Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad

Subject: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 05:39 AM

Musical Traditions website (www.mustrad.org) have just published a transcript of an old interview with the late Bert Lloyd. The interview was conducted by Mark Gregory in 1970. It is very interesting and sheds some light on the endless 'what is folk' controversies which rage endlessly on Mudcat.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 06:09 AM

To be pedantic, it's www.mustrad.org.uk

The Bert Llloyd artice is at: http://www.mustrad.org.uk/articles/lloyd.htm

Thanks for the heads up, Shimrod.

Ed

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 06:23 AM

You're absolutely right, Ed. Typed it in a bit of a rush. Sorry about that.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 08:40 AM

interesting,it does not shed very much light on what is folk.
however here isdifferent opinion of what is folk.
John Brune said.
we must get rid of songs below a certain standard,we must write and compose more contemporary songs,we need a different approach.,perhaps we should ask whether songs in a collection are in good taste,good taste can be defined more easily than folk songs-it is thelove of things of lasting value,coupled to an instinctive dislike of anything merely fashionable.
I interpret this as meaning,we should be judging songs whether new or old on their merit.
whether it is a folk song is not so important,this seemed to be the attitude of singers like Fred Jordan.
Folk song collectors make a similar as well,by only collecting from traditional singers.
folk song collectors[or collectors of traditional singers,make a value judgement] who they are going to collect from,rather than are these good songs and/or is the singer a good singer.
the classic example of this was the sussex singer Bob Blake who was in fact a revival singer,and who collectors like Kennedy pooh poohed and ignored,and whose songs and singing were collected only because the collector genuinely but mistakenly thought he was a traditional singer.
too much importance is given to what is a folk song,or who is a traditional singers,there is an attitude amongst some which is reminisecent of butterfly collectors.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: greg stephens
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 09:10 AM

Very interesting stuff indeed. Bert always talked more sense than anyone on the subject, to my way of thinking. He'd actually gone into the whole thing very deep. Not but what he couldn't talk as much bollocks as the rest of us, when on form. And it must not be forgotten, as is now well known, that he wasn't averse to a bit of evidence-massaging if it suited his case.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Brian Peters
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 09:22 AM

You can't help but be struck by the intelligence and articulacy. Fascinating stuff on the Balkans, early Country music in the USA and the influence of the Revival in the Durham coalfield.

Also some top-of-head speculation about the state of English folk music at the time of Shakespeare and the history of songwriting amongst the industrial proletariat, but then, we'd expect nothing less.

As to Dick's comment: "it does not shed very much light on what is folk", how about:

"...the very purveyors of the popular pap were themselves so impressed by the successes of the folk song revival that they annexed the term 'folk song' to their own particular and peculiar ends"

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 09:31 AM

"interesting,it does not shed very much light on what is folk."

Not a very helpful comment, GSW! In fact the interview acknowledges that 'folk' is a specific type of music which can be differentiated form other types of music.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST, Sminky
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 09:42 AM

In fact the interview acknowledges that 'folk' is a specific type of music which can be differentiated form other types of music.

No need for a definition then.

I notice that the words 'oral' 'process' 'transmission' and '1954' are conspicuous by their absence.

Now, why would that be?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Brian Peters
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 09:48 AM

Couldn't we please talk about the Bert Lloyd article without it turning into another debate about 1954?

(though for what it's worth, Lloyd's various writings have plenty to say about oral process and transmission)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jamming With Ollie Beak (inactive)
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 10:05 AM

"interesting,it does not shed very much light on what is folk."

"Not a very helpful comment, GSW!"
GUEST Shimrod

of course it wasn't helpful, the remark didn't come down on the side of St. Lloyd and his acolytes/followers.(that wasn't helpful either, but that's too bad), I'm no fan of the man.

Charlotte Olivia Robertson (Ms)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: mark gregory
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 10:15 AM

Like many folklorists Lloyd was not eager to fix a definition of folk song but he did think there was such a thing

The closest he came to his own definition I think was in his chapter in a 1979 collection called Folk Music in School (p10)

"I would suggest that nowadays by 'folk' we understand groups of
people united by shared experience and common attitudes, skills, interests and aims.
These shared attributes become elaborated, sanctioned, stabilised by
the group over a period of time. Any such group, with communally
shaped cultural traits arising 'from below' and fashioned by
'insiders', might be a suitable subject for folklore studies. Some of
these groups may be rich in oral folklore (anecdotes, speechways,
etc.) but deficient in songs; others may be specially notable for
superstitions and customs. Perhaps for English society the most
clearly defined of such groups are those attached to various basic
industries: for example, miners with their special attitudes, customs,
lore and language, song culture and such. But it will be seen that my
suggestion does not rule out the possibility of regarding hitherto
unexplored fields, such as the realms of students, actors, bank
clerks, paratroopers, hospital nurses, as suitable territory for the
folklorist to survey.

The present-day folklorist, who views the problem in its social
entirety, and extends his researches into the process by which
traditional folklore becomes adapted to the conditions of modern
industrial life, has to consider the classic 'peasant' traditions as
being but a part - the lower limit, if you like - of a process by
which folklore becomes an urban popular affair. Indeed, as far as song
is concerned, that is the present stage of folklore development:
nowadays there is far greater use of the folk-song repertory and of
folkloric forms of creation in our industrial towns than in the
countryside."

I have found that very useful in my own work collecting Australian labour movement songs and poems. Industrial folklore or 'laborlore' as Archie Green saw it allows us to still claim that people do make their own culture, stories, joke, songs in ways that is connected to their work, life and aspirations.

At this time in Australia The Rail Bus and Tram Union has a $1000 song competition for a railway songs continuing its own tradition of such competitions. see http://railwaysongs.blogspot.com/

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 10:19 AM

it does not shed much light on what is Folk.
no one on this forum seems to be able to define it,furthermore it is a waste of time trying to define it,
what is more important[imo]is to judge songs on their merit not on their label.
Bert Lloyd was a good singer,who encouraged lots of other singers.
he was not a god,his thoughts on what is a FOLK SONG are not some sort of Gospel.
his utterances should be treated with caution,in view of his tainted scholarship and his intellectual dishonesty.
Brian Peters, what purveyors of pap
Bert lloyd does not qualify who he was talking about,did he mean the Everlys Flatt and Scruggs,the Original Carter Family,or the New Christy Minstrels,Peter Paul and Mary, Pete Seeger,The Kingston Trio.BobDylan one of the main purveyors of popular music of that time were the Beatles,well they never claimed to be folk singers
sorry but that remark is just hot air.,if he had qualified it,it might have meant something.
Bob Dylan,Flatt and scruggs both claimed to play folk music both were popular,who is he on about,unless we know it is meaningless drivel.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 10:21 AM

sorry, correction it is complete bollocks.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Brian Peters
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 10:26 AM

Dick, the key phrase is not "purveyors of pap" but "annexed the term 'folk song'". The point being that two words which once had a specific meaning were given another, rather different, meaning. Which, in turn, is at the root of much of the hot air that's expended daily on Mudcat.

I don't think you'll find many people anywhere arguing that Lloyd's thoughts are 'Gospel'. He knew better than most what he was talking about, though.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Brian Peters
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 10:27 AM

Which bit was "complete bollocks"? I'm getting confused now...

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 10:52 AM

the influence of the Revival in the Durham coalfield.

It's always interested me, being from a Northumbrian mining background myself, that I never heard any of these mining folk songs until I started going to folk clubs. We had the odd verse of The Colliers Rant kicking around, but in talking to the very musical grandparents (and in some cases great-grandparents) of my mates in the mid 70s, they had nothing which Bert Lloyd would call a folk song. One old lady gave me an old zither upon which she used play hymn tunes as a girl in the 1920s; another sang me a Gilbert and Sullivan song (Tit Willow) she learnt at the knee of her own father when she was a little girl in the 1900s. Later on, in the 80s & 90s, living in the colliery villages of Durham, I asked the same thing of the old ex-miners I met there and got much the same answer. It wasn't as if they weren't shy in coming forward either - one old man in his 90s, a fine singer with an amazing repertoire of popular songs going back to the early years of the 20th century, showed me the cigar-box fiddles upon which he and his brothers used to play Christmas carols in 4-part harmony, but he didn't know anything like a folk song. The culture was musically rich in other ways, as I say, and linguistically rich with a common dialect (Pitmatic) and highly literate; my relatives (Cloughs & Allens) played Northumbrian Small-pipes, but whilst I remember any amount of Musical Hall songs (mainly from old 78s), of folk song, as Bert used the term, there was precious little, if any at all.

Sometimes I might entertain a notion of contamination with respect of a folkish agenda on the part of Lloyd and his chums - but mostly I just ponder to what extent folk song (as we understand the term here) ever permeated traditional popular culture at all. Having been brought up within and alongside such a culture, I do have my doubts, and good reason for those doubts...

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Brian Peters
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 11:07 AM

By "the influence of the Revival in the Durham coalfield" I was referring specifically to the notion that the revival, and Lloyd's interest in mining songs in particular, fed back into local culture in such a way that new songs were composed and old ones dusted off. How widespread this was, and how many songs resulted from it, is something I'd be interested to hear more about. But surely the Elliots of Birtley both contributed to and drew inspiration from the early revival?

"I just ponder to what extent folk song ever permeated traditional popular culture at all. Having been brought up within and alongside such a culture, I do have my doubts"

I think you were simply too late, Suibhne.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 11:08 AM

no Brian,the whole remark is complete bollocks because it is unqualified,who was supposed to have annexed the term,if we knew,then we could discuss it,but because we dont know who he is talking about[was it Bob Dylan/was it new Christy Minstrels,or The Dubliners]it is meaningless
. who were these purveyors of pap who supposedly annexed the term,it certainly was not the Beatles,or The Dave Clark Five,or Elvis Presley,or Cliff Richard,all of whom were playing popular pap.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Brian Peters
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 11:15 AM

"who was supposed to have annexed the term[?]"

I presume he was referring to the commercial music industry.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 11:26 AM

He names some names in the article: Bob Dylan, Donovan, Julie Felix. (I'd say he's being a bit unfair to Felix, at least considering her subsequent career, but then he only had what she'd done by 1970 to go on).

I'd bet he was not overly impressed by the New Christy Minstrels either.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 11:34 AM

I think you were simply too late, Suibhne

The chap with cigar box fiddles was in his nineties when I spoke to him in 1994. He'd been a singer all his life and took a keen interest in all aspects of his musical culture as well as his mining heritage and lore which he was very keen on sharing with me. This is what struck me - how he didn't know any folk songs, when he spoke of songs he learnt from his own grandfather with such pride. Other aspects of that culture - clog dancing, piping, clippy mats, crackets, pitmatic, allotments, pigs, storytelling, monologues, guising, brass bands, pigeons, whippets etc. etc. - were very much alive amongst the older community (and younger ones) in my childhood (and beyond) but not folk song which has always struck me as odd somehow.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Brian Peters
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 11:56 AM

Cross purposes here, Suibhne. According to Lloyd's ideas (not mine) the old repertoire of ballads and lyrical songs died out in urban areas during the industrial revolution, but was replaced by a tradition of industrial song-making. I have more faith in part (i) of that than part (ii), but am very happy to be corected on either score, and I'm very interested in the cigar box fiddle man. My grandmother in the South Wales valleys did know a couple of 'proper folksongs', but much preferred singing Sankey and Moody for her own amusement.

What I meant was that you were too late to hear 'The Seeds of Love' warbled by bucolic milkmaids in pre-industrial Co. Durham.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Reinhard
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 12:32 PM

Is that the same interview that used to be on Mark Gregory's Australian Folk Songs website folkstream.com? Does anyone know what happened to that site?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 12:42 PM

S O'P it depends on whether you would define the plethora of Geordie songs that were around when I grew up in the North East as "Folk Songs"; they certainly were popular (the better know ones at least) with the people who followed the cultures that you describe. Plus the amount of North Eastern songs that we learned at school at that time although again they were not always described as "Folk Songs".
I am reminded of the excellent quote in Pete Wood's book "The Elliotts of Birtley" where they say "We didn't know we were folk singers until Mr Lloyd told us we were"

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 12:49 PM

"We didn't know we were folk singers until Mr Lloyd told us we were"
- The Eliotts of Birtley

How very telling, The Birtley's were just singers (albeit excellent ones) as far as they were concerned, singing for enjoyment and the enjoyment of others, in other words it was the music that was important, not some damned definition bandied about by those who should, but don't, know better. You can see it clearly, can't you? The Birtleys are singing away to their heards content when up pops old A.L who says, "hey, you're folk singers!" The reply could have been (and perhaps should have been) "Oh, we are? What's your point?"

Charlotte Olivia Robertson (Ms)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 12:58 PM

If he is referring to Bob Dylan,he is out of order,that is why it is makes much more sense,to listen to John Brunes words than BERT LLOYD.
It does not matter a fiddlers fart whether something is labelled folk song or not,it is whether it is a good song that is important.
Masters Of War is a good song,so is The recruited Collier,one written by Dylan,and the other by Lloyd,it does not matter if either of them they are folk songs.
what does matter is that any utterances by Lloyd should be examined with close scrutiny,in view of the fact he was economical with the truth about some of his own compositions.
it was LLoyds obsession with what is a folk song,that led to his dishonesty.
it does not matter what a ,folk song is,give this nonsense up.andstart judging songs on merit.
John Brune was right, Lloyd was wrong.
John Brune also had a sense of humour,it was he that fooled MacColl[radio Ballads],we shall hear about this when Jim Carroll returns,but Brune proved his point that MacColl was not making judgements on collecting purely on merit,he would have included Brunes efforts, if Brune hadnt owned up.
slightly off thread but if I had had the choice of an evening of Roy Harris REVIVAL SINGER,and Gordon Hall[now deceased] TRADITIONAL SINGER,I would choose Roy Harris,why? because I ignore labels and make judgements on that which I hear.
that should be what is important if a song is a good song or a singer is a good singer the label is not needed.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jamming With Ollie Beak (inactive)
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 12:58 PM

arrgghhh!! I thought I was logged in, but apparently not...previous "GUEST" was me

Charlotte Olivia Robertson (Ms)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Dave Sutherland
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 01:01 PM

I have to point out that The Elliotts would have gone to the wall for Bert.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jamming With Ollie Beak (inactive)
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 01:07 PM

"I have to point out that The Elliotts would have gone to the wall for Bert."
- Dave Sutherland

And...? Like I said I'm no fan of the man

Charlotte Olivia Robertson (Ms)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 01:16 PM

I'm no fan of the man

That conveys a lot, doesn't it?

What are you going to tell us next, whether you prefer Coke or Pepsi?

Would you rather Lloyd's books, recorded performances and field recording had never been made? If so why? Do you detest Albanians and miners or something?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 01:23 PM

it depends on whether you would define the plethora of Geordie songs that were around when I grew up in the North East as "Folk Songs";

I would personally. As I say I knew a lot of these from 78s (the aforementioned Music Hall Songs) - Feet Still, Haad the Bairn etc. but I don't think that's what Bert Lloyd had in mind somehow. I remember a rich and wonderfully unique cultural landscape; pits, fields, & farms - rural with steam trains! Here it is in 1974, the year I turned 13 and made my first forays into our local folk club...

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

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST,Derek Schofield
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 01:24 PM

In the interview between Louis Killen and Johnny Handle at Whitby F/W last week, Louis recalled that when he showed a copy of Bert's collection, Come all ye Bold Miners, to Johnny, it inspired him to go and write songs about his own personal experience working in the mines. Yes, Johnny was already influenced by blues, jazz and the emerging folk revival, but he also worked in the mines. I think Jock Purdon also falls into this category, if I remember correctly. The Elliots' collection of songs from a variety of sources - childhood to the pits to music hall to labour politics - Bert encouraged them to sing them all, and he was a respected and welcome guest at their club.
I'm also reminded of Bert's comments about the Watersons family, and their love of singing together, harmonising etc. The comment is something along the lines of ... they maintained a family singing context and perhaps style, but had lost the "folk" repertoire, which they acquired when exposed to folk song.

I think the popular pap reference has to be seen in the light of the 1960s. There was a folk song revival in the USA and UK, and it was becoming more popular. Bert was suggesting that the term "folk" got attached to singers who were not singing "traditional" songs, because it made commercial sense to record companies and concert promoters. It could be argued that the same sort of thing is happening today.

From memory, there is a section in Bert's Folk Song in England wheer he says that if Bob Dylan etc are singing folk songs, then we need a new term for The dark eyed Sailor etc.... (I don't think Bert was making a value judgement between the two - just an observation).

Derek

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 01:49 PM

Quite a lot of the points raised on this thread as to Bert's views on what really constitute folk music were dealt with in an earlier interview I did with him for Folk Review which appeared in the issue for September 1974. It constitutes however a close-printed 3xA4 pages, and the relevant matter is scattered thru parts of his life-story and comments on other matters; so it would not be possible to extract the parts relating to this thread and reproduce them here. If anyone would like a copy, email your postal address to me - mgmyer@keme[dot]co[dot]uk - and I will happily send you a fotocopy.

If anyone wants to follow up his essay called 'The Meaning of Folk Music' in the book "Folk Music In School",part of CUP's Resources of Music series, referred to above (to which I was also a contributor so have a copy to hand), the publication details are: Folk Music In School, edited Robert Leach & Roy Palmer, Cambridge Universtiy Press 1978 {ISBN 0 521 21595}.

Michael Grosvenor Myer

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jamming With Ollie Beak (inactive)
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 02:02 PM

I'm no fan of the man

That conveys a lot, doesn't it?
Yup, says it all, without being overly verbose.

Pepsi or Coke? neither


Would you rather Lloyd's books, recorded performances and field recording had never been made? No matter to me.Like I've already staed I'm no fan nor acolyte

Do you detest Albanians and miners or something? This,J. Campin, says more about you than it does about me

right that's that interview over with, no on to actually playing the music rather than just yapping about it.


Charlotte Olivia Robertson (Ms)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 02:13 PM

Further to my note above re Folk Music In School CUP 1978, I am reminded looking back on my copy that it also had contributions from prominent folk people of the time like Sandra Kerr, Ailie Munro, Michael Pollard,et al, which Catters might find of interest.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Wotcha
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 03:19 PM

There really is interesting folk music in Alabania -- it is even sung in their karaoke bars today!

Gezuar!
Wotcha

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jamming With Ollie Beak (inactive)
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 03:31 PM

"There really is interesting folk music in Alabania -- it is even sung in their karaoke bars today!"
- Wotcha

I know
I've been listening to this programme for quite sometime now
The Balkan Hour

which is why I say in answer to Do you detest Albanians and miners or something?

This, J. Campin, says more about you than it does about me.

Charlotte Olivia Robertson (Ms)

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST,Winger
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 03:42 PM

Can anyone shed light on the biography on Loyd that Dave Arthur has written? It was supposed to be published last year but as far as I know, it didn't appear.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 03:43 PM

Derek,it just wont wash,
how can anyone say that Recruited Collier or Reynardine is a folk song and Masters of War is not,it really is rich coming from Bert Lloyd,considering that he pretended to collect Recruited Collier,
now what is important is that they [Masters of War AND Recruited Collier] are both good songs.
we dont need new terms at all,again that is just bullshit,within the category folk song[if we have to have that label,in the existing repertoire we have love songs plus songs of social comment,and many other songs Dark eyed Sailor ,Hard Times of Old England. Patience Kershaw]The last two are songs of social comment,yet Bert has no trouble with that,why should there be a problem with Bob Dylan songs ,Masters of War and others fit all the criteria,he was quite incorrect to say that we needed a new term.
Bob Dylans songs cant be dismissed like that,some are very good and fit all the criteria of a Folk song,or[perhaps this is a better phrase] are compatible with the traditional repertoire others are crap and do not
If Bert had qualified his statement[which Dylan songs and why] and been more specific it might have made sense .
Bert Lloyd was friend of my parents,I think he was a good singer and did a lot of good for the Folk Revival,however he was not a God or Guru, his scholarship on occasions was dodgy and on occasions he talked rubbish.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Howard Jones
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 04:06 PM

It is absolutely clear from Lloyd's own words that by "purveyors of pap" he meant the entertainment industry, and he specifically mentions Dylan, Donovan and Julie Felix as examples of "folk singers" even though "their products, their repertoire generally, had much more to do with the world of the night club and the cabaret and the popular concert hall than it had to do with musical folklore."

"Folk singer" came to mean someone singing with an acoustic guitar, regardless of where their repertoire came from. They may have had some knowledge of what Lloyd termed "folkloric" folk music, even included some in their repertoire, and in Dylan's case freely plundered it to create their own material. However the result was that a term which had once had a clearly understood meaning became diluted, to the extent that we are still arguing about it.

Where I think Lloyd was mistaken was blaming this all on the entertainment industry. It seems pretty clear that the folk revivalists colluded in this in order to claim high-profile artists like Dylan as part of their world.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 04:37 PM

I'm no fan of the man
That conveys a lot, doesn't it?
Yup, says it all, without being overly verbose.

It conveys that you have unreasoning prejudices against certain dead people and won't even pretend to have grounds for them. Is that what you actually intend to come across?

What part of "Why?" don't you understand?

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Dead Horse
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 04:43 PM

".....and in Dylan's case freely plundered it to create their own material."
Isnt that what Lloyd did?
And should that music be passed off as "Trad" or self penned?
Whatever else you say about A L Lloyd, he sure could waffle.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jamming With Ollie Beak (inactive)
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 04:51 PM

Dead has nowt to do with it, I didn't like St. Lloyd when he was alive either.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 05:54 PM

Howard,since when has folk music not been entertaining,of course folk music is entertainment.,it is not bloody well going to church.
Tam linn is entertainment, when sung properly its a first rate story.
next,lets stick to what Lloyd said,not where youthink he was mistaken,or yourviews on folk revivalists colluding.
Lloyd said there is a section in Bert's Folk Song in England wheer he says that if Bob Dylan etc are singing folk songs, then we need a new term for The dark eyed Sailor etc....
and I am saying that is bullshit,and for the reasons I stated in my previous posts.
now no one criticises MacColl ,or Jock Purdom ,or Tommy Armstrong for using traditional tunes,but along comes Howard and criticises him for using a traditional tune[or was it Jean Ritchies tune] presumably for Masters Of War,and Bob Dylans Dream.
Masters Of War,is compatible with the traditional repertoire.
Lloyd was wrong to dismiss all of Dylans songs,without being specific.
you cannot dismiss Dylan, without discussing his songs in depth,[he may have been right about some]but then some of MacColls are best forgotten too.
Lloyd was allowing prejudice to cloud his judgement,it really is extraordinary because he was a political animal,and you would have thought he would have related to Masters of War,it is a really powerful song with a timeless quality,and is compatible with the tradtional English /American repertoire
Brunes attitude is much better,we must accept contemporary songs but look for quality in both contemporary and traditional repertoire.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 06:10 PM

or was the problem this?.
MacColl and Lloyd were at the heart of the English Folk Revival,Lloyd was a Father Figure with a lot of influence,passing on songs to young singers collecting songs etc etc,then along comes a charismatic young Bob Dylan,who is influencing young people, suddenly its fashionable to sing folk songs,thousands of people are doing it,but they are no longer doing it THE WAY Bert thinks would be best,suddenly Dylan is a major influence and possibly a threat.
before people condemn Dylan,every one of you ask yourself who brought you onto the Folk scene,my guess is that there are many more,who came in through Dylan,Fairport Convention,Steeleye Span,Dubliners,and other Folk caberet groups.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Mick Pearce (MCP)
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 06:32 PM

If you bother to read the final pages of Folk Song in England you'll find that Bert wasn't so far from some of the more inclusive attitudes propoed by GSW.

He (Lloyd from here on) is at pains to distinguish and separate the modern compositions from the traditional songs and would clearly like the term folk song not to be applied to the new songs (If 'Little Boxes' and 'The Red Flag' are folk songs, we need a new term to describe 'The Outlandish Knight', 'Searching for lambs' and 'The coal owner and the pitman's wife'), but does not diminish their own value: Show-business songs and labour hymns have their own qualities, and neither their mass connections nor their artistic character are satisfactorily suggested and emphasised by emotionally applying the description 'folk-song' to them.

He also goes on to say It may be that the term "folk song" is losing its meaning, just as the thing itself fades and merges into a general stream of music, into that One Music that begins to embrace not only Western high art, popular and traditional musics, but also the musics of other continents and cultures...

He finishes the book with a long quote from Charles Seeger, which I assume reflected his own attitude:

To the folklorists of crepuscular view, Dr.Charles Seeger, who has brooded over the problem longer and more wisely than any of us, gives this reply: 'Rather than say "the folk is dead" and attempt to keep folk song alive as something quaint, antique and precious, let us say "The folk is changing - and its song with it", and then help what it is changing into - which may be the whole people welded into one by the new media of communication - not to be ashamed of its ancestors, but to select the makings of a new, more universal idion for the more stabilized society that we may hope is coming into being, from the best materials available, whether old or new. Better than to lament the loss of ancient gold will be to try to understand its permutation into another metal which, though it may be baser, may still surprise us in the end by being nobler'

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 06:53 PM

before people condemn Dylan,every one of you ask yourself who brought you onto the Folk scene,my guess is that there are many more,who came in through Dylan,Fairport Convention,Steeleye Span,Dubliners,and other Folk caberet groups.

In my case it was first Jimmy Shand, secondly Jean Ritchie, and an honourable mention to Peter Cape though I guess he was more of latter-day broadside balladeer. Dylan and the Dubliners I just found pompous, overrated and annoying; the English folk-rock crowd were just boring, except for the Incredible String Band who at least knew what decade they were living in though their appeal wore off rather fast.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: GUEST,Derek Schofield
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 07:30 PM

Having looked up Folk Song in England, I was going to quote bits of the last couple of pages here, but Mick has already done that! Great!

If Good SS re-reads my earlier email, he/she will see that I said that Bert was NOT making a value judgement about Bob Dylan. I recall the photo taken by Brian Shuel of Bob Dylan singing at the Singers' Club. I think Bert is in the photo with a smile on his face!

I try to be polite in my postings - I wish people would act similarly in response to people's opinions.

Derek

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Howard Jones
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 07:36 PM

GSS, you seem to be arguing against points which no one has made. Where did I say folk music isn't entertaining? Lloyd was referring to the "entertainment industry" - it's a shorthand term, but it's clear what he meant.

If we're going to stick to what Lloyd said, it's there in the interview and there's nothing more for any of us to say. But this is a discussion forum, and so I'm discussing what he said. As are you, for that matter.

I wasn't criticising Dylan for using traditional material for his own songs, neither was I condemning him. I was simply using it to acknowledge that he had at least some connection with folk song, in the original sense of the term. Nevertheless, Dylan's songs, and those of Donovan and the others, are not "folk songs" in the same way that Tam Lin is (and that's not a judgement on the quality or entertainment value of either). Dylan himself recognised this when he later distanced himself from the folk scene.

I've no idea whether Lloyd felt threatened by the influence of Dylan and the others. Perhaps he did, but that doesn't come out in the interview. What Lloyd was talking about was the dilution of the terms "folk song" and "folk singer", something which we are still discussing at great length today. He wasn't saying (and neither am I) that only traditional folk song has any merit, simply that the term was losing its meaning, and in doing so had ceased to mean anything much.

You're quite right that Dylan and the others brought many people into the folk scene. That illustrates my point, it wasn't just a label imposed by the music industry for its own purposes, the folk revivalists went along with it because they wanted to be associated with the success of Dylan and the others. When that music ceased to be fashionable, attitudes changed and a gulf opened between "traditional" and "contemporary" folk.

Subject: RE: Folklore: Bert Lloyd Interview on Mus Trad
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 02 Sep 09 - 07:55 PM

Reinhard - Mark's sites are under the influence of the webhost or something - he's expecting them to be back in service soon.

sandra