In Praise of Traddies!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 25 Feb 10 - 07:29 AM

That is exactly what folk music does not do (remain unchanged in versions)

Further idle musings...

Once a variant has occurred, it remains unchanged. If another variant is made, that does not, as a rule, change the variant it derives from, nor yet preclude other variants being made from the initial variant, or yet earlier variants. The learning and shaping of songs in an oral tradition across isolated communities with poor communications would lead to a greater fluidity by way of comparison, but not necessarily with any given variant or singer thereof. Thus folk songs exist in many variants, but each variant is an entity in and of itself, and each variant is the consequence of exacting craftspersonship on the part of the song maker, who is working within the idiom of his or her tradition.

Getting back to my final point above, when a variant remains unchanged in & of itself then does this not preclude it from being a Folk Song according to the 1954 Definition?

*

I've never sang Karaoke, but from what I've heard I'd say that whatever the backing track does, it's the singers determine the essential folk character of the music.

How does the 1954 Definition work when applied to musical genre rather than specific compositions? How could we, for example, apply it to the development of pop music from, say, Louis Jordan to Bat for Lashes taking in everything from The Animals, Zappa, Soft Machine, The Fall, Neu!, Henry Cow, Art Zoyd, Spherical Objects, Young Marble Giants, This Heat, Univers Zero and It Bites along the way? Could we do a similar thing with reggae & jazz? All of these things are included in the remit of the International Council for Traditional Music after all...

*

I mentioned Folk Songs and Crop Circles a while back. Interesting that the makers often hide away too to help propagate the myth of alien process. I love the Crop Circles Tradition, not least for the fact of what a bunch of blokes with sticks can achieve on so vast a scale in so short a time. This is Folk Mastery at work!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 03:59 PM

That is exactly what folk music does not do (remain unchanged in versions) but exactly what karaoke seeks to do (for example I will ask the operator if he has the Chuck Berry version of "Down the Road Apiece" rather than the Rolling Stones version)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 03:53 PM

300

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 03:53 PM

Oh pullleeezzzeee!
We've been through all this and I don't think you had any takers for the idea that all songs were folk then.

Then I suggest you look at all the Mudcat threads and see the diversity of music spoken of here as being Folk; go into any Folk Club and hear what people of singing and playing in the name of folk. Mr Fox - classic Folk, but they only recorded one traditional song on two classic albums. Like I say, I'm not making it up - it's out there & it's happening.

*

For example there is a specific exclusion for composed music that is retained in its original form - which is precisely what karaoke seeks to achieve. Likewise classical music retains the "dots" and merely alters the performance, not even the key, and any changes of language are limited to translation.

Musing idly...

Here I resort to the organic principles of the Tao, or maybe it's some of that Folk Character that the 1954 speaks of. There will always be intention, there will always result, perhaps Folk Character is measured by the shortfall between the two. Whatever Karoake & Classical music might seek to achieve, fact is there will always be change & variance in the sonic experience of what remains an empirical event.

One wonders to what extent Traditional Singers & Song Makers changed their performances; Jim has spoke of improvised ballad renderings, but is that likely? Ultimately no two performances of anything are identical - this accounts for the innumerable recordings of classical favs on the market: Purcell's Dido & Aneas (of which I have 4 audio & 2 on DVD), Vivaldi's Gloria (RV 589) (of which I have 5), Orff's Carmina Burana (of which I have none) - all of which are very differet corporeal realisations of what is essentially a concept for performance. And what of 4'33" which Cage envisaged as a demonstration of performance variance & listening, rather than the fatuous silence people generally take it for?

The dots may not change (although performance editions do change), but like Karaoke, each performer will bring to the thing their own character & interpretation and other random elements which will defy exact reproduction but will be a unique & an integral part of any performance of any piece of music. I don't think is is any different from what we have in (so-called) Folk Music. The crux is in the mechanism of variation that is known as The Folk Process. Like Global Warming and Crop Circles - the evidence is right there, but the jury will be out regarding the cause.

Here's a thing - if one thinks of Folk Song as being made (and therefore composed) and each variant remaining unchanged in & of itself with respect to its composer, does that not exclude Folk Song from being Folk according to the 1954 Definition?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 01:30 PM

Not getting into a fight about this. There are no reliable statistics and would be extremely hard to do it anyway with the problem of definitions.

And being in Sheffield we get a lot of people who play in the local pubs when they want to have a jam or a practice.

Hard to define. I think also the definition wpuld be edgy since many professional performers aren't in the sense that they make money in other fields too.

That wasn't the way when folk clubs started.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 01:14 PM

More professional musicians are choosing concerts and festivals than clubs but there are more playing and recording opportunities for 'career folk music performers' at present. There is a difference between CFMPs and club members singing old songs.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 12:11 PM

The problem is that most folk music takes place in folk clubs.

Sure about that? I would guess that around Sheffield it would be sessions and concerts, then folk clubs.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 11:44 AM

The problem is that most folk music takes place in folk clubs. Now I don't have anything against folk clubs, though I admit to having attended a few crap ones long ago, but their remit is not by and large to explore the limits of what folk might legitimately be, nor to chart the transformation of popular songs but to give the regular punters what they expect to hear with some liquid refreshment.

Over time this has compounded a historical resistance to the new and modern, which was one of the reasons clubs began originally, into a kind of reactionary musical stance - enthusiasts for a music defined by change resisting the very change that defined it. That's one of the reasons you're as likely to hear folk song at a football ground as a folk club. It's also why as much as I love English traditional song, I've have low traddie tolerance.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 11:30 AM

Good heavens! I mostly agree with Glueman, except that I don't think that all traddies by any means have that expectation of a means of delivery. Consider for example Brian Peters who uses some very electric guitar deliveries on some recording, or Jon Loomes whose stuff is all arranged, or "The Imagined Village", or even my humble self playing mostly what I sometimes with a bit of a tongue in cheek call "Folk 'n' Roll".

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 11:24 AM

I think Glueman's got it about right there. Traditionalists need to be able to examine their expectations.

For my own part, I have two very different personal responses to traditional song. One is to just sing it straight up as I currently do, no folkie styling extras. I enjoy doing that, it's very simple and immediate, and honest. And I enjoy hearing others do the same too. The other would be to really explore it with all the musical and technical options we have at our disposal today. That's an approach I will definitely be pursuing in the near future.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 11:06 AM

"One would be "Folk is anything down with an acoustic guitar with limited amplification by drippy hippies and stuff like that" (and one's mind boggles)."

To most peeps, I think that *is* what "folk" means - and that's precisely why traditional song has been effectively lost beneath the term. It's certainly what 'folk' has always meant to me (I wasn't around during the 60's when the revival was buzzing and hip). I'm not a muso, but I've always been interested in and open to different types of music too - which is just as well, because without exploring Sean Nos and stumbling into E. Trads somehow en route, I'd have never known that this vast body of traditional material existed beneath the genre of pretty boys and girls playing acoustic guitar and singing sad pretty songs about other pretty boys and girls that I'd been ignoring all my life. Arguably, the revival spawned a monster child - a very pretty and pleasant one, but it's smothering it's mother.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 10:53 AM

I'd suggest what traditionalists really mean is the definition plus the 'sound', the sound being a mix of instrumentation, delivery and subject matter but largely of context. If the 54 definition alone were the measure of folkness it would allow other music in because it was clear it met the criterion, as it is 54 is not used as a pathway but a keep out sign.

That's unfortunate because it means people go round the definition which lets in all kinds of wet, folk-lite, drippy acoustic music rather than genuine recent versions of folk, which may sound nothing like what traddies or the man in the street recognise as folk. It's not the definition that needs to change, it's traditionalist's expectation. It isn't The Definition or anything goes, people need to keep to the letter of 1954 then it'll be clear what is or isn't folk music. What they choose to call folk club music is of course up to consenting adults.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 10:10 AM

Sweeney, that is entirely at odds with the definition. For example there is a specific exclusion for composed music that is retained in its original form - which is precisely what karaoke seeks to achieve. Likewise classical music retains the "dots" and merely alters the performance, not even the key, and any changes of language are limited to translation.

As Jim says, there are three choices. One would be "There is no such thing as folk" (and concomitantly there would be no meaning to other terms that sought to describe a limited set of music). One would be "Folk is anything down with an acoustic guitar with limited amplification by drippy hippies and stuff like that" (and one's mind boggles). The last would be something like the 1954 definition.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 09:42 AM

Oh pullleeezzzeee!
We've been through all this and I don't think you had any takers for the idea that all songs were folk then.
"Hardly contempt,"
Do you really want be to dig out all your sneery remarks about collectors and researchers dreaming it all up - happy to oblige.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 06:41 AM

So - no new definition yet - I await with bated breath, but have been doing so for a long time! gasssssspppppppppppp

Point is there is nothing in the 1954 Definition that can't be said of all musics. Does that mean all music is Folk Music? Of course not, but, pragmatically, all music can be Folk Music if we think of music being defined by its context. This is well in keeping even with the most orthodox reading of the 1954 Definition which deals with context & derivation rather than genre. Folk as a genre is something else altogether - traditional musics & traditional idioms continue to be developed without the need of definitions as the music pretty much defines itself.   

Shouldn't concern you one way or the other as you rejected their first efforts anyway, and treated their work with the contempt you appear to treat all such, so why should the next one bother you?

Hardly contempt, old man - as this stuff concerns me, so I must engage with it in the hope that others do too. But just as the study and definition of Folklore has moved on a lot since 1954, one would hope the same might be said of Folk Music, which would appear to be the case if the ICTM (who changed their name 30 years ago) is anything to go by.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 06:31 AM

Entirely plausible. I wondered where I had got it from! In any event, others might like it now.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 04:22 AM

PS - HERE.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 04:05 AM

Cheers Richard! Took 15 seconds to download & now I listen to it I see it's the same session I posted here a couple of years back.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 03:52 AM

Here (allegedly) is the link which will (allegedly) remain available for 7 days or 100 downloads: -

https://www.yousendit.com/download/RmNDcmxUVEhmVFpFQlE9PQ

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 03:43 AM

Last night at the Bull in Snodland (Kent, England) was almost 100% contemporary or American except me so I dug my heels in and did all folk songs (albeit "folk'n'roll" except for the first one)

Cupid's Garden
Blackleg Miner
Gentlemen of High Renown
Sir Patrick Spens (considerably shortened)
The Grey Cock (done uptempo with the "I'm a Rover" chorus)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 24 Feb 10 - 03:37 AM

File allegedly on its way - the network light is blinking steadily!

Once that has happened I will see if I can figure out how to post the link for others who want to hear it. For purposes of research and private study of course!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 08:36 PM

So - no new definition yet - I await with bated breath, but have been doing so for a long time! gasssssspppppppppppp
Shouldn't concern you one way or the other as you rejected their first efforts anyway, and treated their work with the contempt you appear to treat all such, so why should the next one bother you?
Incidentally, I owe you an apology. I was mistaken when I said that you 'didn't do' research; it was your 'alter ego' Glueman who said he "wouldn't allow research near the music he loved" - sorry.
I still wait to see the basis for your (to date) arbitrary declarations, but I can only hold my breath for one thing at a time.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 03:20 PM

Was aware that IFMC had re-named - didn't know they'd re-defined - enlighten please?

I keep meaning to join the ICTM to see what's what, but I'm spurred on by their aims which are to further the study, practice, documentation, preservation and dissemination of traditional music, including folk, popular, classical and urban music, and dance of all countries. So folk is still in there - but popular, classical and urban are coming under the heading of traditional which is pretty much what I'm on about anyway. These days the ICTM is very much about ethnomusicology which covers pretty much everything (I had a friend who did her post grad ethnomusicology thesis on Barber Shop Singing in Hartlepool). So we're back to music in context, however so derived or otherwise defined. With that in mind, it's interesting to look through the contents of the IFMC / ICTM yearbooks & journals which you might access here:

http://www.ictmusic.org/ICTM/ictm/journal_index.html

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 02:16 PM

Yousendit Account Active, but I still appear to need a contact email.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 01:16 PM

Sweeney, Yousendit is not sending me my verification email but I may have found a different way of doing it via Cutesendit, so PM me your email address which I will need for that. I have found the MP3 but it is about 100Mb. It is an M4A on my phone and that might be smaller if I can get it off the phone.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 12:27 PM

PS The rest of the world dowesn't give a toss - unless you can show where they do
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 12:26 PM

"Only for the 1954 Orthodoxy, old man - the rest of the world, including the IFMC that came up with it, appears to have moved on."
Was aware that IFMC had re-named - didn't know they'd re-defined - enlighten please?
The rest is 'convenience defining' to fit square pegs into round holes.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 12:18 PM

Are you ever going to get to Swinton BTW?

Problem with mid-week clubs is our early starts the following morning, but hopefully we'll be getting over for one of your March singers nights. Any club with a penguin on its website has got to be worth a visit!

a heart-felt reaction to "Blues, Shanties, Kipling, Cicely Fox Smith, Musical Hall, George Formby, Pop, County, Dylan, Cohen, Cash, Medieval Latin, Beatles, Irish Jigs and Reels, Scottish Strathspeys, Gospel, Rock, Classical Guitar, Native American Chants, Operatic Arias and even the occasional Traditional Song and Ballad" definition of 'folk'

Hey, don't shoot the messenger, old man! Just reporting on the empirical facts of folk as I regularly experience it in many of the folk clubs I go to where the defining factor is one of celebratory humanity irrespective of genre, though there is invariably more than a hint of what the 1954 Definition calls Folk Character. I'm torn here because I'm a Traddy who sings Trad and likes hearing Trad, but I'm also in favour of the inclusive ideal of the come-all-ye & believe that people should be able to sing whatever they like - which is just as well really, because that's pretty much what they do.

None of this makes the slightest difference to the fact that there is an existing and workable definition of the term 'folk' and [...] this will remain the case for some time to come.

Only for the 1954 Orthodoxy, old man - the rest of the world, including the IFMC that came up with it, appears to have moved on.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 11:10 AM

"Coming from you, old man, that represents a degree of fawning hypocrisy"
Nope -it was a heart-felt reaction to "Blues, Shanties, Kipling, Cicely Fox Smith, Musical Hall, George Formby, Pop, County, Dylan, Cohen, Cash, Medieval Latin, Beatles, Irish Jigs and Reels, Scottish Strathspeys, Gospel, Rock, Classical Guitar, Native American Chants, Operatic Arias and even the occasional Traditional Song and Ballad" definition of 'folk' and your crass suggestion that we should abandon definitions altogether, presumably to accommodate your.... well, whatever you call what you do!
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 11:06 AM

I wonder how Hannibal would get on with Mad Lizzie? After all she dresses like a lady and does not get drunk so she should be safe, shouldn't she?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 10:47 AM

Bloody Hell, Suibhne! I would have put you as at least as old as me - Not nearly 10 years younger:-P Are you ever going to get to Swinton BTW? We had another catter there last night - I like to collect them. Not in a Hanibal Lechter sort of way you understand...

DeG

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 10:08 AM

You had to be on one side or another by 1967/68!

Hell, I would have been six at the time! Too young to be taking sides but my mother bought all The Beatles singles & I had my first pop/folk epiphany round that time when I flipped over All You Need is Love & thrilled to the eastern modal piping keyboards of Baby You're a Rich Man - so, pretty seminal I'd say.

I was listening last night to an MP3 of an old radio 2 interview of Peter Bellamy

You couldn't post that up at YouSendIt could you, Richard?

you can't imagine how inspiring it is to us veterans to have a new kid on the block to bounce ideas off.

Coming from you, old man, that represents a degree of fawning hypocrisy that has me, let's let this right now, ROTFLMAO.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 09:49 AM

I was listening last night to an MP3 of an old radio 2 interview of Peter Bellamy (and getting steadily less overwhelmed, sadly) and he proceeded to murder some other Stones song with a badly strummed (I hate that word and use it deliberately in this context) acoustic guitar after a bitter sounding comment about Carthy over-clever guitar-work.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 09:33 AM

My first sight of Peter Bellamy was wearing that same T-shirt! Along with a flat cap and holding his concertina under one arm while singing an unaccompanied number. It's what made me decide to play concertina. Far easier to hold and not do anything with than a guitar:-) I was never a big fan of the 'Stones either but I put that down to my (musicaly) formative years being under the influence of The Beatles - You had to be on one side or another by 1967/68!

DeG

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 09:09 AM

You Can't always get what you want (Stones)

A favourite encore of Peter Bellamy's - I saw him do it at The Bay Hotel in Cullercoats at some point in the mid-eighties; as I recall he was wearing a Brian Jones t-shirt that night too. Whilst I'm first and foremost a fan of Popular Music, and whilst I share PB's passion for Kipling, Harry Cox and Appalachian Hollerin', I can't say I've ever been impressed by The Rolling Stones at all. Odd that.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 09:04 AM

CS, keen to re-enter the fray but a little busy.
Quickly; I can't speak for Richard, but I'm a little uncomfortable at being entered in the rolls as a "strict traditionalist".
As a researcher who occasionally writes and gives talks on the subject, I adhere to the existing definition - I am not aware of a workable alternative and consitent requests have failed to produce one.
As somebody who has been involved in the club scene from my early twenties, while I have always known and welcomed the fact that the songs I hear at clubs are not going to be strictly 'folk', I do expect that what I am given is going to bear some relation to my understanding of the term. My reservations stem from the fact that has become less and less the case. Looking through my old repertoire book I find that out of 300 odd songs, at least 4 dozen of them are non-traditional; some of these (MacColl's re-write of 'Farewell To Ireland', 'Rambler From Clare', Pete Smith's 'Clayton Aniline'..) are still the ones I would not hesitate to sing at a local session now that I am no longer performing regularly. I was associated for over 20 years with the arch traddie Ewan MacColl, (whose work first gave rise to the epithet 'finger-in-ear) who, along with Peggy Seeger, contributed more newly composed songs than any other two individuals in the revival. He believed that without new songs the revival would be little more than a museum - I go along with that totally.
None of this makes the slightest difference to the fact that there is an existing and workable definition of the term 'folk' and no matter how often people drag out the overworked 'singing horse' to give it yet another flogging, this will remain the case for some time to come.
"And as such, shall now respectfully withdraw!"
Please don't stray too far - you can't imagine how inspiring it is to us veterans to have a new kid on the block to bounce ideas off.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: melodeonboy
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 07:43 AM

Gillingham fans used to sing a rather crude version of "Distant Drums" (which was slightly amusing to those like me with puerile tendencies!). I don't think they were the only ones who sang it.

And I can stil remember the lyrics, funnily enough. It must be the folk process at work! :)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 07:39 AM

The important thing [imo]is to enjoy playing and singing.
Creativity is important as well,I prefer to spend long winter evenings making music rather than going around in circles on such subjects as folk music or folk club music or traddies or singer song writers.
I will leave you to your fun.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 07:36 AM

I'd like to point out that although I am a firm believer in the meaning of the word "folk", and that folk music and song is an important part of our cultural heritage - a part of what we are and why we are that - I also do (as well as modifying and arranging traditional songs - for example TFFOSM as Mad Lizzie linked to) sing and play in acoustic song sessions quite a range of contemporary originally electric songs, for example: -
Play with Fire (Stones)
Substitute (Who)
Shooting Star (Bad Company - or is it Free?)
the Folk Singer (Tommy Roe)
Come Away Melinda (mostly from the Uriah Heep version)
Walk me out in the Morning Dew (mostly from the Nazareth version)
You Can't always get what you want (Stones)
You Better Move on (Stones)
Signed DC (Love)
Who am I (Country Joe and the Fish)
I washed my hands in Muddy Water


and a number of contemporary acoustic things for example
Ride On
Love has no pride
Fall River Hoedown
Step it out Mary (under pressure)
A couple of Richard Matthewman songs
The Importunate Child
Watercress-O
With God on our side
I shall be released
There but for Fortune
What have they done to the Rain?
The Cat came Back
A living wage
Hilda's Cabinet Band

And have originated a couple too
The Common Road
The Mulberry Bush
and some political parodies.



Sometimes this makes me wonder why I am so firmly and universally termed a traddie.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 07:25 AM

Oh, dear, Glueman ~ I wonder if you were wise to introduce the concept of a distinction between "folk music" & "folk club music". I can feel all sorts of potential proliferations breathing down my neck...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: melodeonboy
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 07:25 AM

"It's more about expertise in reviving old songs than accessing recent ones, no matter how 'folk' they may be."

Hmmmm... What do you call "recent"?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 07:09 AM

Football songs continually change the words and sometimes the tunes of popular songs, 'Annie's Song', 'We Are Sailing' and 'Guantanamera' three of many. The only reason they're not accepted as folk songs is because of the context. The spontaneous or rapidly proliferating dispersal of a song is not the subject of folk club music. It's more about expertise in reviving old songs than accessing recent ones, no matter how 'folk' they may be.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 07:03 AM

Where's Lizzie when you need her to interject a modicum of common sense into a debate?

---

Are you looking for trouble, Ralphie? Please be aware that you are under scrutiny.
-Joe Offer, Forum Moderator-

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 06:20 AM

PS - I aught to add that it's just an opinion, I don't think I'm 'right', it's just the way I look at these songs - as cultural artifacts from a prior period in our history.

If others see an ongoing unbroken tradition of folk song - there is room for that approach IMO. And it's not for me to tell them they're wrong either.

It doesn't have to be 'either / or'.
Depending on what particular markers we choose to use to define our understanding of terms such as 'culture', 'community', 'tradition', 'folk', there is obviously room for any amount of individual ways to think about this stuff. But for the sake of clear and squabble-free communication, it'd probably be helpful if we set out our premises first!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 06:18 AM

... even if you had cross-posted to withdraw from the discussion...!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 06:16 AM

The Industrial Revolution didn't end it, CS; as books & albums & songs like Shuttle & Cage, The Iron Muse, Come All You Bold Miners, Wark O' The Weavers have shown — even if A L Lloyd is suspected of having interfered to some extent in the process. I am not thinking of things like Beatles & Abba which get sung because we all know them & could conceivably become multiversional with the passage of time (tho I must say I can't see much evidence of such a process going on); but more of such a thing as a song that might come out of a few overnight pickets in a strike improvising some words that might catch on.

Though one must nevertheless also allow for the purposes to which popsongs &c can be put. I once said to A L Loyd that Liverpool FC supporters had turned 'You'll Never Walk Alone', a song from a Rodgers & Hammerstein Broadway musical, 'Carousel', & so of immediately identifiable provenance, into a folksong by the purpose to which they had put it. He thought for a moment & said, "Well, folk in function but not in form." I replied, "But in folksong, does not the function define the form, at least to some extent?" He paused again and then said, "To some extent, perhaps." And that was as far as the conversation went. But I am sure you will follow the points I make.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 06:03 AM

Actually, I've just realised I'm getting into one of 'those' discussions.. *feels a bit worried*

And as such, shall now respectfully withdraw! ;-)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 05:57 AM

"I am not sure, mind you, CS, that no traditional songs will ever more be writ [in the sense you have just used this phrase]."

The folk revival has become a form of tradition in and of itself (though tiny by comparison), so the term of course may be applied in various ways - but the culture that forged those particular old songs is simply gone. The industrial revolution ended it and we are left with a specific body of cultural artifacts which give us a glimpse into the imaginal worlds and experiences of them as wot went before. But still, I've absolutely no idea what it must have been like to live then, to think then, to partake in that world. However much I might like to imagine it, or engage with those songs that were preserved - it's another country to me, and ever will be. As for 'traditional songs' in today's world, then I'd probably put my money on stuff like Abba and the Beatles: we all know the words, everyone can sing them. They'll probably go down in history in some fashion and people in a couple of hundred years time will look back at the hey-day of pop and maybe even have societies for the preservation of traditional pop music?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 05:47 AM

Don's 'guardians' conjours up two gnomes either side of a clipped yew arch.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 05:24 AM

I am not sure, mind you, CS, that no traditional songs will ever more be writ [in the sense you have just used this phrase]. Traditional artefacts still certainly appear by oral tradition ~ urban myths; jokes: & some songs also, in fact ~ football chants, children's songs... All surely part of the anonymous oral tradition however you define it. To what extent, if any, serious, adult more extensive songs are appearing or will ever again appear is perhaps less clear: but I don't think the possibility can be entirely written off.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 23 Feb 10 - 03:37 AM

"To be lumped together as "snigger/snogwriters", or the AGB (Anything Goes Brigade), is insulting in the extreme, and it is hard to see, failing acceptance by traditionalists of having a place in the folk genre, where we actually belong."

I don't see the need for terms like snigger/snogwriter either, though I don't have a personal problem with 'anything goes' in and of itself (I might not seek it out from HMV but during an amateur music session it's all good to me).

The 'revival' as a particular cultural phenomenon distinct from the old oral tradition, inspired a bunch of people to compose songs echoing elements of the old. The 'folk genre' as most people (bar strict traditionalists such as RB & JC there) think of it now, was born during the revival and has sprung off into all kinds of directions since. The term became reassigned by dint of popular musical trends and general language usuage to include modern musics - including music that barely makes a nod at the old songs, if indeed any at all.

But that's the way music and language evolves, and indeed mostly for the better. Without new arts and new ideas frogleaping off the back of prior ones - we'd all be stuck in some pretty ugly twisted shapes creatively and intellectually.

Having said that a Jacobean Tragedy is a Jacobean Tragedy, and however many contemporary writers are inspired by the Revenger's Tragedy and however many modern gory screenplays are composed, no more Jacobean Tragedies will ever be writ. That's my take anyway..

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 07:55 PM

For me, traditionalists (I hate that contraction "Traddy", which is almost always pejorative),are the guardians of a body of material which is essential to the survival of our heritage and culture.

That said, I could wish that the same respect might be shown for those who, like myself, try to add something to the genre.

To be lumped together as "snigger/snogwriters", or the AGB (Anything Goes Brigade), is insulting in the extreme, and it is hard to see, failing acceptance by traditionalists of having a place in the folk genre, where we actually belong.

Perhaps somebody might apply some degree of concern to answering that.

Meanwhile, I offer my undying gratitude to those who have made it possible for me to know, and to sing, the traditional songs which I also love.

Don T.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Campin
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 07:04 PM

the imaginal worlds these old stories can evoke, can be jolly magnetising in a very 'otherness' way. I don't know how I'd describe it, but perhaps the same psychological/emotional effect as reading Brothers Grimm as a child.

Some of the songs that have the deepest effect on me aren't the mythological ones - they're the ones that set a moral/political example. What I found researching the old songs of Edinburgh was that a lot of the dead were more inspiring company than the living - there were people way-back-when with principles and guts beyond what I often come across now. Duncan Campbell beating the shit out of a cop and having to skip town because the cop was an anti-Irish bigot. The martyrs of the 1820 weavers' rising. People who stood up for religious freedom against the Edinburgh Annuity Tax even though it meant getting their possessions seized.

Or from eastern Anatolia 200 years ago

Ferman padishahin, daglar bizimdir
(The order is the Sultan's, the mountains are ours)

The attitude I have to people like Dadaloglu is a sort of religious one, but it isn't about quaint myths, it's because they set an example for me to live by.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 06:33 PM

Spleen, you are right to ask.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 03:43 PM

"'the pleasures of the text' are different for a historical song, novel or wa'ever than a contemporary one."

I don't think I've ever thought about that. As a kid I don't think I ever differentiated between E. Nebit or my stash of Marvel comics. And nothing much has changed since. Of course my old stash of Marvel comics would have been collectors items now (if they had survived).. Does that make them old? I dunno!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 03:10 PM

Yes but 'the pleasures of the text' are different for a historical song, novel or wa'ever than a contemporary one. I have no problem with people getting off on an old tune, it's those who think they're part of a living, on-going form that scare me rather. In the same way people who ride round in machine gun toting BMW sidecar combinations in wehrmacht uniform are un-nerving.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 03:00 PM

CS - sorry to interrupt but I think you're locked in conversation with Glueman's parrot
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 02:58 PM

"By continuing to sing them we are keeping them out of the museum and because each successive generation has interpreted them in their own way they are anything but fossilised."

Sure, if I read Tolstoy, I'm just reading Tolstoy same as anyone who has ever read Tolstoy. I'm not partaking in a re-enactment of other people long ago who once read Tolstoy. When I'm reading a classic Russian novel, I'm simply reading a novel same as when I sing a traditional folk song, I'm just singing a song.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Tootler
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 02:52 PM

"...for our clinging to fossilised material

Why is it some folks refer to traditional song as "fossilised" or "fit only for a museum"?

No one seems to make similar remarks about the music of Bach or Handel - or going further back, the songs of Dowland and his contemporaries. The label "Early Music" might be applied to music from the period of Dowland and earlier, but they don't seem to refer to it as fossilised. Rather it is considered music worth exploring and playing.

The same is true of traditional song. They are songs worth exploring and singing. I sing traditional songs because I enjoy them and because they speak to me. By continuing to sing them we are keeping them out of the museum and because each successive generation has interpreted them in their own way they are anything but fossilised.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 02:46 PM

Parrots are smart critters - I don't know why they imitate sounds though. Is it a social thing?

But further to the so-called tradition. I don't see myself as a part of any tradition as such. There was an oral tradition once, there isn't one now. But there is a large body of material from it, that is of poential interest to anyone who has an interest in culture, art, music or social history.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 02:38 PM

"She'd be a parrot, doing what parrots were born to do."

Eat crisps? (It's a long story about a violent African grey who had a penchant for Walkers' Salt and Vingar but only if they weren't broken. Crunched crisps would send her into a rage and she's trash the house. My friend would break them into their constituent molecules on the way back from the pub to see her become Death Bird, The Avenger. Happy days.)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 02:22 PM

"If I trained my parrot Maud to sing the Oak and the Ash would she be continuing the tradition or denying her true voice?"

She'd be a parrot, doing what parrots were born to do.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 02:19 PM

If I trained my parrot Maud to sing the Oak and the Ash would she be continuing the tradition or denying her true voice?

By numinous I meant the hearth to which we must all return, whether wormy loam or the brown utility mantelpiece of my forfathers.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 12:17 PM

"it would be no bother me at all;"

It wouldn't bother him. There's no argument to be made out of that really. It doesn't bother me that it wouldn't bother him either.

For me there's a big difference between people choosing not to investigate something *although* it's easy to discover and access and being unable to make that choice, because it's not easy to discover and access. Knowledge is all. Disseminating knowledge that gives others the freedom to make the same choices that you were free to make - to either engage with something or not - is as much as is needed. There will always be those interested in reading John Donne, singing and hearing traditional songs, acting and watching Shakespear - if such things are not effectively impossible to discover.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 12:06 PM

"If people never sang another note of these songs it would be no bother me at all; they have been sung by the masters"
Quite right - Shakespeare has been done by the masters, Tree, Irving, Olivier, Geilgud, Pryce, Branagh - why bother doing it any more?
What utter crap; you really do go from idiocy to idiocy SO'P.
Heep it coming; it really does help shorten the long winter evenings.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 09:30 AM

Are we talking the mysterium tremendum or mysterium fascinans here? Just so's I'm clear...

When we think about the numinous in terms of transcendence, it is quite possible to separate it from the supernatural.

Enough bollocks from me.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 09:22 AM

Watters o' Tyne

In my experience this is always sung as Waters of Tyne even in the strongest of Northumbrian dialects.

I reckon we deserve some credit for valuing the old stuff, wanting to keep it alive, and encouraging youngsters who take an interest.

I reckon we should just do what we do without this perverse sense of that in so doing we are somehow doing something worthy. We're not keeping anything alive here - any more than the bloke around the corner is keeping the age of steam alive with his model railway layout. If youngsters want to do it, fine - if they find something better to do, it's no great loss.

The important thing is that, once upon a time, there was a genre of music that created the body of songs we think of today as English Traditional Folk Song & Ballad. It is to the makers, shapers & singers of these songs we should turn our efforts and energies, rather than obfuscating their significance with the so-called revival, which might only preach to the converted anyway. I would like to see a Society for Traditional Song which is dedicated purely to the preservation & promotion of the treasures in the various Traditional Archives, to make this as integral an aspect of the collective cultural heritage & history of the English Speaking World as any other in all their raw, primal, unexpurgated glory. If people never sang another note of these songs it would be no bother me at all; they have been sung by the masters - Phil Tanner, Davie Stewart, Harry Cox, Walter Pardon, Sam Larner, Willie Scott, Mrs Pearl Brewer of Arkansas et al - let that be enough to let them resound down the ages.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 09:18 AM

"The word "numinous" does imply the presence of a deity"

I think modern usage has rendered the term more flexible now RB.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 09:09 AM

The word "numinous" does imply the presence of a deity. Hence my objection to it.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 09:02 AM

"The intended subject of this thread was whether those of us who (for want of any better term) can be labelled "traddies" are miserable buggers, fit only to be either despised or pitied for our clinging to fossilised material, or whether we have our virtues.
I'd better finish by declaring where I stand.
I belong to the "traddie" camp.
I reckon we deserve some credit for valuing the old stuff, wanting to keep it alive, and encouraging youngsters who take an interest."

Well I wouldn't have learned anything much about this peculiar body of dusty old material without the grumpy old traddies here. So yep, that's basically what I was getting at when initially posting my lighthearted but genuine 'praise'.

For my own part I've never had an interest in general folkie style music, as it's always seemed far too pleasant but dull* to attract my interest (and still is in the main) but traditional songs on the other hand I find to be strange and fascinating creatures.

I also think it's useful - for someone like me if no-one else - to have terms which define it as a particular body of material distinct from other sub-genre's of folk music. There are after all lots of other sub-genre's which are themselves defined by a variety of terms.




* purely a personal response - hope I'm allowed that before anyone gets uptight.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 08:36 AM

It's a pity, though not surprising, that some of this thread has returned to the old (mouldy) chestnuts of "what is folk?" or "what is traditional?" or "why the hell does it matter anyway?". Despite the arguments as to whether definitions are useful at all, and despite the difficulty of agreeing about them even amongst those of us who see a need for them, clearly there are different camps among us.

Some of us prefer to sing and listen to mostly the songs that have knocked around in the tradition for a long while, plus some of the more recent ones that have been written in comparable styles. (I say "styles" plural because I don't see a lot in common between, for example, Cruel Mother, Cupid's Garden and Watters o' Tyne.) Some of us prefer to sing and listen to mostly recently written songs about the human condition or current issues. Some of us are very enthusiastic about particular performers. Some of us have catholic tastes. All those preferences are legitimate, and no-one should object to anyone else's. However we do have a right to complain if the description on a particular tin misleads us about the contents.

The intended subject of this thread was whether those of us who (for want of any better term) can be labelled "traddies" are miserable buggers, fit only to be either despised or pitied for our clinging to fossilised material, or whether we have our virtues.

I'd better finish by declaring where I stand.

I belong to the "traddie" camp.

I reckon we deserve some credit for valuing the old stuff, wanting to keep it alive, and encouraging youngsters who take an interest.

Richard

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 22 Feb 10 - 04:18 AM

Seconded!

I sing (say) The Innocent Hare for direct communion with the numinous embodied in a certain potency one might only find in such songs. Whatever their actual provenance, they do facilitate the old singaround / seance something wonderful!

Beer is not essential; I find an injection of liquid Ecstasy in the soft flesh just above the front tooth does the job just as well.

E by Gum.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 08:58 PM

I venture to suggest that folk music and song do not indicate the presence of a deity but rather assist in the envisagement of a preceding reality (or perceptions present in such a reality). This is why one experiences a feeling of connection when something like "Pleasant and Delightful" lifts off in a full-throated assembly.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 08:33 AM

Speaking as someone who can get quite weepie over any old bollocks it's hard to discriminate what's pushing my numerous musical buttons.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 08:31 AM

"It's not a hotline to 'them as is gone before'"

No, I don't commune with the ancestors! You'll need to ask SO'P about that one. But the imaginal worlds these old stories can evoke, can be jolly magnetising in a very 'otherness' way. I don't know how I'd describe it, but perhaps the same psychological/emotional effect as reading Brothers Grimm as a child.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 08:24 AM

"That's precisely what it does for me"

Well okay, but only if accompanied by a few pints of Bladder's Olde Thrush and a very special rendition of a song. It's not a hotline to 'them as is gone before' any more than Telstar or the Charleston.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 08:18 AM

"It won't connect you to the numinous,"

That's precisely what it does for me (sometimes), YMMV

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 08:14 AM

The only honest response to the traditional from a contemporary sensibility is to appreciate it as another style of music. It won't connect you to the numinous, or your real or imagined ancestry, or Eden or whatever personal transport you project onto it but it comprises a vital part of our musical backdrop.

A melodian and a tuba and a fiddle make as compelling a noise as any yet invented and it's unfortunate some people ascribe dubious links to the resulting sound. Enthusiasts take it all far, far too seriously.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 08:08 AM

"a number of people there were visibly shocked by the word shit & refused to sing along"
Are you sure they weren't objecting to listening to shit?
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 08:04 AM

Oh no Crow Sister - just as I've got him convinced that folk music can have one foot out of the grave he'll come and see the ghastly truth!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 05:37 AM

"a number of people there were visibly shocked by the word shit & refused to sing along."

Sounds like you're going to the wrong sessions SO'P - the regulars at RB's session would take it up with hearty enthusiasm!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 05:25 AM

Reckon I should ask Joe to retitle the thread 'In Praise of Old Hippies'. Works for me..

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 Feb 10 - 05:03 AM

I'm sure I made that a clicky; anyway here it is, Bog Roll Blues, the mighty Groundhogs at their finest:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Myt6xtMYeLA

Lyric add perhaps? I'll be singing this with the fiddle next time I visit the Beech!

Hanging on a convenience wall,
A roll of two-ply crepe and one-ply clear,
The silent sentinels of health,
supplied by the corporation hygiene surveyor,
Perforated, sectionalised, medicated, sterilised each layer,
Property of Birmingham City Council now please wash your hands.
But, if you think this is all that these tissues appear to be,
Then listen to the kind of thing these tissues have to be and have to see.

They're witness to a junkie's needs, soaking up the blood spilled on the floor,
A message scribbled on a sheet, state date, time and size pushed under the door,
Rolled up to a pellet size, shoved into the hole drilled through the wall,
Streaming projectiles hurled through the air out of the trains after
games of football.
But I don't suppose anybody really cares, there's too many nowadays just want to wipe their ass of the whole affair.

Or maybe not - Rachel & I sang The Slurf Song at a session recently and having had all manner of songs dealing with incest, murder, maritime venereal disease & the causes theref, a number of people there were visibly shocked by the word shit & refused to sing along. For those who've never heard it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZA7OT3Ib5I

and The Great Man himself, just last year, with new verses:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZmJnY6N56M

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Feb 10 - 05:59 AM

Sorry Mr Cringe - Just saw your post as well, Aye - I was given 'Iao chant from the cosmic inferno' a couple of years ago and loved it. Now, back to another topic - The Iao chant is one hell of a length - About an hour I think. Beats all previously mentioned lengths anyway:-) To my chargrin I have not aquired any more of their stuff but I really must one of these days.

DeG

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Feb 10 - 04:53 AM

Very funny, Richard, and oddly perseptive. Having hosted events with young(er!) people I have heard arguments about prog-rock, alt-rock, metal, heavy-metal, death-metal, classic and ballad rock rage with almost as much intensity as those about folk! I am sure you were already aware of that but just in case anyone else wasn't!

Cheers

DeG

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 05:37 PM

I'll see your TCFTB and raise you Hogwash, which whilst fielding Clive Brooks (ex-Egg)instead of the venerable Ken Pustelnik, does feature my two all time favourite TS compositions in Earth Shanty & 3744 James Road. In fact, tucked away someplace I have a BBC In Concert session consisting of extended workouts on both these songs with TS doing a choice mellotron interlude. Anyone fancy this I can post it on YouSendIt.

I love TCFTB too of course; Bog Roll Blues is another all time favourite.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 05:08 PM

If we are going Groundhogs, I think I'd opt for "Thank Christ for the Bomb".

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 02:39 PM

""Then, at the height of simmer when you HAD to have the window open,""

One of those marvellous typos which actually says it even better than what one intended to type.

Love it!
Don T.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 02:24 PM

And RB if you're including Tangerine Dream in 'rock' then Comus counts? Song to Comus If I remember rightly, my parents saw Comus along with King Crimson at the Wheeley rock festival.. (see here )
All before I was born of course, though I think my 'spirit' has been badly touched with a good 2nd hand dose of hash and LSD. The first song I recall hearing: 21st Century Schizoid Man.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 02:10 PM

The Pink Fairies

Respect!

Do It!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 01:54 PM

Wot, no Deep Purple? somehow brilliant

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 01:44 PM

Oh, no, you want proper traditional rock music, doncher? Not this modern stuff.

Jefferson Airplane, Budgie, Frank Zappa, Atomic Rooster, Electric Prunes, Vanilla Fudge, late Pretty Things, the Pink Fairies, Amon Duul, Tangerine Dream, Hawkwind. That's what I call proper traditional rock music. It has to pass the 1974 test (of being recorded before then).

Grin!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 12:04 PM

Talking of Acid Mothers and Gong - ever hear Acid Mothers collaboration with Gong? They did an album called Acid Motherhood (2004) which has quite possibly the vilest cover ever dreamed of; nightmare stuff, not for the faint hearted & enough to give the staunchest Daevid Allen fan the heebie-jeebies (see HERE but you have been warned!). That said, the music is absolutely amazing - but when is it not?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 11:34 AM

"Acid Mothers Temple".

Bleedin' Nora, Mr Gnome! And there I was thinking I was the only visitor to Mudcat who liked that crazee bunch o' Japanese hippies!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 11:23 AM

Oops, I'm pretty sure I said some hideously divisive things there, and shall be lambasted presently..

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 11:06 AM

Further to some of Jack's points below..

I think for someone who hasn't been exposed to traditional material either as a consequence of being around during the folk revival boom period where every other band was wearing cheesecloth and doing covers by Trad. Anon. or by being in close association to someone who was, it's very easy for traditional stuff to get utterly occluded by the 'beautiful young man with guitar' stylee folk that flourished alongside it, and eventually came to completely overshadow it.

This is the main reason that I think of trad. songs/tunes as a body of material rather than a musical genre. I've never been a fan of folk as a musical genre, still not really - oddly enough! So the two things are quite distinct in my mind - apples and oranges. Traditional Song is to current musical trends as Shakespear is to this season's blockbuster. I have the Collected Works of Shakespear on my shelf, but I still go and watch this season's blockbuster movie, whatever it may be.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: melodeonboy
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 11:03 AM

I tried to walk up Milton Regis 'igh street the uvver day, so I did. And could I get aht on the street? Could I buggery. There they all were, playing away on their djembes and pipes and God knows what. I says "What are you lot doin' 'ere". "Well", they says, "This is the new Britain, innit? All the sreets are full now of people playing rootsy music." "Blimey", I says, "I only wanted to get up to the Co-op to get a flagon of Diamond White, and the 'ole street's full of musicians".

So, after pushing my way froo all them bloody musicians (and catching me 'ead on the rim of someone's tuba, while I'm abaht it, I might add), I finally gets to the Co-op, expecting a nice bit of piped music to accompany my purchase, and what do I see but the manager sitting cross-legged on the floor, playing away on the fiddle like a maniac, wiv a mandolin player on one side of 'im and a washboard player on the uvver.

"I ain't 'aving this", I says, "it ain't right for people to be exposed to all this non-mainstream music. Where will it all end? Next fing you know they'll be taking X-Factor off the telly. I'm 'aving a word wiv the Old Bill to get all this stopped".

"You'll be lucky, Cocker", says 'e, "the Chief Constable's just taken up the melodeon!"

What a f****in' liberty!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MikeL2
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 10:32 AM

hi leveller

The bagpipes are great......at a distance of about 3 miles...lol

I lived in Inverness some years ago and in the summer evenings a lone piper would play sometimes. He was about 3 miles away and it was beautiful.

Mind you sometimes in the town we had the massed pipes and drums of the Scottish regiments....louder than any disco I have ever been to.

Cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 10:20 AM

Must be something in the water - I am currently listening to Acid Mothers Temple after a day of New Model Army, Old Fleetwood Mac and Kasabian (I blame the Brits) yesterday!

:D

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: theleveller
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 09:33 AM

"Did you ever come across the worlds worst busker there?"

No but when I had an office in St. Anne's Square there used to be a very good one-man band. Then, at the height of simmer when you HAD to have the window open, there was bagpipe player stood right under our window. Aaaaaargh!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Brian Peters
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 09:26 AM

Traddie, moi? I'll have you know I share many of Mr. O'P's more esoteric tastes, including Gong, Magma, ISB, you name it!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 08:45 AM

Hey Mr P - You pinched 200.

Bloomin' traddies. Mutter, mutter...

:D (eG)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Brian Peters
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 08:43 AM

"Until that is some Traddie comes along and starts to lecture me on musical righteousness."

And how often does that happen on Piccadilly in Manchester?

Or anywhere else for that matter?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 08:43 AM

Walking down Picadilly in Manchester you'll get...

More likely Market Street, Picadilly is too full of buses to hear anything and the gardens have them stupid fountains now! But I will let you off for that one:-)

Did you ever come across the worlds worst busker there? they guy with the out of tune blue guitar who shouted all his songs? I could listen to him with a smile on my face for ages!

Cheers

DeG

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Campin
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 08:22 AM

I was really thinking of the media barrage that aims at stopping anyone thinking about anything except celebrity culture and brand names. If it isn't going to make Murdoch any money there are dozens of TV channels and Hello! lookalikes telling you to think about silicone tits and Nintendo instead.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 08:21 AM

So which one are you?

I see myself in them all actually; some days you'll find me the merry outsider, gooble-gobbling away with the best of them - other days I'll be recoiling at the abject horror of this very freakish thing that has been called Folk...

I think Jack Campin was referring, at least in part, to the constant barrage of noise (usually pop music) that is forced upon us, and the fact that this has increased significantly over the past few decades.

And this interferes with - er - Traditional Music how exactly? Up in Edinburgh I flee from bagpipe & djembe duos - generally for the nearest shopping arcade (or better still Ocean Terminal) there to heal my soul with piped pop. Walking down Picadilly in Manchester you'll get mbira, kora, blues guitar, rock n' rollers, folkie fiddlers, string quartets, homeless penny whistlers and hip-hoppers - and I think to myself, what a wonderful world. Until that is some Traddie comes along and starts to lecture me on musical righteousness at which point I reach for my pistol wondering which of us knows the most deserving misery.

Just listen to me, he who avoids those local folk clubs that use PA systems...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: melodeonboy
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 07:02 AM

"What you dismiss as Cultural Noise Interference is the glad reality of actual music"

I think Jack Campin was referring, at least in part, to the constant barrage of noise (usually pop music) that is forced upon us, and the fact that this has increased significantly over the past few decades. It's now become almost de rigeur to have piped music playing in shopping centres, airports, pubs, supermarkets, shops, restaurants etc., and often in the workplace as well. I think "Cultural Noise Interference" is as good a definition as any. I find it irritating and distracting. Glad reality, my a**e!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 07:00 AM

Oh, there's a cosy looking singaround. Is that the Beech? So which one are you?

Here's a tubey of one I go to, from Knockholt folk camp last Summer Solstice. Poor quality video because the light was dimn (you might recognise Richard Bridge from the Pigs Ear tubey posted elsewhere): Knockholt Folk Camp

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 06:49 AM

don't think I'd have stuck around here without a sense of humour

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBXyB7niEc0

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 06:04 AM

"Westwood"

Tim? Yo, Yo! I crack up in fits every time I hear the bloke. He's hysterical!

Anyhoo, Cheers JC - don't think I'd have stuck around here without a sense of humour.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 19 Feb 10 - 05:02 AM

who have managed to find their way to traditional music despite a much greater volume of cultural noise interference than my generation had to deal with.

What you dismiss as Cultural Noise Interference is the glad reality of actual music; it is the music of what is & thrives in continuance of that which gave us music in the first place. Can we continue to praise Traddies when, unlike their Model Railway Enthusiast counterparts, then continually fail to recognise real trains when they see them? I think, sadly, perhaps not. Once again we're back to Folk as Cultural Autism, at which point I tune into Westwood and rejoice.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Campin
Date: 18 Feb 10 - 07:15 PM

And before this thread reaches 200, let's hear it for younger traddies like Crow Sister herself, who have managed to find their way to traditional music despite a much greater volume of cultural noise interference than my generation had to deal with.

And we didn't have the experience she's had, of digging for information in a space that feels increasingly like the downslope end of an elephant cage.

And especially well done for retaining a sense of humour while doing it.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: John P
Date: 18 Feb 10 - 06:08 PM

Back to praising traddies. People who have given me years of enjoyment and inspiration, some only through recordings and some through playing with them over the years:

William Pint
Gabriel Yacoub
Martin Carthy
Jamie McMenemy
Alan Stivell
Anna Clemenger
Denny Hall
Mike Saunders
Tim Hart
Olov Johanson
Pierre Imbert
Scott Marckx
Danny Carnahan
Tania Opland
Maddy Prior
Bob Kotta
Eliza Carthy

and many more that aren't springing to mind right now.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 11:18 AM

Oh ~ thank you.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 10:25 AM

I think he used the 'N' word in a recent magazine interview.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 08:18 AM

michaelr ~~ RU there? Could I please repeat my ? of 0151 am: what is 'racist' about John Mayer {NoRelation}?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 08:14 AM

After all, most of us can spot a Folk Song, or a song aspiring to be a Folk Song, when we hear it - just as most of us can tell if a person is speaking French or German even if we can't understand what they're actually saying. ~~ S'OP
                              =======

I would commend this as a most noteworthy & valuable point {emerging from it must be admitted, a certain quantity of quasi-redundant verbiage}.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Sandman
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 07:33 AM

I am in favour of anyone who makes their own music whether it be traditional,jazz, blues,or anything acoustic,Iam not against electric music either.
I am in favour of creativity .
I sing traditional english/irish scottish music for a living because by general consensus I do it better than blues.http://www.dickmiles.com

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,S O'P (Astray)
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 06:51 AM

Whether we agree with it or not is irrelevent as just inventing other definitions will only cloud the issue.

I think it's probably better to get rid of the definitions rather than making new ones; neither the Horse Definition or the 1954 Definition tell us anything about the music. A musicologist might however - for more see below.

*

The kind of people who expect sex on the first date, and there is plenty of anecdotal evidence for this - are those who have met in internet chat rooms or other ways across the ether.

People of both sexes have been happily having sex on first dates long before the internet, that they continue to do so, in hotel rooms, is a matter of pragmatics & personal discretion.

*

No, Sweeney. "Folk" differs not in form but in derivation, as the 1954 definition states.

Yes, Richard. Because all music is thus derived. Show me one which isn't.

"Community" is an elastic term and a community may be long or short lived, large or small, dependent on particular links or general, and physical or today virtual, and nothing about that undermines the 1954 definition.

If that's the case we have no argument & there's no difference between the horse definition and the 1954 Definition. So - folk music is tautologous. Where does that get us? Far better we focus on what does make it different, and we won't find that in the 1954 Definition.

There is nothing condescending or patronising as far as I can see in referring to a community as a community - and if there were, so what, it would still be a community.

I'm thinking of the romanticism (and by implication patronisation) that assumes there can be such a thing as a community uninfluenced by popular & art music. The whole thing is couched in a functionalist rhetoric which has no place in today's thinking. How can music remain unchanged? Change is the very nature of the thing.

You seek to build upon an error therefore when you proceed to assert that we have failed to define "folk music".

The essence of music can be found in the material itself, the idioms rather than their derivation. It is a musicological issue, if it is an issue at all. After all, most of us can spot a Folk Song, or a song aspiring to be a Folk Song, when we hear it - just as most of us can tell if a person is speaking French or German even if we can't understand what they're actually saying.

An immediate culture cannot be a heritage. A heritage is what those before you did, and from which you spring.

In which case it's a bit vague to be of any use, even though I'm dealing with various consequences of the past all the the time. When I bake bread, am I doing so as act of heritage or necessity? I think heritage, like folk, is maybe missing the point rather. Both are unhelpful constructs and both are the reserve of a minority of enthusiasts.

PS: Another horse definition. You can take a horse to water but you can't make it drink.

Or as Stan Laurel said: You can take a horse to water but a pencil must be lead. But that's a proverb surely? There's a few more here:

http://www.ultimatehorsesite.com/info/quotes_horseproverbs.html

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 06:44 AM

The 54 definition is built on a set of terms which were assumed to be permanent. For better or worse descriptions like community have altered, probably irretrievably. The definition has no currency outside the revisionist format of the folk club, and sporadically then.

The changed nature of community has rendered the definition obsolete unless 'folk' and 'tradition' have further qualifiers. Within the world of the club it makes sense, like the scores in croquet or dungeons and dragons or the ascent through freemasonry but those inside over-estimate its thrall when applied to modern definitions of the same terms in the outside world.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MikeL2
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 06:31 AM

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 04:51 AM

hi Crow Sister

<" And after all the threads on this topic and all the arguments for x, y and z, I'm just left thinking "so what?" >

Excatly my thoughts too.

It appears that after nearly 50 years of singing folk song I was wrong. And all the folk clubs and events I performed at and sat in the audience were not folk clubs at all.....lol

Hey ho....

Oh the praties they grow small....

regards

MikeL

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 06:03 AM

PS: Another horse definition. You can take a horse to water but you can't make it drink. The temptation to say "think" is almost irresistible, but I suspect that you probably can make a horse think, so long as you expect it to think like a horse.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 06:02 AM

No, Sweeney. "Folk" differs not in form but in derivation, as the 1954 definition states. "Community" is an elastic term and a community may be long or short lived, large or small, dependent on particular links or general, and physical or today virtual, and nothing about that undermines the 1954 definition.   There is nothing condescending or patronising as far as I can see in referring to a community as a community - and if there were, so what, it would still be a community.

You seek to build upon an error therefore when you proceed to assert that we have failed to define "folk music".

An immediate culture cannot be a heritage. A heritage is what those before you did, and from which you spring.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:59 AM

Positivitly unsanitary Definitely a traddie as well then:-)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:56 AM

"BTW - I call mine Samantha. Far easier..."

But does Samantha give it up on the first date? I bet she does. All those traditional songs are right slags! Not fussy at all about who sings them.. just think of all the people and places they've been and been putting it about with?
Positivitly unsanitary.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:11 AM

Tell me Lizzie - do I count as a traddie?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 05:06 AM

There are two definitions of Folk that I'm aware of: The Horse Definition (variously attributed, but I always hear it in Satchmo's voice)

Then I offer a third definition - music that accompanies a raffle.

(Courtesy M. Simpson).

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 04:56 AM

BTW - I call mine Samantha. Far easier...


:D

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 04:51 AM

SO'P calls the body of songs that he mainly works with 'Traditional English Speaking Folk Song & Ballad', I call them 'Traditional Songs', other people call them 'Folk Songs'.

And after all the threads on this topic and all the arguments for x, y and z, I'm just left thinking "so what?"

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 04:45 AM

There isn't a working definition of folk music.

I thought there was? The 1954 definition. I do not know it that well but, as far as I know, it is the only one we have. Whether we agree with it or not is irrelevent as just inventing other definitions will only cloud the issue.

Not sure of the relevence to 'In praise of Traddies!' though.

Cheers

DeG

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,S O'P (Dreaming of Glenisla)
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 04:23 AM

what you say could only have value if there was no point in knowing what made folk music differ.

There are two definitions of Folk that I'm aware of: The Horse Definition (variously attributed, but I always hear it in Satchmo's voice) and the 1954 Definition (to be intoned in the RP of Maud Karpeles & the International Folk Music Council - now the International Council for Traditional Music whose aims and objectives would be appear to be rather different). In both of these definitions the outcome is the same - that there is nothing about Folk Music that is any different from any other music and that, therefore, all music is Folk Music. Where the 1954 Definition fails is in its romanticised (& patronising) use of the term community. In today's folklore a community can be as many as two; it can exist for as long as a day; and in its history it will develop its own folklore, language, traditions, and perhaps its own folk music too. This is what people do. Of course this isn't going to be of any interest to the Folk Orthodoxy, but that's one of a particular Faith rather than a general actuality. It's a faith I might join in with myself from time to time, much as, as an atheist, I might find meaning in the RC Masses over the Easter Triduum.      

Without that knowledge it would cease to be differentiable and so become diluted to the point of invisibility.

Well, that's not strictly true because in having tried & failed to define Folk Music as being any different from any other music, there remains the evident fact that it is different - but only in terms of Genre & Idiom. What we now might think of as Traditional English Speaking Folk Song & Ballad is an international phenomenon which is quite different from any other but not according to the 1954 Definition which is, as I say, simply too anachronistic to be of any use to us today as a definition - though it does have use, which I'll come to presently. I sing these songs with a passion, but their difference is not how they came about, rather it's their idiomatic essence & enduring potency.      

If that is all you care for your heritage you are rootless.

We are each of us our own heritage and are rooted accordingly. My immediate culture is my heritage & my only interest in the past is where it intersects with the present. The only traditions of any real human value are the ones that thrive today and, unfortunately, Traditional English Speaking Folk Song & Ballad is not one of them. There are, however, millions of others out there that make me praise the new dawn each day I wake up. All music is a joy to me because of its traditions, its heritage, its community, its variation - all the things, in fact, enshrined in the 1954 Definition, the true value of which is to remind us of the essential humanity of music as a totality.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Feb 10 - 01:51 AM

... and in what way do you believe him to be 'racist' ~ I can find no evidence of this on his youTube perfs [mixed race groups &c], or his wiki entry [he explicitly acknldgs his Jewish roots].

So why 'racist' m.r?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 11:37 PM

Not that I have ever heard of, michaelr. There are quite a lot of Mayer·s, I think. My relatives of that name are all LA-based, AFIK.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: michaelr
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 11:34 PM

Is John Mayer (the racist pop star) a relative?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 11:26 PM

and lots of 1930s MGM musical ditties

BTW ~ Yes! relation: Louis B Mayer was my 1st cousin 2ce removed, i.e. my paternal grandfather's first cousin. Why surname spelt differently?: why, becoz Americans can't spell, of course!

His nephew Daniel was a dancer who used to come over with Judy Garland's annual visit & we would all meet him for tea at my grandmother's. Next time you see movie of Guys&Dolls, look out for the crapshooter in the sewer in the big green fedora hat ~ that's my (god knows how-manyeth!) cousin Danny Mayer...

~ Michael Grosvenor Myer ~

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 07:00 PM

"If that is all you care for your heritage you are rootless."

Not at all. My earliest memories are of my mother singing music hall songs (she was born in a zepellin raid), probably learnt from her mother. There were a sprinkling of traditional songs in there and lots of 1930s MGM musical ditties. My 'heritage' is blues, soul, rock and folk via popular music radio and concert going, which I consumed indiscriminately until discrimination showed me they blurred marvellously and I could no more be a sharecropper than a ploughboy.

Plenty of lovely old songs with personal experiences laid over vicarious and imagined ones until they form a palimpsest of history, their provenance defined and re-defined in my own window of time. Far more important than the individual meat pies of someone else's taxonomy.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: John P
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:52 PM

There isn't a working definition of folk music. I could make equally good arguments for it being only traditional music, any acoustic music, rock, rap, and "Happy Birthday".

There is, however, a decent working definition of traditional music, if you are willing to accept wide individualized gray areas. And if you ignore the grumpy, compulsive "don't try to define my music" crowd.

John

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Bert
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:11 PM

OK. What is a working definition of "Folk Music" ?

It's what we do here at Mudcat of course.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:10 PM

Glueman, what you say could only have value if there was no point in knowing what made folk music differ. Without that knowledge it would cease to be differentiable and so become diluted to the point of invisibility. If that is all you care for your heritage you are rootless.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:08 PM

1954. Do try to keep up.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,999
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:31 PM

OK. What is a working definition of "Folk Music" ?

There'll be a bloody fight within ten posts.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:26 PM

"Yours is a stereotype I've only encountered on Mudcat..."

Really?!?

"...and then only in the words of people who somehow think it's wrong to desire a working definition of a type of music."

Ah. It'll be their fault then. Not the nutters.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: John P
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 02:06 PM

Traddie always conjours a grumpy, compulsive type of person to mind and I'm always shocked how accurate such a casually drawn stereotype has become. It's changing but everso slowly and on Mudcat hardly at all.

Obviously, there are few weirdos in the traditional music scene, but the same is true of any group of people, musical or not. "Always conjours a grumpy, compulsive type"? Maybe it conjours this in you, but not in me or in any of the intelligent, well-rounded people I know who happen to play and listen to traditional folk music. Yours is a stereotype I've only encountered on Mudcat, and then only in the words of people who somehow think it's wrong to desire a working definition of a type of music.

If you encounter grumpy, compulsive people in a folk club, in a grocery store, or on the train, I encourage you to emulate me and just walk away from them without worrying at all about what they say.

John

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 02:06 PM

The folk 'attitude' is a modern construction that's arrived in the last 50 years. The price of reviving the music has been a certain cumudgeonliness, a proprietoriality, an adversarial quality the original singers may not have identified with. It's a long way from 'a song I leaned on my mother's knee' to the lab testing it has to submit to now to pass the traddie test.

The simple pleasure of hearing old songs performed well should be sufficient without ownership arguments or provenance contests. That way lies madness. Or academia.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 01:10 PM

Ah, well, that's fair enuff. I tend to be a bit of a compulsive; but endeavour to keep the old grumpiness under wraps AFAP!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 12:32 PM

"Is there nothing you engage with, with any degree of love or enthusiasm? Goodness, how sad!"

Many things, but I'm eternally vigilant it isn't terminal bloke-iness, a kind of bubblegum card collecting that's looking for a object of desire, rather than the other way round. Remember, universities are full of people who find moth's wings the most important thing in the universe and make a good living out of their hobby. Is it healthy? - probably not. Will they gain the respect of their peers? - Certainly.

Traddie always conjours a grumpy, compulsive type of person to mind and I'm always shocked how accurate such a casually drawn stereotype has become. It's changing but everso slowly and on Mudcat hardly at all.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 12:17 PM

Well they might be just a bunch of old songs to you, glueman, but they happen to be far more than that to me ~ &, it appears, to many of us.

I know people who think the Plays of Will Shax are nothing but a boring load of incomprehensibility; & I am genuinely sorry for such people & what they are missing.

Is there nothing you engage with, with any degree of love or enthusiasm? Goodness, how sad!.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 12:09 PM

One hopes that enthusiasts for any music are able to get it out of its box, give it a good polish and put it away again, safe in the knowledge it'll be there next time they need it. It might be in good enough nick that they can pass it down to the kids.

Unfortunately musical enthusiasm, like any other, is but a short leap into obsessive compulsion and a rapidly diminishing sense of perspective. If traddie means someone who appreciates an old song I fit the bill but if it's wallowing in life-style folkiness forget it. They're just a bunch of old songs.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 11:58 AM

No, you didn't mention it, but I can gather things are a bit chaotic. Glad it arrived & is approved of, anyhow.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,S O'P (Astray)
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 11:43 AM

CD arrived safe & sound, and has had several plays & received braw hoots & plaudits accordingly. Sound stuff. I'm sure I mentioned it, but it's rather chaotic just now, as ever...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 11:29 AM

Thanks Sweeney. BTW - did the copy of my CD I sent you ever arrive? Things seem to be in a bit of a flux for you; I have PM'd you a couple of times to ask, but not clear if PMs are getting thru to you at present, so hope you don't mind my asking question here on the thread.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,S O'P (Astray)
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 11:16 AM

Just for interest ~ even if only to me ~ my darling late wife Valerie took that pic. I think there should be a credit to that FK to be found in the booklet somewhere.

Nice to know! Wonder what the word-scores were?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Lizzie Cornish
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 10:57 AM

"So what? Who cares if you get pictures or not? Is this thread about what we can do to make traditional music more appealing to Lizzie Cornish? No, it's about people who appreciate traditional music, and the people within it. If you don't relate to either of these things, why keep coming to the thread to have gratuitous pops at something you neither like nor understand? "


I was merely replying to a question which Tam asked me. If you have a problem with that....................

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: John P
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 10:40 AM

I play traditional music. I'm a jazz pianist. I'm a bluesman. I play a lot of medieval music. I play hard rock, jazz-rock, progressive rock. I'm a drummer, a guitarist, and I play the harp. I have about two dozen hand drums, a mandolin, a cittern, and an oud. I can't sing for shit, but I do it anyway, in the privacy of my home.

I have never -- nor has any other traditional music lover in any thread I've read on Mudcat -- tried to tell anyone what to play or how to play it.

For those who don't like traditional music, that's fine. But don't tell me that I'm doing anything other than encouraging everyone to play and listen to whatever kind of music turns them on. The whole "music locked up in a basement" thing simply does not exist. Not on Mudcat, not in real life, no where except the minds of those who for some reason feel threatened when confronted by people who generally like trad music more than most singer-songwriter music.

I would like to add my thanks to all the great traditional musicians from whom I learned songs and tunes, all the dedicated collectors who found the songs and put them in books so I could find them as well, and to all the promoters who bother to make live traditional music possible. I could say the same about the older rock musicians who helped get going when I was young, and the blues and jazz players who put up with my lack of skill and knowledge and played with me anyway.

John

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 09:26 AM

Bad example. Dave ~ some [tho not all] of the points she makes on that thread are fair: see a point I have made there in correspondence with Royston. (Mods ~ sorry to confuse threads: but he started it, Miss!)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Brian Peters
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 09:25 AM

S.O'P. wrote:
"It is well reported that after gigs Bellamy would give serious scrutiny to his hosts record collections, insisting on playing some real music which was seldom revival folk."

Yes, and he could be savage about their choices, too.

The first time I spent an afternoon with Bob Copper he used the phrase, "Now let's listen to some real music", on arrival in the room with a huge armful of classic blues recordings. At dinner with the Bellamys on one occasion (if you're going to drop names, make them good ones) Peter played nothing all night but New Orleans jazz to accompany his home-cooked gumbo, red beans and rice.

"No one said traditional music was the invention of the bourgeoisie"

Well, you do claim regularly that the concept of traditional music is the invention of the bourgoisie, and others try to convince us that the 'middle classes' or 'professors' have expropriated it, or that Cecil Sharp made it all up. You can't deny being an agent provocateur, surely? But I'm not rising to that "all music is traditonal" bait, on this occasion.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 08:27 AM

No - there doesn't seem to be: very remiss, Neil!! However, there is on the sleeve of Both Sides Then, on which a companion photo from the same set appears.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 08:21 AM

There's a picture of Peter Bellamy with a scrabble board (in the booklet of WTVE) on which are the words BLEATING BORING OLD TRADDY. SO'P

===================================================

Just for interest ~ even if only to me ~ my darling late wife Valerie took that pic. I think there should be a credit to that FK to be found in the booklet somewhere.

~ Michael ~

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,S O'P (Astray)
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 08:10 AM

A couple of metallers I was hoping to talk into recording a full-on electric version with me rather dissed it as being "too hey nonny-nonny": I suppose we all have different perspectives.

Shame; thanks for the expansions though. I know Carthy set it to that particular tune, but I like what you've done with it and could see it going in any number of ways, but as it stands the trance / Velvets thing is very evident & welcome. I've just bought a Kaossilator - a hand-held looping synth no bigger than a slice of toast - and am presently experimenting with using it with the old songs; I could see it fitting in with what you do too actually - trance grooves & all!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 08:03 AM

"Surely it's possible to be a traddie and a non-traddie at the same time - enjoying both sides of the folk music coin."
On 29th December last year after Bob Gilroy's funeral in South Shields
Jim Murray, one of the finest Blues performers in the North of England, Dave Smith, a good guitarist in the Martyn/Harper mould and I a traddie(yuk) of forty plus years standing walked out of the crematorium together. We had all been involved in the running of South Tyne Folk and Blues within a ten year time scale and while performing our own music we also had a deep respect for the other types of music on offer at our club. Terms like "traddie" or "Bluesman" were never used in a derogatory sense and no such divisions existed; that is probably why the club enjoyed a lifespan of some twenty years.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,S O'P (Astray)
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 07:42 AM

'Traddies?' Yuk!

There's a picture of Peter Bellamy with a scrabble board (in the booklet of WTVE) on which are the words BLEATING BORING OLD TRADDY. As far as tastes are concerned, they don't come any more eclectic than Bellamy; I have in my keeping a video of an interview filmed in his home with the walls lined with his celebrated cassette collections with the spines spelling out entire back catalogues of rock, jazz, and folk artists. It is well reported that after gigs Bellamy would give serious scrutiny to his hosts record collections, insisting on playing some real music which was seldom revival folk. If that's what being a Traddy is then I can dig it myself, which is the same as the ICTM, which includes folk, popular, classical & urban music too. I wonder, to what extent is the term Traditional Music actually a tautology? Are there any musics which aren't traditional? If so, what are they?

The 'traddies' here generally seem to rush to the barricades only when goaded by agents provocateurs determined to prove that traditional music is the invention of the bourgeoisie, or some such nonsense.

No one said traditional music was the invention of the bourgeoisie, rather than the conditions that define it as being essentially different from other musics are a bourgeois fantasy hatched at a very significant remove from the initial context of a music which is, in fact, only different from other musics in terms of its idiom. Is saying such things being provocative? Myself, I just love the music - all music - having been raised on Pop, Northumbrian piping, Indonesian Gamelan, Plain Chant, Free Improvisation, Albanian Vocal Polyphony, Bothy Ballads, Child Ballads, Torch Ballads, Ars Nova, Prog, Post-Prog, Punk, Post-Punk, Medieval, Thrash, Hip-Hop, Industrial, Experimental, Opera, Baroque, Be-Bob, Free-Bop, Gagaku and Piobaireachd, it seems a tad limiting to use the term Traditional Music to apply to something that is no more or less traditional than anything else.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 07:27 AM

As an aside (but not straying from topic) and prompted by the mention of the Ian Campbell Group, I am reminded of a set I saw at the weekend from one of Ian's sons, David. The range of material went from unaccompanied Child ballads to contemporary Americana with and without banjo and uke. Here indeed is a man steeped in traditions rooted in areas of his experience backed up by fine musicianship and a voice inherited from his famous family. Which just about sums up what those who are being called "traddies" seek out.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 07:20 AM

I'm so glad Brian Peters has come along as I was getting dangerously close to demonstrating how, if you're not keen on a tune, you can use or adapt another. As he is the master of this I'll leave it to him, pausing only to agree wholeheartedly that the term "traddie is yuk. Nearly as bad as "folkie". They have been coined purely and simply to engender division, an "us & them" which certainly exists but only in benighted pockets among idiots. They're easy to avoid; for instance if at a festival you see a bar with beards, tie-dies and tankards and a notice reading "no instruments", or another with callow youths escaped from their bedrooms with laments about how the world owes them a living, DON'T GO IN.

Otherwise, I'm entirely with Brian Peters' definition of a "traddie" , which here appears to mean anyone who prefers Beer & Knightley when NOT performing typical SoH material. Of the theory that trad music was invented by the bourgeoisie, this is to totally ignore the huge body of work emanating from miners, seafarers, canal, rail and road construction workers and travellers. One can, of course, understand that such realities of life would not have touched someone from the London Borough of Harrow whose conception of the former Merrie England comes from a chocolate box and other assorted heritage shop tat.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 07:18 AM

Re what Smedley said above, about ignoring MLC for a day :

All in favour ?

Her conduct is a bit like that of my youngest grandson, aged 7 - can't abear to be ignored.

My own thoughts, when she posts : here's twenty pence, Lizzie - go and phone someone who COULD give a fuck.

After the condemnation by SoH you'd think she'd find a dark corner to curl up in.

Many years ago, Jack and Lyn Taylor published a "folk magazine", and I seem to remember a condemnation of those of us who preferred traditional music to the introspective, navel-gazing compositions of the three chord wonders

in denim caps, written on a piece of shit-paper in the interval : we were labelled "minuscule minded traditionalists". It was a 'label' I wore with pride.

It was the likes of the classic "traddies" - Martin Carthy ; the Watersons ; Alex Campbell ; the Ian Campbell FG (when Swarb was still with it); Dave and Toni Arthur, and their ilk, that put the likes of me back into confidence of the

enduring qualities of traditional music and (with notable exceptions which might prove the rule ) the ephemeral transience of other materials "performed" in folk clubs (see my earlier comments).

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 07:15 AM

I should add (as the hardened festival goers will have spotted, not least from the dark glasses) that it took most of my set to get most of the previous night's hangover out of my throat.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 07:03 AM

BTW Crow Sister - I think I have the same radio series from the same source. YOU know who you are, you old traddie, you. What a guy:-)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:58 AM

The 'traddies' here generally seem to rush to the barricades only when goaded by agents provocateurs determined to prove that traditional music is the invention of the bourgeoisie, or some such nonsense.

Well spotted, Brian:-) It is quite true of course.

Diane - in fairness to those 'on high' I was guilty of starting a thread about why a thread had been closed - which I know we should not do. I was quite rightly chided for doing so and agreed, myself, to not get so hot under the collar about Lizzies goading. So really it was a promise I made myself that I broke, rather than an imposed condition.

In fairness to myself I have neither the patience of a saint nor the wisdom to stop manning the barricades mentioned by Brian when there is no real need. When under attack it is difficult to spot who is firing blanks at times! Going back to my earlier football analogy I can only stand so much 'Your team's a load of wankers' before I will start throwing bottles:-)

Cheers

DeG the hooligan

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Captain Jack Sparrow
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:48 AM

O judgement! Thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And women have lost their reason. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Tradition,
And I must pause till it come back to me.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:39 AM

I didn't really want to talk about me but a couple of things there I cannot let go.


Well, Sweeney, the song is a folk song because of its derivation. Nothing you can do in the way of performance or arrangement of a folk song stops it being a folk song (until you reach the point where it is not that song any more - it has then gone from being "trad/arr" to "original inspired by".

Is it a "cover?" No. My riff is derived from the Carthy riff - but it is different (at least one percussionist I know simply can't play it although he concedes I am consistent, and a kit drummer I know says he can't count it but just has to "play the tune"). I'm not trying to reproduce what Carthy does (fat chance). My version is certainly not the Carthy version (it's missing a whole lot of the verses without I hope losing essential narrative, some verses have been elided, lines have been altered to get rhymes and a constant metre) and I was looking for (and I think got) a presentation that was somewhere between dance/trance on the one hand but the superficial constancy with lots of little shadings that the Velvet Underground used to do.

Lizzie: If you don't hear the changes then either I'm doing it wrong or you are not listening, but on that particular occasion I did have people boogieing at the back of the tent, so maybe the dance/trance part sort of clicks. Nice chap though Seth Lakeman appears to be I find his stuff rather samey - so I don't see why you can boogie his boogie (when the words are very hard to hear) yet not find a similar drive in this rivetting song. But de gustibus non disputandum.

Sweeney: The deadly story (still with it's basic melody) however is still a folk song. A couple of metallers I was hoping to talk into recording a full-on electric version with me rather dissed it as being "too hey nonny-nonny": I suppose we all have different perspectives.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Brian Peters
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:39 AM

Most of the people I know who are deeply into traditional music ('Traddies?' Yuk!) actually have very broad tastes, including (farily obviously) traditional music from other parts of the world, but also other things ranging from vintage rock'n'roll to modern dance music, heavy metal, classical or quirky prog rock. The 'founding fathers' Lloyd and MacColl were both very knowledgable about music from other cultures. Many 'traddies' also enjoy recently composed songs and instrumental music written within the general parameters of the tradition, but not too many of them enjoy the more confessional style of singer-songwriter exemplified by the likes of James Taylor and Jackson Browne, which you used to hear a good deal of in folk clubs of yesteryear - hence the 'Trad versus Contemporary' split that Howard Jones analysed sensibly above.

What happens on Mudcat is a separate issue from what happens in real life. The 'traddies' here generally seem to rush to the barricades only when goaded by agents provocateurs determined to prove that traditional music is the invention of the bourgeoisie, or some such nonsense.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:18 AM

Well, of course, if MLC really were organising the Torbay Festival, a radio programme and campaigns for this and that, we could all contribute ideas and (possibly) support for these and not just about her. As it is, all that can be done is to contradict every outpouring of mindless drivel and tell her why she is WRONG. I see DtG has been instructed from on high not to do this, and an entirely on-topic contribution from Richard Bridge demonstrating how unreal bonkers her drivel is has disappeared.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:17 AM

I think it's a bit like football, MikeL2 - Not that I know anything about that! Supporters have to have a go at the 'other team' whether they have an admiration for them or not and the closer the teams get - the greater the rivalry.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MikeL2
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:06 AM

hi ruth

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Ruth Archer - PM
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:27 AM

I am in complete agreement with what you say. What I was pointing out was that any newcomer here would get the opposite impression.

regards

MikeL2

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 06:00 AM

Can we have an agreement to stop talking about Lizzie for a day? Please? Pretty please?...


-------------------------------------

Given what she has been saying in the thread about 'blame' and rape, I suspect not.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:54 AM

Can we have an agreement to stop talking about Lizzie for a day? Please? Pretty please?...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Ed
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:51 AM

Here's an example of a song based on the memories of an old Wolds farmer who I knew many years ago - it sort of blurs the boundaries between traditional and contemporary:

It's also deeply dreadful

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:47 AM

If you go to a club, the vibe is always welcoming. Lizzie I reckon you need to get out a bit more and meet real people instead of squabbling on here. If you did, your opinion would no-doubt to a swift u-turn.

And if you are going to get out a bit more - would you be kind enough to warn us in advance.

But I suspect your idea will fall on deaf ears. All other helpful advice has. She was offered shedloads of help when she wanted to run a folk festival, specialising in artists who Lizzie thought ought to be headlining and weren't.

Do anyone get any thanks? Nope.

Did the festival go ahead? Nope.

Another piece of Lizziana.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: theleveller
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:41 AM

For me it was the tradition that came before the music - it was my love of history, legend, etc. that brought me into contact with folk music. That led on to writing songs myself, but many of these are based on the history, traditions and stories of the East Riding of Yorkshire where I live. I have even had people claim that some of them are traditional songs, though I have never ever tried to pass them off as such.

Here's an example of a song based on the memories of an old Wolds farmer who I knew many years ago - it sort of blurs the boundaries between traditional and contemporary:

jack and jill

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:27 AM

Mike L2: most of the Mudcatters I have met enjoy a variety of music, traditional and non-traditional. But some people here have invested a lot of time and energy trying to turn "trad" into a dirty word, and vilifying people who enjoy traditional music, or the scholarship that sometimes accompanies research into the roots of songs. This is usually more about their own insecurity than any situation that exists in reality. In real life, very few people only enjoy one type of music, and the entire "argument", such as it is, is an entirely false construct.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MikeL2
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:22 AM

Hi leveller

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: theleveller - PM
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 04:54 AM

<"Surely it's possible to be a traddie and a non-traddie at the same time - enjoying both sides of the folk music coin. Personally, I think they complement each other">

This is the most sensible post on this ( and other parallel ones )topic

Of course you are right. It is only here on Mudcat that they are not.
Most ( dare I use the word) folk musicians that I have met have great respect for each other regardless of what kind of music they play or sing. Most audiences too enjoy most types of *folk.

Of course there are always exceptions - on all sides.

Cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 05:09 AM

"I don't get pictures with it, Tam....the monotony of the tune obscures the story for me. It dominates the song, rather than the words. My brain shuts dow and wanders right away."


So what? Who cares if you get pictures or not? Is this thread about what we can do to make traditional music more appealing to Lizzie Cornish? No, it's about people who appreciate traditional music, and the people within it. If you don't relate to either of these things, why keep coming to the thread to have gratuitous pops at something you neither like nor understand?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 04:59 AM

"From: Ruth Archer - PM
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:58 AM
This idea that there is a group of people who are trying to keep other people from discovering folk and traditional music is something I have never experienced or encountered. The most knowledgeable people I have met on the folk scene are always keen to share their knowledge and welcome new people, in my experience. And I am eternally grateful to them."

Yes to all the above.

In fact people have gone out of their way to be supportive of my interest in traditional songs (hence the reason behind my initial post made last Spring). And still do, I received two parcels of discs from a fellow poster in the last few weeks (one of a radio documentary series and another full of ballads). Both volunteered by him. I wonder why he did that?

If you go to a club, the vibe is always welcoming. Lizzie I reckon you need to get out a bit more and meet real people instead of squabbling on here. If you did, your opinion would no-doubt to a swift u-turn.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: theleveller
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 04:54 AM

Surely it's possible to be a traddie and a non-traddie at the same time - enjoying both sides of the folk music coin. Personally, I think they complement each other, otherwise I'd be constantly beating myself up (and quite right too, I hear you cry).

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Helen Jocys
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 04:27 AM

To 'Folk Police', please identify yourself on Wednesday at the Beech! Re 'Traddies', I am a dyed-in-the-wool Wagnerian; adore Beethoven et al but also love my folk music/songs.
HelenJ

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 03:46 AM

(felt like I was being smothered. "If only!" they all cried in unison)

Bloody hell Lizzie has written two things I have agreed with in one thread.

For the rest of you, Lizzie and I have been swapping humorous comments about each other for simply ages.

She loves it - don't you sweetums?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Lizzie Cornish
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 03:27 AM

I don't get pictures with it, Tam....the monotony of the tune obscures the story for me. It dominates the song, rather than the words. My brain shuts dow and wanders right away. I tried to concentrate on the words but nope, I was watching Richard playing the guitar, his body language, the inside of the marquee, but my attention won't stay on that song. I never even get to the end of it...

It is *nothing* to do with Richard or the way he sings it, and that point I want to get across, it is purely the song/tune itself.


Now when John started singing 'Marks In The Grass', which I think is wonderful I was off and running! The gypsies, their history, the way they live their lives, how they're treated by society, the terrors, the horrors they so often endure, simply for living their lives they way they chose, differently to others...I was looking up all sorts of information, still have it here in my 'favourites' as I was going to write a long piece on it....Very moving and inspirational song.

But 'Famous Flowers', no...the first time I heard it, and that was Martin Carthy's version, with the same tune, I just wanted to escape, had a terrible feeling of claustrophobia, felt like I was being smothered. ("If only!" they all cried in unison) :0)


Thanks, Jim, I'd like to think you're not an airhead either.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,S O'P (Perplexed)
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 03:20 AM

Thanks, Lizzy - nice to see The Boy Bridge in the flesh after all these years of imagining him as sharp-suited legal-eagle with hair by Versace BUT what I'd like to know is how a cover-version of a Martin Carthy setting off a Martin Carthy LP remains a Folk Song according to his definition of things? Or is this the Oral Tradition at work? Could be at that...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 03:00 AM

I think Richard sings it most ably. I also think that one of the most beautiful of ballad tunes. Tastes naturally vary; but I do think, Lizzie, that you underrate a very fine ballad.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 02:58 AM

Forgot to add this for all (myself included).

PLEASE try to handle disagreements respectfully (no insults or language designed to cause pain or embarrassment) and only in the present moment. Do not bring up the past. Past grievance has no place in the present and only destroys both the accuser and accused.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 16 Feb 10 - 02:51 AM

Thank you for posting that Lizzie... I enjoy hearing Richard perform that piece, every time he does it at mutually attended sessions. Which is not often enough. and NOW... I can attend to what he is saying without all the external noise.

Thank you again!

By the way, Lizzie, what is your interpretation the story of Fairest Flower of Serving Men? Quick now, with no cheating by looking at other resources.

I charge you to try and find what is good about the song.
Here's a tip. Listen to the words. You claim that you think in pictures. Well the imagery in the ballad is stunning. Glean the story for those pictures.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:24 PM

Nope, I don't do all that history and arrangements stuff, Diane. I love the songs for very different reasons to you,

And the reasons you love the songs ARE????:

I know - you love the artists, you love the boysies, and you love being able to post your enthusiams about bands the rest of us discovered by going to festivals and clubs. Spending our own money. On listening to bands live.

It's how the bands you like make a living Lizzie. Which festivals you going to this year?

Which folk clubs you going to?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:23 PM

"simply means I love different things to you, that's all."
You are very fond of using the term 'folk police' yet you spend a great deal of time berating people who don't like the things you like and pontificating on why they don't like them - isn't there a message for you in there somewhere Lizzie.
I would like to believe that you aren't a somewhat eccentric, attention-seeking airhead, so please stop acting like one.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:16 PM

simply means I love different things to you, that's all.

Exactly, Lizzie. And surely if you can see that then you can see that not everyone loves whoever it is that you love at the moment and not everyone will agree with your postings. What is the problem? When someone says 'It's not really my cup of tea' how come you equate it to 'you are soulless and have no passion'? You can be very insulting at times.

Sorry Joe, I know I said I would not engage but I cannot help it with that one!

Cheers

DeG

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 04:30 PM

Oh, LOOK! :0)

Richard, cogitating with the Famous Flower..

Very nice, but it's the same, all the way through...it doesn't alter, ALL the way through. It's just the song, not the way you sing it, it's that bloomin' song...and the tune.

Not for me..

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 04:11 PM

Oh, The chip shop one went in the thread about fish and chips, remember? :0)

Nope, I don't do all that history and arrangements stuff, Diane. I love the songs for very different reasons to you, and don't have any concerns about taking an NVQ in folk song. I love the characters, the passion, all the things that happen, but who collected it, when, where and what they did with it? Nope, that's really not that important to me.

It doesn't make me thick (steady, lads!)...simply means I love different things to you, that's all. however, I appreciate that you love all that research stuff...that's fine, but just don't expect everyone else to do it too, for there's no rule which states that I have to learn the entire history of the song, apart from in your mind.

If it's 19 minutes of excellent music and song, beautifully played and sung, then that's fine by me, it'll have me transfixed, but..if it's 19 minutes of dirge then nope, I'd rather be washing me hair.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 01:41 PM

When Chris Wood did Lord Bateman and One In A Million back to back live on Late Junction it lasted almost 19 minutes. Using her methodology of reasoning, it is to be supposed that MLC "loathes" this rendition even more than FFoSM. But does she know the stories behind these songs, their histories or how to compare various arrangements? Of course not.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Seamus
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 12:18 PM

There are no stranglers here, only friends...etc.
There certainly are stranglers.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Folkiedave
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 12:16 PM

The most knowledgeable people I have met on the folk scene are always keen to share their knowledge and welcome new people, in my experience. And I am eternally grateful to them.

I'll echo that.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Campin
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 11:42 AM

"American Pie" is 8:36 minutes. Now that's long.

Looking round at a few random YouTubes:

The Wife of Usher's Well - 5:11
Willie o Winsbury - 5:19
The False Knight on the Road - 2:34
Edward, Edward - 3:36
Dives and Lazarus - 4:01
Lord Randal - 5:22
The Golden Vanity - 5:06
Geordie - 3:48
Mary Hamilton - 2:59
Two Sisters - 4:01
My Son David - 4:01

Dear Mr President (Pink) - 4:59
Cry Me Out (Pixie Lott) - 4:12
Wanderlust (Björk) - 7:39
Like a Virgin (Madonna) - 7:31
Vincent (Josh Groban) - 5:46
Fuck Forever (Babyshambles) - 4:46
Everywhere I Go (Oysterband) - 7:07
Hard On Me (Richard Thompson) - 7:02

Looking at revival/folk-rock performances of "She Moved Through the Fair" gives some extraordinary figures. How on earth did Pentangle manage to spin it out to 12:26? (I have no intention of listening to it - 5:30 of Richard Thompson maundering on with pointless guitar decorations and an Oirish accent was bad enough).

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: michaelr
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 11:10 AM

Re my earlier post: Thanks for demonstrating what I mean.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,SplCr
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 10:45 AM

Just a touch of arrogant ear mange...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 10:25 AM

Gasp! Shock! Horror!

Not A Mageneto Arranger by any chance?

:D

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 10:06 AM

Guest four posts above was me. I'll let you into a secret, Dave. I cheated... ;-(

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:58 AM

Personally, I don't care how people are marketed. If they achieve commercial success and get more people into folk and traditional music, good luck to them. I have no problem whatsoever with Seth Lakeman, for example. And as a far more relevant example of commercial success, I tried booking Mumford and Son before they went orbital, but they were obviously already destined for greater things. I still think they're great now they're getting mainstream BBC radio play. Hurrah for them.

This idea that there is a group of people who are trying to keep other people from discovering folk and traditional music is something I have never experienced or encountered. The most knowledgeable people I have met on the folk scene are always keen to share their knowledge and welcome new people, in my experience. And I am eternally grateful to them.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:55 AM

Those are the titles of four films I'd be interested in seeing.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:54 AM

I can see where they all fit! You need to get in league with Stanley Accrington (Can't act yell nor sing) and start a thread analysis based on anagrams. How many more hidden messages are there? The truth is out there...

:D

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:47 AM

Fits paranoid desire...

Insipid oaf arrested...

A pornstar is deified...

Disparities of a nerd...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:38 AM

"Judas!"


Yeah, I know... :0)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:36 AM

"But the way Seth L was marketed was bound to rile a lot of people in the folk field, because that field (or at least many corners of it) tends to define itself by its opposition to commercial success."


Why? WHY aren't artists 'allowed' to be commercially successful in the Traddie world?

It's nuts.

It's bitter nuts too.

I know all about the 'the music is a living thing, passed down to us to keep alive and it should never be bought, sold or commercialised' stuff, but I've never agreed with it.

The music stopped belonging to the dear ol' peasants who invented it when the Professors of Music Academia and Pedantry took it over, bound it up with *their rules and regulations* and started looking down their noses at the very people who invented the songs in the first place!

Yeesh! If Mathis Longbottom had been 'discovered' by the Victorian equivalent of Simon Call, I've no doubt his village would have been ECSTATIC for him, and that Mathias would probably have brought some of his money back to his village to help others out...

But no..the high fallutin'..er...rich and wealthy upper class whatsits got hold of the music and suddenly, this myth that the music was 'holy' was built up...

Good luck to Seth and all who sail in him...and to anyone else who takes the music out there and brings more people to it...

And quite frankly, Jim Causley is another lad with the X factor, who'll bring in loads of new people to traditional music, for he has a great charm, a lovely voice and a whacking sense of humour too, and the latter is sorely needed in the English traddie world. Crow Sister has a terrific sense of humour, btw..

Stop trying to stop the music from getting out..Let people make money from the songs and be happy for them, there is nothing wrong with it.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:33 AM

I doff my cap to you Mr Cringe. You have indeed found the truth!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Spleen cringe
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:22 AM

"Past is dead inferior"

Discuss...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 09:10 AM

I just figured out that the anagram of 'In praise of Traddies' is 'Parasite fried in sod'.

Wonder what it all means...

:D

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MikeL2
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:56 AM

Hi Tam

<" Last time I saw her... CS was neither old nor grumpy and defo not a git.">

I was in no way implying any personal disrespect for Crow Sister. She always makes sense to me.

Maybe I just didn't make it clear that what I was pointing out was that this was just another thread that would encourage cliques and the endless broadsides that occur here far too often.

I apolgise to Crow Sister and to you and anyone else if they feel that my cooment was personal.

Regards

MikeL2

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:51 AM

"That pounding, driving beat, the intensity of his fiddle playing..."

Like D H Lawrence had never lived.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:50 AM

With absolutely no wish to get involved in mudslinging can I just point out that the title and purpose of the thread is 'In Praise of Traddies!'

Can we keep it in the spirit it was intended and, if anyone wants to damn traddies instead, would it not be better to start a seperate thread? That way, those who want to hear how good traddies are can stay here and those who want to heap scorn upon them can go to the new one.

Makes sense to me anyroads.

DeG

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:48 AM

Lizzie, I am far from a hard-core Traddie. And I have no objections, on any kind of principle, to anybody making a living out of folk. But the way Seth L was marketed was bound to rile a lot of people in the folk field, because that field (or at least many corners of it) tends to define itself by its opposition to commercial success. I'm not always convinced by those viewpoints but nobody can deny they exist.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:43 AM

The zider's gorn sour,
The cows be looming in
Combine harvester's buggered
The wheat be growing thin
A cheese-making error
But I has no fear
Chewton Mendip be drowning
And I... I've run out of cheddar


---------------------------------------------

Bravo! Applause!!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:39 AM

Yes, they are unnkind, Smedley....and they also sadden me, because it highlights the unsweetness of the Traddie way of thinking, and that is that if you dare to make money from folk music, you are seen as some kind of pariah and a campaign will be launched against you. It *did* happen to SoH, and it *did* happen to Seth too.

To see that now, the Traddies are behind SoH makes me feel a little weird, because I don't feel they're there for the right reasons. I feel they're there because Phil is doing some great work recording young tradiitional artists...and others are there purely for the fact they can keep talking about how Show of Hands have come out against me, and they LOVE them for *that* reason....alone. And that's wrong, in my book, but it doesn't surprise me one iota.

Seth Lakeman is bringing in more young people to folk music, traditional music, than any other act on the folk circuit. I know, I watched him from when he barely sold out a 100 seat theatre, to huge tour buses outside Exeter Uni's Great Hall, where the queue went right around the entire building...and the queue for last minute cancellations was almost as long.

I don't like Famous Flowers of Serving Men, and that's fine by me, but I also know that others love it. So it is with Seth and Show of Hands. Each to their own...

To say that Seth is only liked for his looks is more than a little prejudice, to be honest...It's simply the way he was born, he looks very like his father, so are you saying that Geoff Lakeman too has only got by 'because of his looks' ?   That's daft.

Seth's music appeals to as many men as it does women. That pounding, driving beat, the intensity of his fiddle playing, the songs he sings...They may be frowned upon by the Traddie World, but there really is nothing wrong in making a living from folk music..and a good living at that..

Surely you should all be behind him? Pleased for him? GLAD that your music is being opened up and that some may look deeper into traditional music, find it via folk festivals?

I don't understand why you would feel anything else....

Next folks will be screaming "Judas!" I guess..

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:37 AM

Perhaps The Wurzels sing The Clash

When's the album coming out? Put me down for one!

The zider's gorn sour,
The cows be looming in
Combine harvester's buggered
The wheat be growing thin
A cheese-making error
But I has no fear
Chewton Mendip be drowning
And I... I've run out of cheddar

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:30 AM

Combine!
I wanna combine!
Combine!
A harvester of my own.......

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:28 AM

"English yokel Springsteen wannabes"

Perhaps The Wurzels sing The Clash?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:15 AM

Referring to Lizzie's question(s), could it be that SoH and Seth Lakeman are just a bit, erm, sorry about this....naff ?

The former might, from the most uncharitable stance imaginable, be thought of as some sort of English yokel Springsteen wannabes; and the latter let his marketing people emphasise his bone structure (and he *is* cute, in a certain stable-lad kind of way) and put him on GMTV.

Those are unkind thoughts, but there you go.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: the Folk Police
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:14 AM

...back to the original thread, I'd like to add my halfpennorth of praise to the traddies at the Beech singaround in Chorlton, Manchester. I've met some lovely, generous & funny people and heard some wonderful singing and lots of songs I never expected to hear in a pub less than half a mile from my home. In fact, thanks to their ceaseless encouragement (despite my own well-founded doubts about being able to carry a tune) I've polished off a song or two for this Wednesday... be very afraid.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 08:04 AM

There's a Bateman set in Devon, as in:

He sailed East, and he sailed West,
Until he came to proud Torquay

Go learn it.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:59 AM

Oh, I know what Provenance is, it's a French town. ;0)


Um...something I've never understood...

WHY when I wrote about John Tams, and I used to write reams, was that OK, but if I wrote about SoH, all you Traddies went bonkers?

WHY when I wrote about Mawkin's CD was that OK too?

WHY when I wrote about the two Jim's, Moray and Causley, was that also not picked on?

WHY when I wrote about The Demon Barbers, Spiers and Boden, Barry Lister, Salsa Celtica and all the other myriad of names, were they not ridiculed in the way you chose to ridicule Show of Hands, or Seth Lakeman, both of whom were artists that Ian Anderson admitted had 'got in under the radar'..the 'radar' being that which the Traddie World had placed around 'its' music..?   


Just wonderin'............

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:49 AM

"Not that I'm pointing fingers at anyone! :)"

'Tis Richard's fault... :0)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:37 AM

I'll leave you all

Excellent.

In the course of your hopefully prolonged rest from squeeing, do go and investigate Flower Of Serving Men which, as I said, comes in at well under 4 minutes with an entirely different tune, and all the myriad takes on Lord Bateman from many different cultures (since you can't even work out what "provenance" means).

Have you got Tourettes, among your many other "gifts"?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:32 AM

For fox sake Lizzie grow up.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: melodeonboy
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:31 AM

Well, who'd 'a' thought it? Even this thread has been turned into a SoH thread! Not that I'm pointing fingers at anyone! :)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:24 AM

So er...where IS this fangirl 'drivel' then? I mean am I cooing and squeeing all over the place about them, as men? Nope...I wrote on here, recently, for the first time in ages, about Arrogance, Ignorance and Greed, from a social point of view...and that is er...squeeing?

Oh, purleeeeeze!


You know, you're still fuming from when you sent me some real nasty PMs, asking if I had Tourette's, then followed it up with another PM asking me to have a cuppa tea with you. ????? When I told you where to stick your teapot, in polite terms, you got sooooo mad.

Methinks you is a little confused...


Many of Steve Knightley's songs touched many social isssues which were dear to me, so...I wrote about those songs. No problem about that. The Traddies hated that, because they, AT THE TIME, didn't want any mention of Show of Hands, doing them down at every turn, yourself included...and so a witch hunt was launched....weirdest thing, purely for liking a music you all hated..

However, you've now all seen the light, for the right, or the wrong reasons, and I'm glad that you're also realising how many people, and how much money their fans bring into festivals.

Excellent.


I'll leave you all to carry on your squeeing in peace now...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Ruth sans cookie
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 07:06 AM

I'm all about the manga - in between the milikn', pet.

---

Ooooh nooooo! Guest above was me!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Emma B
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:55 AM

Awww sorry to diliisusion you smedly but squee is already out there in the big bad world of web slang defined as

'A noise primarily made by an over-excited fangirl'
'The cry of the rabid fangirl (Usually a rabid anime fangirl'

It really is wonderfully onomatopoeiaic isn't it?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:55 AM

And who knew Ruth was so hip???

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:54 AM

Ah well, you can't expect an old git like me to know about the speak on the street innit..........

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:51 AM

Sorry. Smedley - It IS a word!
In the Urban dictionary anyway.

D.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:48 AM

Squeeeeesh . . .

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:46 AM

I know 'squeeing' was a typo, but I would like to claim it as an excellent new word & a prime example of onomatoepeia (spelling??!!) in action.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:36 AM

"If they've had to bow and kowtow to you lot because it's the only way they'll be accepted, fair enough."

Yes...because before they ever "bowed and kowtowed" to me by e-mailing me to apologise for your behaviour, or by publicly begging you to stop embarrassing them, they were having such a lot of difficulty being accepted, weren't they? Your argument doesn't hold water, Lizzie. Show of Hands were doing absolutely fine for bookings and album sales for years - long before you ever discovered them, in fact. Surely even you would agree to that. You want to believe they denounced you for careerist reasons - in fact, they denounced you because you were a pain in the arse. Your obsessiveness and insistence on shoving their music down other people's throats was embarrassing. You put more people off than you ever turned on, through your argumentative and spiteful binge-posting.


"What you're doing is making them out to be utterly disloyal to their fans"

No, Lizzie. This isn't about anyone else. It's just about you, and your obsessive behaviour.

"A lot of the reason why They Who Must Not Be Mentioned came in for such stick is not because of what I used to say about them, because I only ever praised and supported them, but it was because of the way the Traddies wanted all talk of them stopped, period, removed, deleted....mainly because they loathed their music and the way in which they were opening up the folk world to the kind of people who the Traddies also loathed..."

No, Lizzie. this is not about Show of Hands, and never really was. It is about you, and your strident and confrontational behaviour. If people want to listen to Show of Hands, good for them. If they want to listen to Martin Carthy singing Famous Flower, good for them. If people want to listen to both, hurrah. Just don't tell me what *I* ought to listen to, because it's my choice. The only person consistently and insistently setting up these things in opposition to each other, and creating conflict where none previously existed, is you.

The reason I do not write acres of squeeing fangirl drivel about Show of Hands, or any other band, is because they neither want nor need it, from me or anyone else. As I said before, I do something that is probably rather more useful to them: I book them.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:33 AM

Anyone think 'Another one bites the dust' will become traditional?

:D (eG)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:33 AM

No, I didn't say Martin was singing, did I? I said I preferred it when he did songs like that. He's PART of it, and that song is done brilliantly.

The Famous Flowers, in contrast, is utterly dreary to the point of wrist slitting...Noooooooo!    However, I'm sure you may love it, and that's fine..just not my cup of music, that's all.

Supranational Provenance?   Now there's fine Peasant Speak for you...


"Do We Think We're Better Than Them?"


Oh yes, indeedy..


Unless you're John Tams, who thinks he's better than no-one and makes songs interesting, enjoyable and believes in the 'no rules' outlook...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:24 AM

Let's get this straight: MLC cites a Chris Wood vocal as Martin Carthy doing something with a WOW factor (i.e. she apparently approves of it). This wouldn't be an indication that she is at last beginning to grasp what actually occurs among musicians? That MC inspired CW (as borne out in the album Wood Wilson Carthy and that he in turn mentored the young Jim Moray (Sweet England and the common factor is Lord Bateman? No, of course not. This ballad is far too long and of such varied supranational provenance, influence and impact to have impinged on her consciousness.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 06:19 AM

Erm...shouldn't your post be in the 'Do We Think We're Better than Them' thread? It's an absolute classic illustration..

..and just so's you know, I wasn't the one who brought They Who Must Not Be Mentioned into this thread, Richard did, so go smack his bottom.

You're doing them far more damage than I ever did, not that I ever did them damage, just got people talking about their music, buying their music...and it mattered not if people were arguing, because it was those very arguments that got people going off in search of their music.

What you're doing is making them out to be utterly disloyal to their fans, right pains in the arses and men who'll do anything to get themselves into the Traddie world.

Of course, I know they're not like that at all. However, you're continuing waspish whingeing is probably causing them far more embarrassment than I ever did.

And...it was because of that very reason, the one you quoted above about how artists find it hard to enter into arguments, that I chose to stand up for them in the first place, against...er...waspish whingeing posts against them, such as the ones you used to put on the BBC.

A lot of the reason why They Who Must Not Be Mentioned came in for such stick is not because of what I used to say about them, because I only ever praised and supported them, but it was because of the way the Traddies wanted all talk of them stopped, period, removed, deleted....mainly because they loathed their music and the way in which they were opening up the folk world to the kind of people who the Traddies also loathed....

So don't come your high fallutin' self-importance with me. Thank you.

If they've had to bow and kowtow to you lot because it's the only way they'll be accepted, fair enough. It's their music, they can take it wherever they choose to...but I find it strange Joan that the ONLY reasons you will mention about Show of Hands is to use them against me.

I'd have far more respect for you if you wrote about their music, or about how they did open up the world of English folk music. I look forward to thaat day coming, soon.


Hey, you can listen to 32 verses of any song you want. I've always said that everyone's different. Personally, I loathe that particular song I mentioned above, for the reasons I mentioned above. I did NOT say that you don't have to listen to them.

Please, leave your manic obsession with me behind..and don't dare to say that I was giving SoH crazed attentions, when I rarely saw them live in the first place, haven't even bought their latest CD, never oooh and ahhhhhh about them, just their music....and am one helluva lot less obsessed over them than YOU are over me.

And now, back to the Sweetness of The Traddies...


:0)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Ruth Archer
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 05:37 AM

"Oh..and Richard, it took They Who Must Not Be Mentioned SIX years to say anything, despite one of them watching the BBC board for years..."

Maybe that's because most professional musicians would prefer not to be drawn into public confrontations with their "fans", as it's unseemly and embarrassing. Maybe because they hoped that sending you subtle messages, such as "Please don't start banging on about our new album because we want people to have the chance to make up their own minds" might be enough to get you to pull your head in. Because they thought that if they ignored you for long enough, you might eventually go away without them having to engage with you. But you finally pushed them so far that they had to make a public statement distancing themselves from you. I should imagine there are precious few stalky fans, especially in folk, who have achieved such a peculiar distinction. You keep telling us how Special you are - so well done. You proved it. Though it's a kind of "special" that would mortify most sane people.

Intriguing that Steve and Phil have "gone over to the traddie side" simply by distancing themselves from your crazed attentions. How are you defining "traddie" in this particular context, I wonder? Just stuff and people that you don't like?

Back OT: apparently some songs are just too long and soul-destroying to be sung, or more to the point, to be listened to. Why? If you don't have the attention span to listen to long ballads, Lizzie, don't. Leave it to people who do. Just because some people like Thomas Hardy, but some people don't have the attention span and prefer comic books, does that mean no one should ever publish or read Thomas Hardy again, just in case the people who like comic books feel badly? No one is telling you to listen to or enjoy traditional music and big ballads, Lizzie. Why should you have the right tell anyone else not to?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 05:21 AM

Yes, I realised that, thank you. :0)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 05:20 AM

Cold Haily Rainy Night - Imagined Village
That's Chris Wood on lead vocals.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 05:01 AM

*Poster is ashamed to confess she enjoyed this and slinks off in disgrace... <<<


But...why?


What takes you six minutes, Richard...the 19 verses....or...the Cogitating?   ;0) (Sorry, couldn't resist that one)

No, that bloomin' song, rattles on and on and on..and it has the most monotonous tune! Heck, I'm going a little wobbly just thinking about it.

I far prefer Martin doing
This..... Now *that* has the WOW! Factor.

:0)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 04:36 AM

Oh dear, I'm having so much fun that I'm getting my links in a twist!

Seven Drunken Nights

Anyone feeling the love yet?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 04:33 AM

C'mere there's more:

Seven Nights Drunk and a bad headache...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 04:30 AM

Yes I do, Smedley - but the trouble with such would-be boundary enforcers is that they confuse categories with boundaries ~ on the lines of, e.g., I like folk music, therefore everything I like counts as 'folk'. I, personally, don't begrudge anyone any boundary-crossing they may like to exercise ~ therefore you are NOT crazy. But I do think that confusion of categories or genres can lead to all sorts of misunderstandings ~ which is why we all get so fed up with that bloody horse!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 04:01 AM

Why not indeed, M, but you know how boundary-line-enforcing people can get.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 03:57 AM

Why should it be crazy? I like Michael Pretorius & Cole Porter also. & Bach & The·Beggar's·0pera. And Ris·de·Veaux·à·la·Financière and steak&kidney pud. Why not?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 03:55 AM

Hmm, I can see a way to heal the divisions on this forum...

Get your dancing shoes on!*










*Poster is ashamed to confess she enjoyed this and slinks off in disgrace...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Smedley
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 03:41 AM

I like 'Saturday Night' AND I like long trad ballads. They both do very different things very well.

Eclectic, or just crazy??

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 03:36 AM

Here ya go Lizzie, you'll just love this! Much better than those boring olden days songs that whine on forever and ever..
Will this joy never end!!!!

Otherwise folks, Ms. LC is a class master (or should that be mistress?) at winding you lot up...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: glueman
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 03:24 AM

Traditional music has always been much too important to leave to traddies.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 03:20 AM

Jumping to conclusions again, Lizzie - it takes me 6 minutes (FFoSM). Maui takes a little longer. There's no shortage of humour in any of my sessions and once again you are talking codswallop, very like a child who has never learned not to jump in with attention-seeking gambits.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 03:09 AM

Whatever reason inspired CS to launch this thread, lighthearted or serious, it is interesting to note that it was a notorious non-traddie who felt it necessary to introduce a note of begrudgery into the proceedings - look to thyself Lizzie when it comes to 'giggle-muscles' - as somebody once said.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 03:05 AM

Sigh! I absolutely hate that media has trained us up to be impatient with long ballads. Once upon a time these were the chief form of entertainment against the dark cold night.

I have nothing but respect for those who attempt to learn and render them in tact. I do my best to follow the story as long as I can hear what is being said. Sadly rooms tend to get noisier as a long piece progresses, making that impossible. I should add this comment to the Bad Boys - Long Ballads thread.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 15 Feb 10 - 02:55 AM

Michaelr, please see my "grumpy old gits" refresh post...

For my own part I take people as I find them - and I've found them colourful, quirky, informative, stubborn, grumpy and bemusing in equal measure. As well as thoroughly helpful, generous and supportive.
And I continue to find them so.

As for the 'mutual appreciation society' well, I was still but a wee traddy babby back last Spring. And I have still as yet to become old or grumpy enough to be of much use to fellow newbies to folk songs and singing. Though hopefully one day I will be..

Is it a full moon? Must be, dunno what possessed me to refresh this thread, think the lunar vibes bring out the mischief in me..

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Art Thieme
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 11:15 PM

It wasn't worth looking back into this one...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 10:32 PM

There's a fire at the end of some variants of (F)FOSM when the king gets rid of the wicked stepmother who organised the original slaughter of fair Eleanor's knight and knightlets. This is to impress her into doing what the king wants cos it would seem impolite not to. I prefer it when she rejects house, lands, frocks and such, much like Willie Of Winsbury did. It then becomes a tale of the triumph of nobility of spirit over evil and materialism.

I do like a good fire though. The one at the end of Fair Annie when the two sisters dispose of the rat who tried to fool them both is a jolly good blaze. I wonder if it's crossed anyone's mind to stage a re-enactment at Abbotsbury?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: michaelr
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 08:54 PM

Traddies can get a terribly bad (and thoroughly undeserved) press on this forum

Undeserved? I think not. They have none but themselves to blame for the way they (some of them) go on hereabouts.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 06:51 PM

Oh, pifle, Richard.

I think Traddies should be tickled, three times a day, during meals.

It would revive their Giggle Muscles.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 06:50 PM

"I have it down to I think 19 verses with a fair bit of pruning.."

NINETEEN?????

Richard, people may have died of old age by the time you get to 17!

(methinks he's not going to be laughing at that one..)


Yes, I do write a load of old codswallop at times, but I think it's a backlash against the stultifying seriousness that surrounds so much English folk music. (Yes, I know I just lost 65 Brownie points for even referring to it as 'folk' music.)

I mean is it forbidden to be able to laugh in it's presence? Do you have to worship at the Holy Altar of Folk Music?

Gawd, I recall being in The Sealed Knot about a hundred years ago, and a chap started singing a song...30 minutes later, he was STILL singing it and most of the room had emptied, but he hadn't even noticed! It was one of those moments when you just knew you should have packed a shepherd's crook in your 17th century handbag.

Oh..and Richard, it took They Who Must Not Be Mentioned SIX years to say anything, despite one of them watching the BBC board for years...Shame they went over to The Traddie Side,(visions of a Star Wars Traditional Movie are now in my head) but heyho..

Come on, Richard, lighten up a little, eh? :0)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 06:39 PM

Lizzie, buy a dictionary, and come to understand that learning requires organised work, and that ears are the better organ for understanding than mouths, and then have another go at rejoining civilised society in due course.

Until then your utterances are merely noise - devoid of semantic content.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 06:34 PM

Ooh, Richard, I don't think 'cogitating' agrees with you. ;0)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Mo the caller
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 06:32 PM

I'll echo the sentiments of the title. And add the people in dance clubs. Going to a folk club and a dance club when staying in Beverley to look after Mother in Law, we were made to feel at home. People spoke to us when out shopping. Made a difficult time bearable.
So thanks for the human friendship as well as the help developing musically and as a dancers and caller. It's a great community.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 06:31 PM

Yes, but the story gets lost, in the utter monotony of the song.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 06:31 PM

Oh Diane, I fear to disagree - but you compare

"T'was all alone I dug his grave
and all alone in it him laid
While Christ was priest and I was clerk I
laid my love in the cold grey (or clay) earth"

(which I think is the strongest verse at the front end)

with

"The fire took first all on her cheek
And then it took all in her hair
It spat and it rang in her yellow hair
And soon there was no life left there".

I have it down to I think 19 verses with a fair bit of pruning and without blowing my own horn, with my trace version of the Carthy riff it is I think my strongest and nastiest bit of work.

I must disagree with you: the fire is at the end!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Mellish
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 06:15 PM

CS said
> Of course you're also a bunch of impossibly grumpy old gits

Oh thank you for those kind words! It takes years to become a grumpy old git, and I for one still don't feel that I've reached the top-class expert level. So it's good to know that we're appreciated by one of the young whippersnappers.

Richard

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,999
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 05:16 PM

"So, this thread is a big fat THANKYOU to all the warm, welcoming, helpful and generous traddy folky people out there: virtual and in 3D, academic and dilettante, amateur and pro', performer and enthusiast, from this forum and others I've visited, both in sessions and on virtual resources such as YouTube, for the CD's pressed upon me, the thoughtful constructive criticism offered, the creative input and inspiration, the time taken, the good humour, the sheer charming quirkiness, the fuzzy beards and free food... "

Ditto.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 05:15 PM

Is it a fucking full moon or something?

I hope so! How do I get in on the action...

:D

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 05:07 PM

isn't this just a mutual admiration society ??

Last time I saw her... CS was neither old nor grumpy and defo not a git.

God the insults are flying unchecked in too many threads... Is it a fucking full moon or something?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Borchester Echo
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 04:27 PM

It must be something of an "achievement" to mistake the epic storyline of fair Eleanor adopting a strategy of crossdressing to flee her spectacularly dysfunctional family, get a job as sweet William at court then tell the king to get stuffed when he finds out and wants to dress her up as a queen, as "bloody awful". Though so as not to confuse this "irrelevance with a big mouth" even further, it should be said that the stupendous and horrifying bit comes at the beginning, not the end. There's an English version of this ballad (entitled simply Flower Of Serving Men but 12 quatrains long which comes in at under 4 minutes. I recommend it for those whose absence of concentration makes listening for 10 too hard.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 03:17 PM

Fair enough.

Lizzie, the reason people turn on you is nothing to do with your importance, although your recently manifested self importance might be a better cause. It is because you spout some of the most unmitigated rubbish and gibberish I have ever read on things you appear to know and worse want to know nothing about.

I have in the past suggested that you should be given a fair crack of the whip - but sooner or later you decide that whatever it is that pulls your chain is more important than a knowledge of the music you like or hate this week (or the people who perform it) and off you go again. Even they who you at a given time idolatrise have been moved to express the fact that the drivel you pour out is embarrassing.

Get it into your head. You are not important enough to have people "support" you. You are an irrelevance with a big mouth and a stupendous collection of ignorance and irrationality. There is no conspiracy against you (except perhaps by a few BNP morons and troglodytes).

And if you want to pick examples of dull songs and singers, you really have got the wrong ones with Martin Carthy and Famous Flower of Serving Men. It is a showstopping riff, and a tale with a stupendous and horrifying climax, consummately told by a man who was awarded an MBE for services to folk (and I suspect that the framer of the citation knew exactly what was meant by that) music.


Tell your "supporters" what you have ever achieved, will you? Is it not limited to being banned from a wider range of forums?

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MikeL2
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 02:02 PM

Hi crow sister

I know that you mean well but isn't this just a mutual admiration society ??

I am neither one side nor t'other.

regards

MikeL2

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 01:37 PM

Oh poo, Richard...don't be so silly. Are you 'cogitating' right now? Can't you be arrested for doing that on a public forum?   ;0)

Oh yes, Michael, please don't worry...you come outside the 'who for the most part' bit...because I do recognise that there are some bloody decent people 'out there'...but there are some right pains in the whatsit too, and they've been a pain in my whatsit to the point where I can't really listen to traddie music any more without hearing their whingeing, whining voices, going on and on and on...

Barry Lister (a traddie) had me in absolute fits of giggles when I met him at Sidmouth a few times..and he's the most lovely voice, sings the songs with a real 'actor's feel', which you have to have to bring them alive.

But let's be honest, there are some bloody awful songs out there...what's that one that Martin Carthy sings? 'The Famous Flowering Thingyummyjigs' one, you know the title, it's left my brain cell for the moment, but it goes on for about 3 hours....Oh cripes!!!
Noooooooo!   Sorry, digressed into the music, rather than the people...

Yes, there are some lovely folks out there, but my goodness, WHAT did the world of tradition do to get the other ones??? It must have been awfulll bad!

Have you finished yet, Richard? Can I open my eyes now? :0)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 01:28 PM

I don't know whether to bother to reply to that post of 01:17 Mudcat time or not. or not. I shall cogitate for a while. It certainly seems that the poster assumes that she has a certain importance.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 01:21 PM

I'm a traddy, Lizzie ~ & I don't always agree with what you say. But I do try to be civil, really I do...

Best of traditional greetings ~ Michael ~

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Lizzie Cornish 1
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 01:17 PM

"When we leave my usually mysanthropic Father is most impressed with chappy at the table, saying to me how jolly pleasant and affable he was!
I say to my Father: "But they're ALL like that! There's no such thing as being a 'stranger' or an 'outsider' with these people..."


You'll excuse me if...................



I have been shown more kindness, more support, more welcome, more love by acoustic singer songwriters, than I *ever* have by Traddies, who, for the most part, on this forum at least, have shown me nowt but spitefulness, narrow mindedness, bigoty, vitriol and pure hatred.

There *are* however, some bloody decent people within the folk world, but some of them are terribly wary of upsetting the applecart, and so they keep quiet in their support of me, despite agreeing with me off the record. I have always kept those people's names private and always will, for I do not wish to hurt their careers, because their livelihoods often depend on the spiteful ones....It has always made me feel sad that the folk world is run in this fashion, but heyho, there ya go.


And now, back to the gushing of the Masonic Folk Club.....

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 01:08 PM

"Of course you're also a bunch of impossibly grumpy old gits"
How dare you madam!
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 14 Feb 10 - 11:49 AM

***REFRESH***

Of course you're also a bunch of impossibly grumpy old gits who never agree on anything and squabble like girls in the playground, but you do make me smile! :-)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 22 May 09 - 04:57 AM

or "strangers", even.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Bryn Pugh
Date: 22 May 09 - 04:57 AM

Thank you, dear Friend and Sister.

It was said to me 50 - odd years ago, when I first went to Folk Clubs "There are no starngers, only friends you haven't met".

The same is true of the 'Cat (pretty much . . . ).

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Art Thieme
Date: 21 May 09 - 10:03 PM

I was just today listening to a cassette of a 1963 radio show that Roy Harris---himself a trad singer extraordinaire---sent to me of a radio show with Lou Killen and Bob Davenport and Isla Cameron and Ewan MacColl plus several others. Also, a set of Roy leading the multitudes in song at Sidmouth in the 1970s. The singing was incandescent!!

Roy Harris ("Burl" here at Mudcat) and his wife Elaine are old friends I never do get to thank often enough. I think I'll e-mail him too.

Yes, a very nice idea for a thread, this is. The trad side is where I've been for the last 68 years ---- and most everyone there---alive and deceased--were just the best folks around. What a pleasure it has been to be part of it.

Love, to all,

Art Thieme

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Charley Noble
Date: 21 May 09 - 08:47 PM

"All the good traddies are dead and I'm not feeling so well myself."

I'm sure someone has said that already but, if not, I have.

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 21 May 09 - 03:23 PM

Yes, I was introduced to traditional music around 42 years ago and it has formed the basis of many firm friendships over the years.

I think that what a lot of people don't understand is that 'traddies' (if that's what we are) are not afraid of criticism or critical thinking. Unfortunately, to many 'non-traddies' (if that's what they are), the word 'criticism' is synonymous with 'slagging-off' - nothing could be further from the truth! It's about thinking about what you do and how you do it and trying to improve. It's also about helping others to improve in a mutually supportive and constructive atmosphere.

I have a treasured memory of the late, great Charles Parker (producer of the Radio Ballads) coming up to me after a floor spot in a folk club and suggesting ways in which I could improve my singing. He knew that I wouldn't take offence - and none was taken (I was flattered!). I took his comments on my singing on-board, worked on those points, and felt much more confident about my singing thereafter. I knew that what Charles was trying to do was not to discourage me, or put me off singing, but to help me to be the best singer that I could be.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 21 May 09 - 03:14 PM

I agree partly Don, I feel that all of my gushing post can no doubt be equally applied to 'traddy' and 'folky' alike, but it's the traditional folk enthusiasts specifically, who seem to be cast as covetous academics jealously guarding their private catacombs of dessicated (and meaningless) manuscripts. As you say they are also cast as virulent haters of all forms of music other than that which 'exclusively belongs to THEM.' All simply not so, and by a VERY wide mark. I don't learn exclusively E. Trads myself, though I do have a distinct attraction to them, and respect and affection to those who love them likewise.

As for 'Traddy' being a pejorative term however... Err, well I'd like to 'come out' on this forum as 'Traddy and Proud!' Such a relief to have it is the open too... >sighs<

Tam.. Whatareyoulike? x

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 May 09 - 02:56 PM

Richard Bridge is a perfect example of what I am talking about. He is as devoted a follower of traditional folk music as you will ever find, yet, spend some time with him, and you WILL hear some very feisty, and enthusiastic renditions of hardline 60s Rock.

I think that's true of a lot of us actually. I'm into all sorts and everything and yet remain proud to be a Traddie; it's what I do in folk clubs & what keeps me going - to hear & sing traditional songs sung by other traddies, each of whom will have other things going on in their lives other than Tradition Folk Song. Hey, besides - Peter Bellamy called himself a Traddy (as in Boring Bleating Old...) so that's good enough for me. And a whole lot better than being a mere Folkie...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 21 May 09 - 02:29 PM

""Bit of a daft thread it seems no doubt, though I hope not...""

Not from where I'm sitting, it's not. "Traddies", when you come right down to it, is an unpleasant term in and of itself. It categorises a group which is largely mythical, and does so in a denigratory way.

Lovers of traditional music have somehow been misplaced into a pigeonhole which truly belongs to exclusive cliques, and those are to be found, as a small minority, in every genre of music and every aspect of the folk arts.

True, there are a very small number of folk clubs which are exclusive in the sense that they choose to operate within fairly restrictive parameters. That is their RIGHT, and generally it is at least mentioned, if not exactly highlighted in their publicity.

I have never met a folkie, to the best of my knowledge, who espoused folk music absolutely exclusively, and would have NO truck with any other genre. I do not believe that any such exist.

Richard Bridge is a perfect example of what I am talking about. He is as devoted a follower of traditional folk music as you will ever find, yet, spend some time with him, and you WILL hear some very feisty, and enthusiastic renditions of hardline 60s Rock.

It's like any barrel of apples. There will always be the odd bad one, but the majority are fine.

Don T.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 21 May 09 - 02:22 PM

Can I offer some gushing thanks too? Including to you. Pleasure to see and hear you perform. More than pleasure. Magical. Surprising.

You got one of those voices. Like out of mists of history. And presentation? Let's just say I would never get bored listening to you.

When is the CD out? What about the concert tour? Have you put link to that Ragwort recording on the new thread Mudcatters Music?

Really people. She is that good and sounds like no one I have ever heard.

OK my gush is over.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Acorn4
Date: 21 May 09 - 02:11 PM

We both range over folk, country, pop, comedy and blues. When we're in the trad "box" we can get totally absorbed by the music and the people who are a great bunch.

We wouldn't try to inflict a country song on them though or anything we thought generally wouldn't be their cup of tea.

When in Rome!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Surreysinger
Date: 21 May 09 - 02:03 PM

Hey, if there's a Girl Guides traddies badge I want one!! As I think I've said to you either on here or elsewhere, Crow Sister, the overwhelming feeling I have about all of this is that we are all extended family - united by joint love of this music. Talking of pubs in Suffolk ... curiosity is rife ... let me know how it went?? And I'm looking forward to having the chance to meet up with you at Sidmouth (or elsewhere). Off to forage for food now

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 21 May 09 - 01:54 PM

Bit of a daft thread it seems no doubt, though I hope not...

I just got overcome with an inner "No, No, Nooooo!" at the unrelenting and blanket condemnation of some of the nicest and most embracing people one could ever wish to meet.
Traddies can get a terribly bad (and thoroughly undeserved) press on this forum from certain quarters. While my personal experience indicates to me that the complete opposite is true.

A liitle anecdote from a trad. folk evening spent with my Da, out in a Suffolk pub we'd never attended before.
We shared the table with another chap who had arrived before us because there wasn't much space. We strike up conversation easily and quickly and the evening passes pleasantly.
When we leave my usually mysanthropic Father is most impressed with chappy at the table, saying to me how jolly pleasant and affable he was!
I say to my Father: "But they're ALL like that! There's no such thing as being a 'stranger' or an 'outsider' with these people..."

I'd not thought about it before. But it's true. Of course they snack on the odd human baby and worry a bit too much about apostrophes', but grammatical fetishes and satanic child sacrifice apart, they are the best of people...
Plus I think I think I can almost sew my Girl Guides Traddy badge on now ;-)

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Diva
Date: 21 May 09 - 12:12 PM

Anne Neilson, Rae Fisher Mike Yates and on and on...

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Diva
Date: 21 May 09 - 12:10 PM

Most definately......from all the folk I have heard over the years be they floor singers or guests or academics I am here because I heard them and they had time to talk to a very young and gauche singer. In no particular order and I will forget a few:
Lizzie Higgans, Stewarts of Blair, Willie Scott, Nan Tait, Joe Rae, Heather Heywood, Cy laurie, Gordeanna McCulloch, The Clutha, JOhn Dillon, Peggy Rainey,Hamish Henderson, Jane Turrif, Stanley Robertson.........Maggie Macrae, Chris Myles, Aileen Carr.......Paddy Tunney, Sean McDonnagh

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: theleveller
Date: 21 May 09 - 07:27 AM

Absolutely. Without traddies there would simply be no folk music.

For me, it started with the help and encouragement of people like the Watersons, back in the 60s, and has been a joy ever since.

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Waddon Pete
Date: 21 May 09 - 07:22 AM

What a positive post, Crow Sister. Thank you for taking the time to tell us how you feel!

Best wishes,

Peter

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 21 May 09 - 07:17 AM

Yeah!

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 21 May 09 - 06:48 AM

Whether I was one or not, you are welcome, and your singing has been a constant joy to hear (and sometimes join in with whether welcome or not! (grin))

Subject: RE: In Praise of Traddies!
From: The Sandman
Date: 21 May 09 - 06:35 AM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4K4-2laAOkI&feature=channel_pagethere are many more traditional songs on this site, google youtube dickmilesmusic

Subject: In Praise of Traddies!
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 21 May 09 - 06:31 AM

Cheesy fuzzy alert. I keep hearing how horrible and selfish traddies are, how they keep the music locked up in some mouldy basement like evil misers... It's lucky that these people obviously lock themselves up in their own basements along with their secret hourdes of treasure, because I've not encountered them.

I can't just keep on listening to these assertions, without piping up!

So, this thread is a big fat THANKYOU to all the warm, welcoming, helpful and generous traddy folky people out there: virtual and in 3D, academic and dilettante, amateur and pro', performer and enthusiast, from this forum and others I've visited, both in sessions and on virtual resources such as YouTube, for the CD's pressed upon me, the thoughtful constructive criticism offered, the creative input and inspiration, the time taken, the good humour, the sheer charming quirkiness, the fuzzy beards and free food... The lifts, the offers of tents, the camaraderie, and not least the immesuarable personal value that discovering this music and it's people, has been to me during difficult times.

Many of you will know who you are, many others won't. Thankyou for helping me to discover and immerse myself this wonderful tradition of music and song.

Phew that was cathartic.
Gushing fit over. I'll get a calming cup of chamomile, and return to learning Sovay now... ;-)