Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD

Subject: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Colin Randall
Date: 02 Oct 08 - 04:45 PM

Mudcatters seemed happy enough when I launched a little Eliza Carthy competition here. So let me repeat the exercise with Maddy Prior's new CD Seven for Old England....

Read my review at Salut! Live and give me your own best Maddy or Steeleye Span anecdote, recollection, thought. The best three - and my decision has to be final on that - will get signed copies of the CD.

Eliza produced a great response and I'd like to Maddy will, too. The replies can be witty, wise, to the point, whatever...

To make things simpler, the comments - which will therefore become the entries - should appear here, either as a reply to this thread or a PM to me.

And, for the record, I think Maddy is bearing up well. it's a fine album.

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: GUEST,Steve Drayton
Date: 03 Oct 08 - 05:09 AM

Any use?
Regards, Steve.

Every Christmas the school disco was the place to be seen. For all budding DJs it was the chance to shake the floor with a record of thier choice. This year, 1975, I had several lined up. Roxy's Love is the Drug, Island Girl, Elton John and Suzi Quatro's Can the Can. There was one recent purchase though that was burning a hole in my turntable.
Could I drop that vinyl?
It would make or break me. Having the courage of my convictions I took it along.
Merry Christmas Everybody, I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday, Lonley This Xmas. The floor was full. Then came my turn. Mr Hornsby took it from it's green paper sleeve, and as the sound of Mud faded away, All Around My Hat burst forth and the dance floor errupted. As I was swept away by Jane Davis for a sweaty xmas kiss, my life was complete. Thankyou Steeleye Span, thankyou Maddy Prior.

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Colin Randall
Date: 03 Oct 08 - 05:23 AM

Steve

I bet Jane didn't wash her face for a week.....


The proper link, which a little local problem (local to the UAE) with Typepad sites prevented me giving in full last night, is

http://www.salutlive.com/2008/10/maddy-prior-in.html

I have also invited people at the Steeleye section of Talkawhile to join in

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 03 Oct 08 - 05:59 AM

After I'd complained about the wallpaper in my room for some time, my parents agreed that I could strip it and repaint, during the next school holidays. Since the paper was now officially condemned, I felt free to add an extra layer of decoration, mainly consisting of lines from favourite songs in laborious swirly lettering.

Pride of place, though, went to a single word in six-inch capitals, placed there remind me of something truly extraordinary that I'd recently seen on Top of the Pops. It was a remarkable performance of a unique piece of music - at once pure and raw, intricate and earthy, delicate and strident, and made up of nothing more than the human voice. There were four voices interweaving like the threads of a tapestry, and above them there was a a fifth voice rising high and clear, sounding like moonlight through a monastery window. It was unforgettable; it still is.

And so I went up to my room and wrote on the wall, in capital letters six inches high:

GALDETE!

(Yes, well, that's what it sounded like, OK?)

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: BusyBee Paul
Date: 03 Oct 08 - 06:37 AM

Which reminds me of: (maybe slightly off topic - sorry Colin)

I was asked to help out in the alto section of a local church choir one Christmas a few years ago. At the rehearsal for the "Service of 9 Lessons and Carols", we were presented with sheet music for Gaudete and started to sing it.

The conductor stopped us and asked us to stop singing like a church choir and to "sing it how it should be sung".

So I stuck my finger in my ear, the conductor collapsed in a heap of laughter and the blue rinse brigade had absolutely no idea what was happening.

I've not been invited back...................


Deirdre

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: DebC
Date: 03 Oct 08 - 11:21 AM

When I was 14 or 15, I used to listen to a low-power radio station that broadcasted from Highland Park, IL, a northern suburb of Chicago. I had my clock radio alarm set for 6 AM when the station signed on in the morning and would doze, listening, for a short time before I had to get ready to go to school.

One morning, I was doing a "doze" and heard "Let never a man a wooing when that lacketh things three...." and was immediatly jolted to full awake-ness. I continued to listen. When the electric instruments came on, I was hooked. I quickly grabbed a pen and paper so that I could hear the back announce and write it down.

That song stayed with me all day until I couldn't stand it. I left school, ditching my afternoon classes (yes I did have to pay the price of after-school detention) and went to the local record shoppe. I actually found a copy of "Below the Salt" and played it continuously for the next two weeks.

I have been a Maddy fan (and a Steeleye Fan) ever since.

Debra Cowan

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: GUEST,Neil D
Date: 03 Oct 08 - 02:08 PM

When I was 15, back in 1973 there were some excellent late night 90 minute music shows on TV here in the states: Don Kirshner's Rock Concert, In Concert and even the pre-disco Midnight Special wasn't bad. What was so good was the variety of artists that it took to fill up that much time. Variety being the most missed ingredient in the modern music scene. You could see Brownsville Station sing "Smoking in the Boys Room" then come back from a commercial and behold there is Pentangle owning the stage.
   Anyhow, one night I saw this band playing this music like I had never heard before. Old as time and yet fresh as the morning dew. It got inside me and changed my outlook on music forever. Then this beautiful, ethereal lady singer takes off dancing barefoot all over the stage and that was it! I was in love for the first time in my young life.

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Colin Randall
Date: 03 Oct 08 - 04:54 PM

As a fellow fan of Maddy and Steeleye, I honestly think these memories are priceless. I may need to beg the record label to make more copies available....but please keep the stories coming

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 04 Oct 08 - 03:54 AM

Inspired by Below The Salt (and some Christmas cheer of the liquid variety) three friends and I memorised Gaudete - we actually had the original 1582 version - and then did a pub-crawl along Holloway Road one December night. This consisted of the four of us running in, standing together in a row and blasting the assorted company with a rousing rendition of this carol, in full harmony at top voice, then running out again, quick, leaving the bar customers to their bemusement. (At the last port of call we made sure we got our drinks in first...)

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Darowyn
Date: 04 Oct 08 - 05:51 AM

I was talking a man at a party in Leeds many years ago, who was telling me that he used to be an Arts Animateur somewhere in the West Country.
His project was to help local musicians by arranging local gigs and tours in village halls and community centres.
One of the young artists he helped out was the daughter of a TV scriptwriter who, as he said "turned out not to need very much help at all"
Here's a thanks to that man, and to Maddy for all those great performances.
Cheers
Dave

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: GUEST,Rich
Date: 05 Oct 08 - 05:17 AM

I wish I was old enough to have an anecdote!!

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 05 Oct 08 - 07:53 AM

Reminds me of another Maddy story. I was hearing her live but unamplified for the first time (usually it was at big Steeleye gigs with mics attached to huge rigs) and was sitting fairly close, about 20 feet away. While she was singing a police car drove by, siren in full blare right across her song. She never dropped a beat, just swung into rhythm with it until it was gone, making the cops something of a duet partner. Bet that was a first.

Hearing her live was sort of a revelation for me, because until then I had found a rather metallic quality in her voice which I didn't totally like. But that must have been some effect of amplified sound, because without it, her pure natural tone was a delight. I heard a sweetness that was lacking in the bigger settings, but still with that same clarity and sensitive delivery. It was an eye (or rather ear) opener.

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: selby
Date: 06 Oct 08 - 03:21 AM

The first time I saw Maddy was at the Grand Opera House in York and my wife and I where enthusing about her voice and the concert when the Lady in front turned and said thank you its nice to get feedback she talked to us a few minutes more and dissapeared I have seen her since on stage but I think she has forgotten me :-)but I still like her inspite of this
Keith

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Colin Randall
Date: 06 Oct 08 - 05:16 AM

Thanks for the stories: they can obviously keep on coming as long as Mudcatters find the topic sufficiently interesting, but I suppose I should decide a deadline for entries.
         So if you want to enter the competition, post your anecdote/memory/comment by midnight UK time on Sat Oct 11 (which I think is 4pm Mudcat time Sat Oct 11)
          I will use this thread as well as the Salut! Live site to declare the winners

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Colin Randall
Date: 06 Oct 08 - 10:40 AM

oops..as someone has kindly pointed out by PM, midnight in the UK on Saturday is 7pm Mudcat time, NOT 4pm.

My excuse is having to convert between three time zones.

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 06 Oct 08 - 12:28 PM

Does a Tim Hart story count? Anyway it was at Birtley Folk Club one Wednesday night (as usual)in the early seventies and Steeleye were playing Newcastle City Hall on the Thursday night. Midway through the first half in walks Tim Hart and a member of the road crew and not recognising them Pete Elliott asks them would they mind paying at the desk by the door. The word has already got around the club who has just come in and it finally gets to Pete who looks slightly embarrassed and calls an interval at that point and goes across to Tim and friend to refund their money (10p or so in those days)and welcome him to the club. Tim gets a song early in the second half and not long afterwards in come three more members of the crew all wearing Steeleye Span t-shirts. Looking at them and then to Tim, Pete declares "If you'd all been wearing those bloody things then I wouldn't have dropped my king sized goolie"
Top man, Pete

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Colin Randall
Date: 12 Oct 08 - 01:33 AM

It was only a spot of fun, but I was delighted with the memories that my little Maddy Prior competition attracted.

I have explained my choice of winners in a new posting at Salut! Live which you can find at

   http://www.salutlive.com/2008/10/maddy-prior-com.html
   
If Jim Campbell, Debra Cowan and Bonnie Shaljean can now let me have postal addresses either via PM here or to [e-mail] (don't forget the 1 after my name), I will arrange for the albums to be sent.

I am also going to choose a consolation prize from runners-up (the album will be from me via Amazon, and therefore unsigned).

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: BusyBee Paul
Date: 12 Oct 08 - 05:23 AM

Colin - our thanks to you for letting us dust off our memories.

One of Mudcat's more enjoyable and entertaining threads, IMHO.

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Oct 08 - 06:28 AM

"One of Mudcat's more enjoyable and entertaining threads, IMHO"

    -   hang on, that's enough to get someone kicked off Mudcat!

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Colin Randall
Date: 25 Oct 08 - 03:40 AM

The people at Park Records tell me the albums are on their way to winners of my little competition.

I promised to declare a consolation winner, chosen at random from the remaining entries, of an unsigned copy of Maddy's album,
and that is someone identifying himself as DG&D Dave.

Mudcat was the source, directly or not, of most replies, but not this one. It brought a smile to my face so I share it with the bigger audience:

"Way back in the Mid-Eighties, I was lucky enough to get tickets to Maddy's solo "Woman in the Wings" tour, at Derby assembly rooms. After the concert a friend of mine wanted to get their album signed, so I went along with them. Imagine my surprise when Maddy beckoned me over to join her. However, the reason was that she had no table on which to sign autographs and, being over 6 feet tall, my back made an ideal lecturn."
--

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: GUEST,Claire M
Date: 19 Jun 12 - 05:04 PM

Hiya,

When I was little I loved trad/blues, but when I got older I got some very funny ideas, mostly that young people didn't like or listen to it. I wore blue lipstick and black nail varnish, snapped at everyone, and listened to some truly awful stuff I found on my own. I'd loved writing as a child in between listening, mostly poems and short stories, but young people didn't do that either, so I stopped.

When I went to college I got really ill –- it sounds silly but I'm sure at least some of it was to do with not listening to what I grew up with.


Dad was desperate to see Steeleye Span, but I thought they'd be no good so I said an emphatic NO. This caused problems for him because I am disabled and no care was set up that night, so he couldn't go either – and problems for me, because though I didn't know/think it at the time, I shall regret it for the rest of my life.

Next time he said "you're bloody well going," and dragged me to their gig (not literally). I heard what I now know to be 'Drink Down The Moon', realised why I'd worshipped Ms. Prior since I was little and why I still do, and got so emotional I nearly had to leave.

I started writing again and haven't stopped, and one of my stories has been used for work with disabled children.

Now I'm told to turn my music UP.

Subject: RE: Maddy Prior review - and free, signed CD
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 19 Jun 12 - 05:11 PM

What a lovely story - thanks for sharing it with us! Hope Maddy sees this thread -