Chords in Folk?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 20 May 08 - 04:53 PM

I said "traditions exist due to folks being impressed by HOW (e.g. the unaccompanied singing of verses to tell of something, or the playing of a tune for dancers) their forebears did things", Don, so we are, in fact, agreeing here.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST
Date: 20 May 08 - 05:07 PM

"Is that true? From my experience Africa is perhaps the most likely place where traditional music is going to be naturally harmonised with the minimum interference from western influences: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y3g15n9qCdc"

The musical example you cited on You Tube is more modern rather than traditional. The drumming might reflect the traditional earlier styles but the harmonies are influenced by missionaries and hymns.

If you listen to recordings of earlier African music, you will hear more monody or unison style singing with appropriate effects. Afro-pop, church music and other European influences have found their way into African music such as "High Life" and other forms influenced by American jazz. Traditional music from Dahomey or the Ituri Forest show little influence if any of Euro-harmonic tradition.

The way in which some kind of harmony enters the picture is when you hear a kind of polyphony in the voices such as with the Pygmies in the Ituri Forest but this is in no way
a Europeanized harmonic form as we know harmony from pop, jazz or classical music.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 20 May 08 - 05:10 PM

Walkaboutsverse says, but you, too, have not read. Ahh, but I have read, for clarity's sake I read, and my opinion hasn't changed. Music to your ears is it? Personally I find tennis to a very boring game, cucumber sandwiches are bland, jam tarts fattening and I prefer coffee, oh and I do like chords and harmony with my folk music (I sing myself as well as play fiddle and mandolin) and I don't like your poetry. That pretty much sums up my opinions regarding this thread. Poppagator is perfectly correct, just because there's no docunentation it doesn't mean it didn't happen, there are parallels in modern day society in other arenas that illustrate this point.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST
Date: 20 May 08 - 05:15 PM

""Folk music is pop music. How else can a classic tune survive, other than being popular How else can a classic tune survive being collected by a knobhead like Cecil Sharp?"

Cecil Sharp decried the bowdlerization of folk music by popular influences to such a degree that he thought that the five-string banjo changed the music by introducing popular elements.

There is a distinct difference between popular music created for a music market than an expression of a folk tradition that lies outside the music market area. This "knobhead" was responsible for a folk music revival and interest in the field that would have been abandoned by the "music merchants". His efforts were prodigious. He went into the backwoods of the US with just tools for annotating music and lyrics by hand when no one else was interested. To call him a "knobhead" is to reveal a level of ignorance that defies
categorization but is reflective of the general dissipating level of education worldwide.

This lack of education is responsible for the terrible standards of writing and composing in much of pop music today.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST
Date: 20 May 08 - 05:29 PM

The throat singing relies on the voice maintaining the fundamental with another area producing the natural overtones of that fundamental tone. if you analyze the overtones, you find that they are not "tempered" as we know it but some of the tones are in the cracks, so to speak. The idea behind overtones created the basis for the system of harmony that we now know however this example is not a typically harmonized development which came later when musical instruments created tones that were slightly out of tune. Harmony that we hear today is slightly out of tune. Pythagoras was one of the few constructing tones that were mathematically accurate but would sound out of tune to us today. Bach's "Well-Tempered Clavichord" was as are all keyboard instruments slightly out of tune with the overtone series. Some stringed players compensate by playing sharped notes slightly higher and flatted notes lower but the overall harmonic effect has
to be slightly out of tune to get the fullness we associate with chordal instrumental or vocal harmony. The reason it doesn't sound out of tune is that we have been conditioned to hear harmony a certain way which resonates with our cultural appreciation of it.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 20 May 08 - 05:30 PM

Poppagator said: "I'm quite sure, on the contrary, that many notable collectors did not have recording devices ~ those who worked prior to the invention of (or, at least, the widesprad availability of) recording technology."

I heard the point made recently that the phonograph was a very delicate and expensive piece of equipment, not really up to being trawled around country lanes on the back of a bike. People like Percy Grainger used to have the singers back to his house, where he would record them. Recording in the early-20th century period of collecting was the exception rather than the rule.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 20 May 08 - 06:00 PM

Guest says, Cecil Sharp decried the bowdlerization of folk music by popular influences to such a degree that he thought that the five-string banjo changed the music by introducing popular elements. Oh dear, I don't think Mr. Sharp would very much like the introduction of electric instruments into folk then, which means I may as well throw out my 5 string Violectra, and my customised Gibson F-5 , Oh and I consider E.Carthy to be far from uneducated

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,MikeS
Date: 20 May 08 - 06:02 PM

Of course, prior to the introduction of melody into music (around 384 BC), all songs were sung merely on one note, and strictly unaccompanied. Surely we should all be conscientiously upholding this tradition, lest we lose a valuable part of our cultural heritage forever. The later intrusion of what we now loosely refer to as harmony into Proper Traditional music only came about through people's inability to accurately follow the tune, which was, in itself an abherration caused by the inability to maintain monophonic regularity. I hope this clears up any doubt on the matter once and for all.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 20 May 08 - 06:13 PM

No, I don't think your explanation clears anything up, but that's something I'll have to live with, in my ignorance. Like I said, I'm going to toss away my instruments and probably take up extreme knitting, full time.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,MikeS
Date: 20 May 08 - 07:37 PM

Well, DS, I sincerely hope you aren't contemplating using more than one needle at once.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: M.Ted
Date: 21 May 08 - 12:31 AM

There is a discussion going on in another thread concerning the notorious 1954 definition of folk music--a close reading of that definition suggests that the hymnal which Mr. WAV is "top-lining" doesn't qualify as folk music at all, because "The term does not cover composed popular music that has been taken over ready-made by a community and remains unchanged" The music in the hymnal being written, arranged, and intended for performance in a standardized fashion--

So whatever sentiments the melodies may evoke, they are composed music, and not, in and of themselves, folk music. When Mr. WAV plays the "top line", he is simply playing a composed piece of music. End of story.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 05:35 AM

On myspace, M.Ted, we categorise ourselves into 3 - I put "Folk," "Christian" (because I DON'T see my singing and playing with just the top-lines of my selection of hymns as folk music), and "Other" (as I've tried poetry, also). And I'd agree with those who say folk music can be divided into two distinct categories of it's own - Contemporary Folk (known composer), Traditional Folk (unknown composer).
To DS - I wonder if you'll start singing a folk song to the rhythm of your knitting?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Tangledwood
Date: 21 May 08 - 06:07 AM

"I wonder if you'll start singing a folk song to the rhythm of your knitting?"

Silver threads and golden needles
Little ball of yarn
Green sleeves
Black socks

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 06:09 AM

What's that Mike Waterson song - "Stitch in Time"?...

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 21 May 08 - 07:30 AM

But what about 18th century songs with a known author/composer? That's not something I would call contemporary.
Also, I wonder why folk music is seen as something artless IE only the top-line should be played with no harmony, with no chords.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 07:40 AM

There are other branches of Early Music, Volgadon...and I thought you might have given something for DS to sing to as he/she knits...Scarborough Fair...

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 May 08 - 07:53 AM

The musical example you cited on You Tube is more modern rather than traditional. The drumming might reflect the traditional earlier styles but the harmonies are influenced by missionaries and hymns.

It's curious to reflect on the multiplicity of cultural confluences that may or may or may not resulted in the one thing or the other, whereby whatever it was that the African people took with them to the New World as slaves morphed by whatever transfigurative process into the musics we now call Jazz (no matter what Bert Lloyd has to say on the subject!), Soul, Blues, R&B and Hip Hop, all of which carry the essence of a continuity that might, at last return to the African motherland in triumph to further transfigure the nature of her native music.

It took a Belgian to invent the saxophone, but it took African-Americans such as Carlie Parker, Ben Webster, John Coltrane, and Rahsaan Roland Kirk (et al) to give it a voice; and in the hands of a native Xhosa tribesman such as Johnny Mbizo Dyani a European orchestral instrument such as the Double Bass becomes as African as any balafon or mbira.

And getting back to chords in folk, and multiphonic voices all in the one mouth, can there be anything so pure as Rahsaan Rolank Kirk's take on I Say a Little Prayer? Check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-uRnvMwD6jM

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 21 May 08 - 08:13 AM

There's too many anon "GUESTS"s in this thread - what about that policy of just deleting them?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 21 May 08 - 08:37 AM

I'm not talking about early music, WAV, I'm talking about folk songs with known composers/writers.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,Joe
Date: 21 May 08 - 08:43 AM

If the anonymous guests are making valid statements then whats your problem? If they are abusive it's a different story ...

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 May 08 - 08:45 AM

Don't they a contest in Newcastle for writing unaccompanied songs? Never been but I keep hearing about it. Are you part of that at all, WAV?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 21 May 08 - 08:55 AM

I seem to remember the policy was 'you will be deleted if you do not use a consistent user guest name'.

:-)

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Victor in Mapperton
Date: 21 May 08 - 09:10 AM

No Foolestroupe, some Guest posts are quite good. It's arsehole posts that get deleted. Are all yours still there ?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 09:17 AM

To Volgadon - if you want to make the two main divisions of folk "Traditional Folk", and "Composer Folk" (rather than "Contemporary Folk"), I wouldn't cry over such spilt soya!
To Sedayne - Phil and Cath could tell you more, but it's about the late folk-singer John Birmingham, who left money to encourage unaccompanied song-writing. I only saw him, just before he died, at The Bridge, but apparently he also went on Saturdays to The Cumberland - did you know him? And, yes, I am a part of it (a singaround the last 2 years, and a comp. the two before - which may kick-off again next year) in that I participate with my Chants from Walkabouts and my selection of E. trads (here). (One of us should have told you - sorry, but it will, in one form or the other, be on about this time next year, so please do note it in your calendar.)

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: folktheatre
Date: 21 May 08 - 09:31 AM

Is it just me or am I the only one who doesn't understand the opening post of this thread?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 09:38 AM

Via this theatre of "war", Folktheatre, it has been changed slightly - please use the link just above, and then goto Messages.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,Joe
Date: 21 May 08 - 09:44 AM

"To Volgadon - if you want to make the two main divisions of folk "Traditional Folk", and "Composer Folk" (rather than "Contemporary Folk"), I wouldn't cry over such spilt soya!"

What about Folk rock, Disco Folk, Traditional Dance music, English Acoustic, Folk Metal, all the local variations, etc etc

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 09:51 AM

I'd place trad. dance music in there but not the others you mention, Joe; thus, to me, "Leige and Leaf" should not have been voted the BBC's most influential folk album of all time - as it is not a folk album.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 May 08 - 09:52 AM

Via this theatre of "war", Folktheatre, it has been changed slightly - please use the link just above, and then goto Messages

But you still won't understand it, Folktheatre - owing to the fact that it can only operate via an appreciation of the highly specialised / subjective level of interpretation to which such a statement would make sense. Actually, I think this is what this thread is about more than anything - a quiet place in the universe where we might reflect upon the ephemeral actuality of whatever, whilst WAV perversely persists with his conclusions no matter how off the map they might be.

Before me things create were none, save things
Eternal, and eternal I endure.
All hope abandon ye who enter here.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 May 08 - 10:08 AM

"Leige and Leaf" should not have been voted the BBC's most influential folk album of all time - as it is not a folk album.

In this respect we almost agree, WAV. Here's something I wrote about this & other related issues on Harvest Home forum back in September last year:

1) The condition of traditional song is perilous enough without subjecting them to any further interference. Treat them as listed buildings, the interiors and exteriors of which amount to irreplaceable national treasures all too vulnerable to the ravages of time and ill-advised DIY make-overs. What else is Liege and Leif but a sequence of tasteless, bland modernisations of some nice old characterful properties; the wattle & daub of the originals ripped out and replaced with mass produced breeze block and plaster board; sash windows replaced with UPVC and the open fires with flame-effect gas fires?

2) The problem is that there is a very definite cut off point between the cultural and social conditions in which the traditional songs arose, and that which exists now. We have lost the continuity in which these songs came into being and as such the only thing we should do with them is observe, and source, and delight in their myriad wonders.

In a nutshell, they are not ours to mess with in the first place - not in any way, shape or form - and God knows there is enough work still to be done (...) in simply learning and singing them with resorting to such underhand methods as addition and interpretation.

3) We lovers of traditional song are not so much the keepers of a tradition, rather the volunteer curators of a museum, entrusted with the preservation of a few precious, priceless and irreplaceable artefacts: hand-crafted tools we no longer know the names of (let alone what they were actually used for) ; hideous masks of woven cornstalks (which are invariably assumed to be pagan) ; and hoary cases of singular taxidermy wherein beasts long extinct are depicted in a natural habitat long since vanished.

Not only is such a museum a beacon for the naturally curious, it's a treasure in and of itself, an anachronism in age of instant (and invariable soulless) gratification, and as such under constant threat by those who want to see it revamped; cleaned up with computerised displays and interactive exhibits and brought into line with the rest of commodified cultural presently on offer.

But not only is this museum is our collective Pit-Rivers, it is a museum which, in itself, is just as much an artefact of a long-vanished era as the objects it contains. It is delicate, and crumbling, but those who truly love it wouldn't have it any other way - and quite rightly so.   

4) The point is that the traditional songs are already dead; they're as dead as the traditional singers that sang them and the traditional cultures to which they once belonged; they're as dead as fecking dodos the lot of them - but we must never forget...

As far as their adaptation goes... of course anyone can do anything they like with them; God knows I certainly have (though a good deal less so in recent years, m'lud) but to do so in the name of The Tradition shows a complete lack of both respect to and understanding of their cultural provenance which is pretty much the whole of the case.

One thing that's immediately apparent even in the most casual study of traditional song is the fluidity in which they once existed in their natural habitat, hence the innumerable versions and variations we know & love today. Traditional songs were shaped by the innumerable voices that sang them; passing them on via an oral tradition in which the songs evolved according to that mysterious process whereby the subjective idiosyncrasies of the individual singers interface with the objective cultural context of which they were part to create something truly wondrous.

This is primary paradise of tradition folk song; a veritable dream-time in which we find them scampering in the new-mown meadows of what some of us still perceive as an agrarian utopia, before the advent of chemicals and mechanisation. So along come the song collectors, recognising that these songs are part of a social context that even in the early years of the last century is beginning to look decidedly fragile, and they do their level best to preserve them.

Taxidermy is, alas, an imperfect science (as the recent research into the Dodo has shown), so what comes down to us in the collections tells us as much about the collectors as it does about the people they were collective from - the stuffers rather than the stuffed, as it were; because one does get the impression that these well-healed paternalists weren't altogether too concerned with the broader cultural condition of these grubby rustics whose precious repertoires they so hungrily plundered.

One finds the same thing in folklore; the paganisation we see today is the result of the self-same paternalism that was used to justify the evils of colonialism - it's there in the cultural condescension that would interpret any given folk custom as being somehow vestigial of something now long forgotten. For example, when the thoroughly aristocratic Lady Raglan first named her medieval ecclesiastical foliate-head a Green Man, she did so fully in the faith that the Jacks-in-the-Green (etc.) of British folk custom were survivals of pagan fertility rites quaintly perpetuated by an ignorant lower order of society unwittingly preserving as mere superstition an ancient belief system that they themselves couldn't possibly understand, either in terms of its true provenance or else its real meaning. That there is no real meaning is perhaps the ultimate irony; the medium is the message and their experience entirely empirical.   

To take the example of the wonderful Buy Broom Buzzems as recorded by Bruce & Stokoe in The Northumbrian Minstrelsy from the singing of Blind Willie Purvis of Newcastle-upon-Tyne; here they freely admit that they chose to omit several of Mr Purvis's verses because they considered them to be somehow extraneous to the sense of the song. What we wouldn't give to hear those extraneous verses now...

A L Lloyd did some sterling work of course, but as Nigel points out much of it was decidedly suspect; I cringe every time I hear Jack Orion (which is often sung unquestioningly as a traditional ballad) and his theories on the origin of Jazz as outlined in the introduction to The Penguin Book of English Folk song beggar belief, even by the standards of the time.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: M.Ted
Date: 21 May 08 - 10:43 AM

Thanks for the posting the Kirk link, Sedayne--it definitely woke me up this morning! I should have figured you for a Kirk fan--seeing him again(because listening is not enough) brought back a lot--I'd forgotten about how effortlessly he could move back and forth between all those horns--wild music that makes you think--

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 21 May 08 - 11:46 AM

Walkaboutsverse says, "Leige and Leaf" should not have been voted the BBC's most influential folk album of all time - as it is not a folk album. ..By that same token I don't play folk music (which I do) because I too use electric instruments, fiddle and mandolin, as I believe I've already stated. Liege & Lief has most certainly been influencial and if you don't like, well you're entitled to your opinion, I consider it a folk album, like it or nor
Oh and Guest MikeS (I do wish these 'guests' would log in, it does add courage tp their convictions), regarding my knitting capabilities, they're just fine, I have great dexterity.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 21 May 08 - 11:51 AM

".and I thought you might have given something for DS to sing to as he/she knits...Scarborough Fair... "

Scarborough Fair. Now how stereotype is that? Dearie me! thank goodness I got beyond that years ago, if I ever knew the song in the first place

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 21 May 08 - 11:57 AM

"To Volgadon - if you want to make the two main divisions of folk "Traditional Folk", and "Composer Folk" (rather than "Contemporary Folk"), I wouldn't cry over such spilt soya!"

Are you really not paying attention to what I'm saying? Plenty of 'traditional' folk songs have known authors. I would say that contemporary folk is better defined as contemporary, IE, of recent origins.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 12:07 PM

"Plenty of 'traditional' folk songs have known authors"...No, Volgadon, if they have known authors they are NOT traditional.
DS - on myspace, e.g., again, folk-rock is a separate category from folk, and in it you will find the likes of Steeleye Span.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 21 May 08 - 12:16 PM

Walkaboutsverse says (rather patronisingly) DS - on myspace, e.g., again, folk-rock is a separate category from folk, and in it you will find the likes of Steeleye Span. (oh and the short-lived band, Def Shepard ) Now tell me something I don't know, and my space?(I will always consider Liege & Lief to be folk.)and my space? My daughter refers to it, quite tellingly I might add, as My WasteofSpace

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,John from Kemsing
Date: 21 May 08 - 12:21 PM

Walkabouts,
            Surely every bit of prose, doggerel and song were, at one time composed, committed to memory or set down by an individual or more (e.g. broadsheets); these authors were, at the time, known to others. Did the material become trad. once the identities of the authors were lost in the mists of time?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Don Firth
Date: 21 May 08 - 12:32 PM

"I said 'traditions exist due to folks being impressed by HOW (e.g. the unaccompanied singing of verses to tell of something, or the playing of a tune for dancers) their forebears did things', Don, so we are, in fact, agreeing here."

WAV, you're reinterpreting what I said so that it reflects what you want it to reflect:   your own viewpoint.

I was talking about being attracted to the total experience, and that included the instrumental accompaniment. When I first got actively interested in folk music, some of my initial purchases were recordings of singers I liked, a couple of song books, and a guitar. And what I did was not particularly unique.

The accompanying instrument was part of that total experience. And I repeat:   my interest was sparked not by my forebears, but my contemporaries.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: GUEST,Volgadon
Date: 21 May 08 - 12:49 PM

"Plenty of 'traditional' folk songs have known authors"...No, Volgadon, if they have known authors they are NOT traditional."

That is preposterous. I consider traditional as something collected. By your reasoning, if Joseph Taylor or Walter Pardon sang something by a known author, it isn't traditional?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 12:56 PM

"Tradition" has different meanings in different contexts - indeed, I remember my anthropology lecturer telling us we should always put it in inverted commas. In poetry, e.g., these days, it tends to refer to the use of metre and/or rhyme (e.g., Walkaboutsverse). But, in music, it refers to a piece to which we do not know the author(s) - e.g., the 17 in my repertoire.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: M.Ted
Date: 21 May 08 - 01:23 PM

The fact that a song is or isn'"t traditional" is irrelevant to most listeners and singers--as evidenced by the fact that musical "traditions" regularly disappear--Amy Winehouse sings to the "Folk" of today--the "folk" of Sharp, Child, Grainger, et al, are long gone, and their music is a preserved relic--

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 21 May 08 - 01:57 PM

Don Firth said,WAV, you're reinterpreting what I said so that it reflects what you want it to reflect:   your own viewpoint.

Don, I've noted that Walkaboutsverse is very good at doing this, making it appear that a person is agreeing whole -heartedly with his (Walkaboutsverse) point of view, which, most assuredly, I do not.

Walkaboutsverse, as to your query he/she, I am female and am of the age Sandy Denny would have been had she lived (I'll let you do the maths)which, I think, makes me somewhat older than you.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Don Firth
Date: 21 May 08 - 02:27 PM

Yes, indeed, Def (if I may be so informal as to call you by your first name), I have noticed that. Trying to get a point across to WAV is a bit like trying to nail Jell-O to a wall.

In the United States, and elsewhere, perhaps, considering the number of singers of folk songs in both the U. S. and the U. K. who sing and have recorded, say, Steven Foster's "Hard Times" and "Gentle Annie," the songs of Steven Foster are generally regarded as traditional. They are not, however, regarded by most people as folk songs.

Steven Foster's songs are essentially "parlor (or parlour) songs," which were intended to be and traditionally were accompanied by a piano. Or if the household couldn't afford a piano, often a parlor (or parlour) guitar.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 May 08 - 02:36 PM

Dear Don, Def, and all: a song by Steven Foster is a Steven Foster song NOT a traditional song.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Don Firth
Date: 21 May 08 - 03:00 PM

And that's definite the whole world over, WAV? There are many knowledgeable people who would disagree with you on that.

"Folk" is not the be-all and end-all of things "traditional."

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 21 May 08 - 03:08 PM

Walaboutsverse says, Dear Don, Def, and all: a song by Steven Foster is a Steven Foster song NOT a traditional song.

Alright; and your point is what exactly? I don't believe I personally ever mentioned Stephen Foster. Don's right about folk, it's not the be all and end all of trad.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Def Shepard
Date: 21 May 08 - 03:10 PM

Don, I'll admit, I, at one point in my life, thought Hard Times was American trad. I love that song very much.

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Don Firth
Date: 21 May 08 - 03:12 PM

This matter has pretty well been argued since Sunday breakfast, but it remains that the idea that traditional and / or folk songs were never sung by traditional and / or folk singers with harmony or instrumental accompaniment is patently absurd.   Making a blanket statement like that is a bit like Wile E. Coyote walking off the edge of the cliff and confidently hanging there in mid-air. Until he looks down, realizes his situation, and plummets to the canyon floor. WAV, you just haven't looked down yet.

You're making an awful lot of unfounded pronouncements about the way things are and are not.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 May 08 - 03:17 PM

A Bachelors' cup-a-soup goes into the pot...

What flavour, WAV?

Subject: RE: Chords in Folk?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 May 08 - 03:18 PM

400