where the "great" are paid to entertain the "punters", and a sing-around or session where we go to enjoy doing what we love (and hope that the rest of the pub's customers will enjoy it mas well!).
But if the "Punters" don't hear the music performed well, how will they be moved to learn to play or sing, and eventually join in a session where mistakes (and even bodhran players), while not approved of, are never condemned, and finally become musicians themselves?

Incidently the fiddle can be played in the "french" style, held low against the chest and bowed almost vertically, in a crowded pub. As long as you're not in a chair with arms.

As many of you have said, the main thing for us is to KEEP MUSIC ALIVE no matter where it is played.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: TheSnail
Date: 13 May 07 - 11:17 AM

I'm sure Walkaboutverse could help you.

Subject: RE: Collapse of the Folk Clubs
From: Georgiansilver
Date: 13 May 07 - 10:53 AM

In the days when men grafted, on ships of the line,
Drinkin tottys and tellin' a yarn.
In the days when the farmers and labourers drank,
At harvests end, sat in the barn.
They sang songs of the era, with overall zest,
Told of tasks they performed every day.
All men were expected to sing t'would appear,
They all did because that was the way.

So Folk songs were born, they were sung then for free,
Some sung to achieve an ambition.
The better ones lasted for decades and more,
Folk singing became a 'tradition'.
There are those round still who would echo that cause,
To use Folk Clubs for all to take part.
But some now think only the best should perform,
I believe they are lacking in heart.

You see some on Mudcat, they spout from the head,
There manner is some times quite crass.
To them I would say stick your head 'tween your legs,
And as far as you can ………….


Couldn't think of a rhyme for the last line