'5000 Morris Dancers'

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Terry McDonald
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 09:46 AM

Why the 'at', WAV?

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: pavane
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 09:47 AM

And I believe that there are records of Cotswold Morris sides travelling to London in the 1800's, to perform there. (Better takings)

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: pavane
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 09:52 AM

(How on earth did I type Which instead of White?)

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 10:00 AM

...and why on earth did I type that "at"?!
Coppers have performed in the Alber Hall - no porky pies, Pavane!

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 11:34 AM

Everybody's performed in London - but what do you suggest....just Londoners?

was it John Foreman who used to sing Dahn the Sewers...? Refreshingly different, anyway.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 12:38 PM

I suggest, WLD, dissolution, such that the 2012 Olympics are held in London, England; and the very last Commonwealth games in Glasgow, Scotland - a fine country that I have greatly enjoyed VISITING.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Fidjit
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 03:15 PM

Sidney Carter surely. It's his "Down Below".

Chas

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 03:57 PM

yeh i know. I just seem to have some recollection of John Foreman singing something like that.....

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 04:34 PM

I repeat, we are a multicultural society and reflection of multicultural traditions at 2012 would demonstrate to the rest of the world that at least some of us are not xenophobic.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 04:44 PM

well actually its aleady been decided by radio 4, the house of commons, a select committee of ex public schoolboys and Andrew lloyd webber - so I'm afraid its bollocks to you lot - multicultural and otherwise.

And that's how England works. get used to it.

Its just bound to be awful. that's how we do things. Its traditional.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 25 Aug 08 - 05:22 PM

To avoid that, WLD, the EFDSS, whose members do sometimes drop in on such threads, should introduce Seb Coe to the likes of Doc Roe - and it does have a nice ring to it: Roe and Coe.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 05:11 AM

They're all universal not because of any melting pot theories, nor because of any superiority or intrinsic universality, but because the USA has, for many years, been very good at flooding the rest of the world with its products, particularly in "cultural" areas

Okay, let me see if I've got this right... First of all they implement a diaspora of Africans with the prime intention of allowing their native musics to intermingle with that of the European settlers who have also found their to the New World. And lo! Jazz, Blues, Gospel, R&B, Rock n' Roll sprung into being in this carefully controlled environment of cultural conspiracy; and the Illuminati sat back and saw that it was good. They then sent it forth as a virus to corrupt and poison the pure indigenous folk musics of the world, many of which had gone into their evil mix in the first place. Thus did the ports of England become points of infection - Liverpool, for example, whose disaffected working-class youth were all too vulnerable to this evil seed, with young men such as John Lennon finding their nasal Scouse voices weirdly suited to the timbres of this vile product that was R&B; likewise on Tyneside, where one Eric Burdon was similarly infected. And so it was The British Invasion took the music back to their American masters, who saw that it was good, and thus was born modern pop music in all its myriad and vile forms. And so it came to pass that the youth of England did lay aside their unaccompanied English folksongs, English concertinas, English citterns, English Country Dances and English Morris Dances, and sold their English souls to the corporate evils of Pop Music - which is one of the American Genres, that should be performed by American citizens, in places such as Atlanta.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 05:17 AM

And it's Doc Rowe, not Doc Roe.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: catspaw49
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 05:28 AM

And doncha' just gotta' wonder..........Why Atlanta?

Spaw

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 05:31 AM

Mr Insane (hope you don't mind me calling you that!)

I hear the sound of nails being soundly walloped here...Brilliant.
Having been shown the error of my ways, I will get rid of 90% of my record collection, destroy most of my instruments (apart from the Concertina, I now see that the rest are indeed products of the evil nation the US of A, who have always been hell bent on World Domination! Mind you they better get on with it fast, the Chinese are coming up on the rails) Sigh, Think I'll have to learn the Cheung now!

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: melodeonboy
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 05:32 AM

"Okay, let me see if I've got this right..."

Er...no, not really. But A for effort!

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 05:46 AM

I'm getting visions of one-ended sticks being desperately grasped at hitherto unseen (by those of the population who still have a braincell or two intact) ends.

Meanwhile, I look forward to masses of stuff being offloaded on eBay or preferably Freecycle. I'll start with my non-English and thus terminally tainted electric bass which, after a minimum of experimentation, I realise I can't play anyway and look forward to picking up some Leicestershire pipes forthwith. Maybe you'll see me annoying the world at the 2012 opening ceremony.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 06:06 AM

On reflection I think WLD is pretty spot on.
It's already been sewn up by the government and Lloyd Webber, why are we bothering?

So expect Starlight Cats In A Saigon Dreamcoat spectacular, performed by Chelsea Pensioners, on roller skates.

Oh, and all bets are off for a fat Italian tenor murdering Nessum Bleedin' Dorma YET AGAIN!

It's just going to a squirmingly embarrassing occasion. Maybe that is the true British way

Anyone remember the Dome?

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 06:30 AM

To Catspaw - Atlanta held an Olympics, where, during the ceremonies, American citizens, such as Lionel Ritchie, I think, performed music from some of the American genres. I'm not sure, frankly, how much Amerindian music and dance was included..?
And God's speed and light to you Diane on your new divine path.
To Ralphie - as part of that, has Fabio Capello employed a voice coach?!

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Penny S.
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 07:28 AM

I always understood the bluebirds to be fantastic birds along the lines of the Firebird and the phoenix, based on Maeterlink's (spelling doesn't look right) play. Unlike the misidentified birds in the country garden song. Or the robin in Mary Poppins.

As a bit of thread creep, I once read a book by an American female author set in medieval England, in which a woman killed a ground squirrel for dinner. Amusingly, she then proceeded to make as much use of it as if it were the ground sloth from Crystal Palace park, or indeed the Derby Ram. Which would have been OK, had the species been indigenous. Strangely, I never felt like that about Twain's Yankee...

Penny

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 07:37 AM

At the mention of Doc Rowe.

Of course, he would be an ideal consultant for the various ceremonies in 2012....
Will they include him in the organising committee????

NAH!

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 07:52 AM

A bit of bad planning to have the Olympics in London in 2012 when every-one knows that it will be over-shadowed.
It is a Preston Guild year.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 08:02 AM

Poem 122 of 230: PROUD PRESTON - AUTUMN 2000

Heavy autumnal rain
    Had surged the Ribble's flow
When I walked to and fro
    The foot-, motor- and train-
Bridges, that have allowed
    Many - some in combat -
To cross this river at
    A town justly self-proud.

From walkaboutsverse.741.com

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 08:13 AM

And God's speed and light to you Diane on your new divine path

This from the man whose concessions to his Own Good English Folk Music consist of a plastic recorder & an electronic keyboard.

Meanwhile I'm off to play some Irish airs on my beloved erhu (note erhu, not erhu fiddle) bought from Ray Man at some point in the early 1980s; another crucial piece of the multi-cultural life of Merry England! Then I'll be cooking myself a spot of lunch (Italian pasta smeared in Hungarian goulash) whilst listening to the American Pop stylings of The Fall.

PS - Leicestershire Bagpipe - A versatile and popular English bagpipe which for twenty years has proved simple enough for beginners but challenging enough for more experienced players.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 08:23 AM

I have TWO electronic keyboards (only one of which is a Yamaha) and a MIDI controller that doesn't work. And lots of wooden recorders, which I am keeping. Oh sorry, I've no idea why I'm telling you all this. I thought I was on Freecycle . . .

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 08:52 AM

Two? Well, I've got an old Yamaha and a Bontempi battery reed organ, and an Oxygen 8 midi controller (don't laugh, they were state of the art 5 years ago...), though our keyboard of choice right now is an Indian Baja harmonium (which punters at The Fylde can hear as part of The Big Sing (Mount, Saturday afternoon) & In The Tradition (The Steamer, Sunday morning) & at the North Euston Concert on Thursday). Only one wooden recorder though, a descant I believe, given to me a girl at school, 40 years ago, no doubt in pity for me being laughed out the recorder class when I took in my Yugoslavian wooden whistle thinking to join in the fun...

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 09:01 AM

When I was a child, the object of my desires was a Sooty piano. I really wanted one.

However, times were hard, and my parents could only afford a drum. During the first day, the sticks disappeared in mysterious circumstances.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 09:04 AM

I could have got a real Welsh chapel harmonium on eBay the other day. I stopped bidding when the stakes suddenly shot up (as they do) but kicked myself when it went at only £102. eBay is crawling with bajas. I wondered if it was code for something else. I got a glockenspiel off Freecycle and I can play The Sugar Plum Fairy.

That's India, Wales, Germany and Russia all incorporated. How's that for multicultural? Must go and get some Oriental bits for my discordance of keyboards . . .

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 09:13 AM

Was it a dream? Or have the Meds stopped working.

Have just seen a trail for a BBC1 (UK TV show) called...
"Last Morris Dancer Standing"
It's due to aired this coming Saturday.

Judged by the redoubtable Simon Cowell (Complete with inflated Pigs Bladder).

The winner will do a solo jig against Boris Johnson, resplendent in his baldricks and bells, to decide who opens the ceremony in 2012.

Nurse......Nurse.....Nurse....

I need Fruit !

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 09:19 AM

A Sooty piano?

When I was very little I was taken to see Archie Andrews at the Sunderland Empire where Ronald Chesney threw miniature mouth organs into the audience so we could play along. I've still got mine even though it put me off diatonic things for ever. I do recall my xylophone hammers being confiscated when I was executing a particularly bravura passage for the umpteenth time when the grownups were trying to concentrate on something trivial.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 12:37 PM

I love the sounds of the English concertina and wooden English flutes, IB - but, alas, can't afford them. So I use an ABS tenor, which apparently are easier to maintain but harder to play, and put electronic keyboards onto "piano" or "pipe organ" voice...or, as I said on myspace, "plead to play a pub's proper piano"!

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 02:48 PM

I saw Archie Andrews as well, And Ronald Chesney and his talking harmonica. I saw them at Peterborough. I was four.

My Mum wrote to Brough and said I was his biggest fan and could I meet Archie. Brough to his credit, wrote back and agreed. So we went to the stage door, which was guarded by this ferocious old man. I walked up and said, I've come to see Archie....
To which the old gentleman replied, Fuck off! And don't you hang round here! And he slammed the stage door behind him.
About ten minutes later the old man reappeared with a message that Archie Andrews wanted to see me. Alas, I was still in shock and floods of tears, and couldn't be persuaded in. So I never got to meet anybody famous.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 05:10 PM

Watched some of the Ediburgh Tattoo last night. Not much was my cup o tea but it looked like the sort of stuff that would, if multiplied, be quite effective in an opening ceremony, and lots of the performers were from the colonies. Some of the tunes were folk. Co-ordination was impressive. We have a multiplicity of military bands that are used to marching about in sequence. Attach a few lights to this lot and we're half way there.

I'll get me coat!

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Alan Day
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 05:45 PM

Sad story WLD ,but it explains a lot.
Al

ps only joking

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 07:22 PM

well actually Al, the incident prepared me for a lifetime of rejection and failure quite nicely really.

Still Archie Andrews was the real thing. I had an Archie Andrews model - whose mouth moved up and down. We were inseparable. In many ways, I often feel all relationships ever since have been a bit of a letdown.

Diane - your Sooty xylophone and my coronation tin drum with the royal coat of arms on the side. We could have made beautiful music together.

We had a real piano - but it was the Sooty one I wanted. that's the thing. The creative opportunity is really in your imagination - rather than anything reality has to offer.

For example, when I was a little older I got the David Nixon magic kit. But the tricks were a load of crap - all bits of paper and card. The thing was though - there was a wand. And when I had that, I was convinced I could do magic.

It would be nice if we could come up with something for 2012, like the Irish did with Riverdance. Its locating the sooty piano and the magic wand within - someting that fires the imagination. Just folkmusic isn't the answer.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Aug 08 - 07:27 PM

The Carry On Olympics...

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 05:42 AM

No - I'd rather see a huge green man, with a stiff upper-lip, carried onto the field of play.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: GUEST,eliza c
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 05:50 AM

doesn't a huge green man usually have a stiff something else? I'd like to see that...
x

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Joseph P
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 06:37 AM

WAV - what about putting on one of the original morris teams in England, like the one I dance & play for? We could dance to the tune that was introduced from Italy, or our most recent addition, a version of an 80's Christmas pop tune! All played on a German made melodeon of course, and including our dancers from Scotland and Wales.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Terry McDonald
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 07:06 AM

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Terry McDonald
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 07:08 AM

Ooops, clicked too soon.

WAV, surely most people would associate a huge green man with the (American)Jolly Green Giant of sweet corn fame?

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Joseph P
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 07:15 AM

I can just picture a combination of what Eliza and Terry have just said, the result of the adverts would be a big workload for Ofcom ....

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 07:25 AM

What Italian tune?

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Joseph P
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 07:36 AM

'That Italian Job'. 'sabout all I know ...

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 08:06 AM

Joseph - but you can also dance to the likes of "English Country Gardens", yes?
And, staying green, I don't claim to be an expert on the Green Man, frankly...so, perhaps, Eliza could come back and carry on with some more of his details!...

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Joseph P
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 08:13 AM

WAV - No we don't dance to 'English Country Gardens', and have no plans to.

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Alan Day
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 08:29 AM

WLD I confess to listening to Archie Andrews on the radio so we have a lot in common.I did have a Muffin the Mule puppet so we could have done a double act. Archie & Muffin.
Al

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: doncatterall
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 08:38 AM

Alan Day - now your talking - I had a Muffin the Mule puppet too - THAT would have made a great double act!!!!!!!!!

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 09:32 AM

Actually the Sooty xylophone that Diane had was pretty cool. Ihere was a picture of Sooty and Harry Corbett on the box. All the keys were different colours.

I never had one, but I think one kid down our street had one.

He was a bit of an anarchist was Sooty. It always ended with HC getting it with a hammer or with a water pistol, and saying dolefully Bye Bye Everybody! Say Bye Bye Sooty!

Could it be, he performed our Freudian fantasies - albeit with a water pistol?

Subject: RE: '5000 Morris Dancers'
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 27 Aug 08 - 10:07 AM

Whilst the Green Men of Folk Tradition, revived or otherwise, are often to be seen brandishing obviously phallic clubs, the so-called Green Men as found in pre-reformation churches have no genital associations, even though often cited as being the consort to the Sheela-na-Gigs, which most certainly do.

I recently came across this carving on a medieval church on The Fylde, Lancashire: A Sexual Contortionist, who might well give many an Olympic athlete pause to ponder, although one does hear reports that Prince once had certain ribs removed so me could perform such feats on his own person. My view, however, is that what we have here is a Sheela-na-Gig, albeit one about the business of giving herself cunnilingus - perhaps the sort of thing the stone mason saw one night in a passing carnival & felt obliged to immortalise in local stone.