Is traditional song finished?

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 05:17 AM

There is more to being traditional than persistence. There are tunes in the repertoire of Chinese court music that date back 3000 years. Until very recent times, they were never played by anybody except court musicians. So they have not been transmitted in an environment where variation could go unchecked. They probably have changed a bit, but nothing like as fast as folk tunes do.

Beatles covers bands operate as conservatively as the Chinese court, but for most re-performances of recorded music there's no particular reason to stick closely to the original, and generally people don't. Recording doesn't change the process of of musical evolution by as much as it's reputed to.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 05:33 AM

"Recording doesn't change the process of of musical evolution by as much as it's reputed to."

No, it doesn't - there it does still change the process.

Each 'local' variation is liable to start afresh from one nationally or internationally famous version, so evolution over time is not cumulative, or is less so, anyway.

Also, when new variations (i.e. 'cover versions') become hits, these set off a new chain of 'local' variations. This is similar to when people moved to a new area to find work and took their songs with them, but we can't infer the same historical data from the recordings as we can from comparing regional variations of songs from 150 years ago.

And that's an important difference.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: glueman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 05:43 AM

"This may help..."

Printed off and hanging above my desk, cheers TFP.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 05:43 AM

""The big problem with allowing for *some* modern folk-like music (be it Ewan MaCcoll or that bit of Pentangle I posted) and not others, is who gets to be the arbiter of what counts as 'folk like'?""

Jim Carroll of course! Have you not been paying attention CS.


LOL
Don T

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Howard Jones
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 06:41 AM

"Beatles covers bands operate as conservatively as the Chinese court, but for most re-performances of recorded music there's no particular reason to stick closely to the original, and generally people don't."

That may be true of musicians trying to make their own version of a song (which in some cases then becomes better-known than the original). It's not true, obviously, of cover bands. Less obviously, it's not always even true of original artists, who are often obliged to mime on stage to their own studio recordings because these can't be reproduced live.

When it comes down to ordinary people singing these songs, the sound image in their head is invariably the best-known recorded version. Hence the popularity of karaoke - people can sing these songs to a backing track which usually tries to reproduce the original record.

The real obstacle to modern songs become "folk songs" in the original sense is this existence of a permanent recorded touchstone to which people can always refer (even if only to deliberately do something different). The involuntary changes which used to arise from different interpretation of a written text or a poorly-remembered oral one are unlikely to survive against this point of reference. The deliberate changes of words or tune with which a folk singer stamped his own identity on a song will now be overruled because they're "not right".

This isn't to say these obstacles can't be overcome, just that it's more difficult for a popular song to become "folk" than it used to be.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: glueman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:06 AM

So in the manner of the West Lothian question, is MacColl's material folk, or not?

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:12 AM

Sorry - haven't got time to read through all these and am not prepared to respond in full until I do. Quick reaction to some in the (possibly vain) hope of clearing them up.
"against subsequent definitions...."
What subsequent definitions - so far we've had 'anything that is performed in a folk club' -are there more?
"you allow modern songs written in a traditional style to be Folk"
Didn't say that, nor do I believe it; I recognise it as being a not strictly accurate, but not importantly so, part of the Wiki definition that you put up. I said that if I go to a folk club I expect to hear songs based on traditional songs - doesn't make them traditional in any way. Ironically, the songs that, IMO, came nearest to becoming traditional were the ones MacColl wrote for The Travelling People. These were taken up by Travellers, often described by them as "our songs" and began to appear in variants. What stopped them going the distance was the collapse of the singing traditions due to the introduction of portable televisions (circa 1973/75)
"Err - how many UK clubs have you been to in the last 10 years Jim?"
Not many - but the dozen or so I have have more or less borne out my opinions. If this was all I had to go on I would happily concede that I did not have enough information to form an opinion; however, I have friends who are still very much involved in the scene and who feel the same as I do and I have (in the permanent form of the Mudcat archive) arguments that more than make my point for me, arguing not only for the acceptance of poor standards, but for their desirability in case they scare off the less experienced; the throwing open of the clubs for any kind of music (and in some cases anything but folk)... it really is all here for those who want to find it.
"Caveat Emptor is universal"
It certainly is Tom - it's a universal way of passing the onus on to the customer and ducking your responsibility as a supplier of whatever.
I find it shady practice in business (if I'd have applied it in my work as an electrician I'd have been permanently signing on the dole). I believe it to be totally unacceptable in the clubs - I certainly never involved myself in ones that operated such a policy. The responsibility of doing what it said on the tin was ours - not left to the 'customers' to get 'stung' in the process of finding what they were looking for.   
"Ever heard of spuds Jim?"
Right, we're getting somewhere - I can call them spuds because somebody wants to call their bananas potatoes - have I got that right?
Glueman
"what's the difference between MacColl and a tinpan alley popular music composer"
I'm taking your question seriously and not as a time-wasting wind-up.
So that's the sum total of "the issues I haven't addressed?" - there's a relief!
More later - in the meantime, can I highly recommend Ian Watson's excellent 'Song and Democratic Culture in Britain" as a discussion of MacColl's and other's songwriting.
"the best thing McColl ever did."
Each to his own - wonder why you think that - because Ms Flack sang it maybe?
Not too bad a love song, but for me, the best long-term side-effect was that it paid for the production of a magnificent ballad series - "Blood and Roses".
Be interested in why you think it's the best he did.
More later.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,padgett
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:19 AM

The folk genre is I feel very wide and MacColl is "folk" in that he wrote songs which fall in the definition of what folk song is

he is not a writer of traditional song ~ do we not believe that generally traditional song has no known author, or pehaps we need to think in terms of putting a date on known song authors (something akin to "Time immemorial" in legal terms)where sources were from broadsides and music hall

Songs being written currently are in the "traditional style" in many cases, in that they hark back to some way of life or feelings in a not too distant past.These can never be traditional songs as we know who wrote em!!

Collecting traditional songs is nearing completion in my view ~ we are in the communications era and people are no longer living as isolated in the way of some 30 to 50 years ago

Ray
Ray

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: glueman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:32 AM

So if McColl's stuff is folk, then surely this is folk too.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:33 AM

Jim you are trying my patience now, mate!

How can you put this:

"What subsequent definitions - so far we've had 'anything that is performed in a folk club' -are there more?"

And then follow it immediately by this:

"you allow modern songs written in a traditional style to be Folk" Didn't say that, nor do I believe it; I recognise it as being a not strictly accurate, but not importantly so, part of the Wiki definition that you put up."

If the 54 is definition (A) then we have:

B: New songs written in a traditional style

C: New songs heavily adapted from traditional songs

D: New songs that have become associated with some traditional activity such as football.

E: New songs that have become very popular and are starting to be adapted in small ways.

F: New songs that are not traditional but which people think are traditional in ignorance.

G: Songs which have been passed orally through a family or other community.

H: Anything sung in a folk club

I: Anything performed by artists who play at folk clubs and festivals.

J: Anything broadcast on a radio station that has a folk handle.

K: Protest songs

L: Songs played on acoustic or otherwise 'folky' instruments.

M: Songs performed with a solo guitar or similar instrument.

N: Songs with a certain brittle style.

O: Songs with big choruses that suit pub singing etc.

P: Story songs.

err, there are probably more.

ALL of these are called 'folk' by significant groups of people. Ergo they are all valid, correct and reasonable uses of the word.

You don't have to accept any of the definitions, but you have to accept that the people who use them are genuine in their beliefs and have as much right to the word as you and the book-writers do.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:40 AM

Yes please. Old Peculiar......

I once did a gig back in 1984 as part of Rhombus of Dooom where we were paid with as much of the Old Peculier as we could drink. The results can be heard on Kallisti (that's me on bass). Needless to say we took this as a team-challenge and I've ne'er touched a drop of it since! I'm beginning to feel similarly about this thread actually...

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Banjiman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:50 AM

There is a serious question here though SOP. Do you think Old Peculiar is a Traditional Ale or just some insignificant revivalist imitation?

The good thing about it is after 4 pints you just don't care!

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Banjiman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:55 AM

Rhombus of Doom? There's more than Old Peculiar gone into the making of that I'll wager!

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 08:00 AM

There are more:

Q: All anon songs

R: All public domain songs

S: Anything more than X years old (x varies from person to person).



Other points raised by Jim:

Spuds - well you chose the metaphor, but 'spuds' only refers to 'conventional' potatoes. Sweet potatoes also contain the word but are never called spuds, (aI won;t try to work in pomme-de-terre and pommes).


""Caveat Emptor is universal" It certainly is Tom - it's a universal way of passing the onus on to the customer and ducking your responsibility as a supplier of whatever."

Suppliers have responsibilities in law too.


There is no fool-proof word to describe all of the music in my list A - S. Folk is the best we have and thus it is used my most club organisers and most people in the folk world.

We all have things in the list that we might personally reject, but we accept that these are reasonable uses of the word to the other guy.

Ergo; Tunng have every right to call their music folk. They are neither cheating to gain acceptance nor behaving irrationally like Humpty Dumpty.

People call me a folk artist too. I'm content with that and I think you should be too.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: TheSnail
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 08:11 AM

Jim Carroll

The impression I have gained has been that most would have drawn their conclusions largely from the folk boom which took its inspiration from the material described by the '54 definition (which includes The Almanac Singers, The Weavers, The Kingston Trio, Peter, Paul and Mary and Bob Dylan, Bryan).

Perfectly true Jim but not the point. The music in the folk boom is not called "took its inspiration from the material described by the '54 definition" by those who were/are involved, it's called "folk music". read what I said - That is what a lot of people who use the word folk understand by it. They have never heard of the 1954 definition Nor are they going to read "D K Wilgus's 'Anglo American Folksong Scholarship Since 1898; or even English Folk Song - Some Conclusions (1907) or English Folk Song in the Southern Appalachians (1917)" because they know what they mean by "folk". It means what has been accepted in some circles since at least the forties. OK, by the 1954 definition they are wrong but there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.

Do I, as potential audience, have any right to expect anything remotely resembling the accepted definition of folk song which my, and just about everbody I was involved with's understanding of the term is based on?

No, you do not because other people's understanding is different.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 08:39 AM

I just don't get why 1954 is so important.

How about this.
Pre   audio recording availability. (1890 ish) Traditional
Post audio recording availability. Sill traditional but slowly morphing into revivalist, with a boom when Radio broadcasting started in the 1920s, when more of the population became aware of music of all genres.
And the situation has been expanding ever since.
Makes more sense to me than the year of my birth being of any significance to anybody. (except me!)

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 08:39 AM

Do you think Old Peculiar is a Traditional Ale or just some insignificant revivalist imitation?

The trouble is, is that the old Traditional Ales as collected by Cecil Sharp et al haven't survived too well. A few years ago I drank a pint of a Traditionally Brewed Ale collected by Annie Gilchrist in Westmorland circa 1905 and was rewarded with hallucinations so violent that even the deeply coded erotic metaphors of the Barbon Pace Egging Song assumed a terrifying pornographic clarity from which I haven't quite recovered - the stomach pump didn't exactly help matters either.

Whilst we drink these things at our own risk, the crafted and unbroken tradition of brewing / drinking / falling down is a continuity that links us with our earliest & unwritten forebears, and I applaud the prospective urge (however so engendered) that maintains that tradition. That said, around the same time as the Rhombus gig alluded to earlier I did a Folk gig in darkest Sheffield where we were paid, significantly I fear, with Whitbread White Label.

A couple of years ago I did a gig at the Bare Arts Brewery in Todmorden where they cracked open a Party Pig of Imperial Stout (7.2%) and couldn't get it closed, thus both performer and audience were well lubricated during the interval. Not quite as extreme as the Westmorland 1905, but it was getting there - how else might we account for this?

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Will Fly
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 08:49 AM

Hi Ralphie - I never knew you were born in 1890 - you've worn well indeed.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Ralphie
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 08:55 AM

Will
It's the drugs and Botox!
R

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 08:56 AM

Do I, as potential audience, have any right to expect anything remotely resembling the accepted definition of folk song which my, and just about everbody I was involved with's understanding of the term is based on?
No, you do not because other people's understanding is different.

That sentence wasn't about the meaning of words. He was saying, could he expect to hear that music performed anywhere? And you know perfectly well what kind of music he had in mind.

And he's perfectly correct that it isn't as easy as it was 20 years ago, though not as difficult as he makes out.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Banjiman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 09:03 AM

So (I'm going to regret this I know!), as a club orgaiser I put on a young band...... they were great and every song in their set was traditional and very well performed. The audience loved them. As their encore they did a "folked up" cover of an 80's pop song (A Land Down Under). The audience (and I) thought this was great fun.

I guess according to JC I should have done what..... switched off the P.A.? dragged them off stage? refused to book them again?

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 09:10 AM

I would prefer it if people didn't refer to posters as "JC", since it invites confusion between the Jaundiced Curmudgeon and myself, the Jovial Crank.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Banjiman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 09:14 AM

Apologies Jovial Crank!

I clearly meant Jim Carroll.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: MikeL2
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 09:45 AM

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Banjiman - PM
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 09:03 AM

Hi banjiman.........paid em more ????

cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: MikeL2
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 10:15 AM

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T - PM
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 05:43 AM

<" ""The big problem with allowing for *some* modern folk-like music (be it Ewan MaCcoll or that bit of Pentangle I posted) and not others, is who gets to be the arbiter of what counts as 'folk like'?""

Jim Carroll of course! Have you not been paying attention CS.">

Hi don

You took the works right off my keyboard....lol

Cheers

MikeL2

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 10:20 AM

As their encore they did a "folked up" cover of an 80's pop song

Ah, but there are different ways of folking up 80's pop songs. There's the Traditional Way of Folking up 80s Pop Songs, and there's The Revival Way of Folking Up 80's Pop Songs. The most celebrated proponent of the former approach is Jim Eldon, who was astonishing audiences with his covers of Bat Out of Hell and Dancing in the Dark even back in the 80s; and a quick search on YouTube will reveal that he's still got the knack - for example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_ovw1-Zjsw.

My missus is a big Blondie fan - she does a great cover of Dreaming on the five-sting banjo which always goes down a treat with traddies, folkies & Blondie fans alike. Thanks to threads like this though we rarely use the F or T words in our house - we are simply fans and exponents of Popular Music, in the Child Ballad sense, in the Jim Eldon sense, in The Fall sense, in the Skepta sense or whatever. Next time she does Dreaming though I'll film it for YouTube.

Otherwise, one would hope no-one is arguing here for Rights and Wrongs here, just the need for clarification of what we do mean when we use these words. Tom's pragmatic approach matches my own, pretty much, given that the experience must always be A) subjective and B) strictly empirical. This is how it touches us, or doesn't, as the case may be. The only thing you have to be true to is yourself; whatever you do, whatever you are moved to do, and hopefully respect others for doing likewise. As in life, then so in folk; square peggin awl...

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 10:49 AM

"Apologies Jovial Crank!"
Sorry folks - I really can't be arsed.
G'luck all
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 11:16 AM

Before you go Jim...

First I think you might reflect on the fact that my decision to join this debate is entirely down to your frequent rudeness to folk 'users,' specially musicians and club organisers.

Someone has now been a little unkind to you, but I hope you're big enough to let that slip by.

What I really want is a clarification on this:

"you allow modern songs written in a traditional style to be Folk" Didn't say that, nor do I believe it; I recognise it as being a not strictly accurate, but not importantly so, part of the Wiki definition that you put up. I said that if I go to a folk club I expect to hear songs based on traditional songs - doesn't make them traditional in any way."

You seem to be using the words Folk and Traditional as I do here: Folk includes 'based on traditional, but 'traditional' is unique. Is that right? If so good - we agree.

But then why have you so frequently waxed incandescent that people like me who perform traditional songs and tunes, as well as self-penned " songs based on traditional songs" (and who do not claim these to be traditional in any way), are allowed to sing in folk clubs? And blame us for the collapse of the folk movement?

If I understood that, I might understand better why you're so cross with people who write new songs that are only subliminally influenced by the tradition (as all songs must be) and then perform them in folk clubs.

Tom

PS Please don't bring the quality issue in here. It's highly subjective and is completely separate to the debate over material - you'll hear all types of song sung well or sung less well right across the scene according to the skill of the individual doing the singing. Nothing to do with whether it's folk or trad or not.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Banjiman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 11:24 AM

Who's been unkind to Jim Carroll? Jovial Crank is Jack Campin's name for himself (see above)???

Confused of North Yorkshire?????

Mine was a genuine question for Jim around how he thinks club organisers could (if they wanted to) apply the controls he seems to want within the clubs.

Hey ho.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: TheSnail
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 12:23 PM

Jack Campin

He was saying, could he expect to hear that music performed anywhere?

I don't think so. A couple of lines earlier - Do club organisers feel they have an obligation to provide what it says on the tin?

I think he is saying that any club that calls itself folk is under an obligation to provide what he understands as folk.

But he's gone now so we may never know.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 12:35 PM

Mine was a genuine question for Jim around how he thinks club organisers could (if they wanted to) apply the controls he seems to want within the clubs.
thats easy,the organiser is the one who funds the club,so he/she is in a position to dictate what club policy should be,he can allow or not allow whatever singers and whatever repertoire he/she wishes,if people dont like it they can go and sing karaoke

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 12:38 PM

It's might be worth having a debate (while we wait) on to what extent a club IS a folk club if it doesn't actually use the word Folk in its title (as many don't).

Personally I call all the venues and gatherings who put on acts who work the 'folk circuit,' who operate in the same basic ways as conventional folk clubs, who advertise in the folk press, or who do actually call themselves as such, 'folk clubs' - and all my comments refer to all of these in a sort of generically vague way.

(I don't call singarounds or sessions folk clubs unless they have a name, but I kind of lump them in)

I think it may be song-gatherings (which quite often don't use the F word anyway) that stick in Jim's craw.

If clubs don't actually use the F word, does Jim mind what they put on?

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 02:18 PM

Personally I call all the venues and gatherings who put on acts who work the 'folk circuit,' who operate in the same basic ways as conventional folk clubs, who advertise in the folk press, or who do actually call themselves as such, 'folk clubs' - and all my comments refer to all of these in a sort of generically vague way. ... I think it may be song-gatherings (which quite often don't use the F word anyway) that stick in Jim's craw.

http://www.myspace.com/chorltonfolkclubChorlton Folk Club

"Chorlton Folk Club was started by Jozeph Roberts in 2002. Every Thursday at about 9 (usually a bit later), Jozeph MCs and a mix of young singer-songwriters and life-hardened old timers play all kinds of music. You could call it an open mic, except there are no microphones or amps."

F-word present and correct. And, though I love it dearly, Chorlton FC is emphatically not the place to go if you want to hear traditional music. In another thread somebody linked to Sandbach FC, which actually boasts of not hosting trad. music. Jim may have overstated the name-on-the-tin problem, but he hasn't made it up. As I've said before, I was blown away by the first few evenings of traditional song I experienced & rapidly decided I wanted more of this stuff. All well and good, except that this was after I'd been a regular at Chorlton for five years. Something not right there methinks.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 02:34 PM

Hi Pip

Indeed - and I could tell you of a couple of dozen or so more, but they DO say what is in the tin.

You have quoted it right there in your post!

My serious point is that the name of the club, and whether it contains the F or T word or not, is no longer an issue in these days of web sites and telephones.

Anyone doing the most casual of research will find out that these two were not died-in-the-wool heritage-type clubs.

For people to insist that these clubs are somehow being dishonest, or engaging in sharp practice, is simply not fair or reasonable.

Out of interest, why do youthinks there's something not right with this?

Tom

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 03:37 PM

"Something not right there methinks."

It's only 'not right' if you buy the proposed notion that the revival and its musics, are in any way siblings of or even first cousins of, Traditional musics.

I don't buy that notion, and consequently I suffer zero dissapointment, frustration or annoyance at the inevitable disabuse of such a notion for someone (such as JimC) who does buy it.

What I'm happy for is a communal space where I can sing these funny old songs, alongside others who like to play Dylan, Beatles, MaCcoll, McTell, parodies, R&B & so-on.

Having said that, a 'mainly trad.' club, might be very interesting too. But if I want something that focused, then I'll have to organise it.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 04:28 PM

What's 'not right' is that I spent five years going to a folk club without ever being exposed to a full evening of traditional music - and when I did get that exposure, I thought it was fantastic & felt like I'd been missing out. Up till then I'd assumed that 'folk' meant covers, original material and the odd bit of traditional: this was the rule both at Chorlton and at a couple of other clubs I'd been to. I had no idea that it was even possible to spend an evening hearing, and singing, almost nothing but traditional material - and, of course, I had no idea how much I'd enjoy it.

Jim's fundamental point, which I think most people are ignoring, is that anything-goes clubs are doing the songs a disservice. I don't agree with everything Jim says, but on that point I think he's dead right. In fact I know he's right, to the extent that I'm doing anything to keep the songs alive - I've built up a repertoire of 40-50 songs, about ten of which I sang in the five years I was a regular at Chorlton FC.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 04:41 PM

"Jim's fundamental point, which I think most people are ignoring, is that anything-goes clubs are doing the songs a disservice. I don't agree with everything Jim says, but on that point I think he's dead right. In fact I know he's right, to the extent that I'm doing anything to keep the songs alive - I've built up a repertoire of 40-50 songs, about ten of which I sang in the five years I was a regular at Chorlton FC."

Mmm - well yeah, I agree that it'd be great if more people had awareness of and ready access to, this heritage song-bag which in theory 'belongs to the people', but trying to load folk clubs with the task of illuminating the people about what they've got is IMO a complete dead end. I'd rather see dedicated 'Explore Traditional Songs of the British Isles' type clubs for total newbs who won't be so touched by revival precidents and assumptions, set up by dedicated traddies reaching OUTSIDE of the boundaries of the revival folk club scene. If/when I feel I've developed enough experience/knowledge of this stuff, that's what I'll be doing.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 05:26 PM

"anything-goes clubs are doing the songs a disservice."

But this is still somehow assuming that folk clubs have some duty to be about traditional music.

There is no moral or legal precedent which requires this.

Furthermore I've seen plenty of evidence to witness that folk clubs have existed from the very start which were not about trad music - they were more about skiffle and/or blues than trad song, many have always allowed show songs and acoustic pop, and/or encouraged song-writing, (and then there was all that comedy in the 70s).

But even if every club in the land had started as a Trad club, there's nothing to say it should continue to be Trad if the people who go there don't want it to be.

Of course this is a shame, but you can't blame the clubs. This is just some people out enjoying live music. And that's ALWAYS a good thing.

Yes, we do need to do a big education job around Trad song - of course we do, but that's as much around schools and the media as about clubs where people have no real interest in or knowledge of Trad.

So yes, I'd love to encourage Trad song in clubs, and more new Trad clubs, but this MUST be done in an understanding that there is no duty to do Trad.

Clubs which choose to do something else may still be called Folk Clubs with impunity.

Tom

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 05:47 PM

"I've built up a repertoire of 40-50 songs, about ten of which I sang in the five years I was a regular at Chorlton FC."

Don't understand this comment Pip. In five years you've only exposed a fifth of the songs you've learned at your regular club? I started out learning songs Hallowe'en before last - and was singing out a few month later. I now do a couple of sessions on and off and I have a similar amount of songs down to you (more like forty than fifty), but I've sung pretty much every one this past year.

Why won't you sing more than ten of your songs? Is it to do with being too self-critical? Or is it something to do with the club?

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Tootler
Date: 09 Mar 10 - 07:54 PM

I used to go to folk clubs in the mid 1960's and, after a long absence, I started going to folk clubs again this century and one thing that struck me was that the mix of types of song that are being sung is not really that different even after an absence of nearly 40 years i.e. a mix of traditional songs, newly composed songs based on traditional song and the occasional adapted pop song. There was always a fuzzy edge and a number of songs that were labelled "folk" in record shops were much closer to pop than to folk.

For this reason, I find Jim Carroll's explanation for the decline of the folk clubs in the 1980's not entirely convincing.

I suspect it might have had a lot more to do with people like me who developed other [musical] interests, got married, had children to bring up and careers to develop so did not have the spare time (or money) to go to folk clubs. When I moved to Teesside in the late 1970's I thought about starting to go again, had a look round and found information on the Cutty Wren (Which is still going, btw) but I did not have a car in those days and getting there by public transport though possible was not practical so I put the idea aside at that time. I didn't find Stockton club, but the same problem of getting there - and even more so home afterwards would still have existed.

I still haven't been to the Cutty Wren, though I know some of their regulars. Maybe one day {g}

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Bert
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 01:24 AM

If somebody was to sing Cyril Poacher songs, would that be folk or covers?

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Mavis Enderby
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 02:45 AM

How do you do a disservice to a song? The only way I can think of is to not sing it. If a club is "anything goes" then that surely includes trad? So sing it with passion and inspire others...

Just my 2c

Pete.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 03:21 AM

Tom - this is still somehow assuming that folk clubs have some duty to be about traditional music.

To be more precise, it's assuming that traditional music deserves to be kept alive by somebody, and folk clubs seem like the obvious candidate.

CS - other way round; it went roughly like this.

2002-7: discovered 'folk clubs'. Discovered I could sing a bit. Built up repertoire of around 100 songs, about 10 of which were traditional.

2008-10: discovered a trad singaround with some amazing singers. Decided this was very much for me. Stopped singing most of the 90-odd contemporary or original songs I'd done before and built up my trad repertoire to 50ish. (And counting - I've got Lord Bateman in my sights.)

If a club is "anything goes" then that surely includes trad?

Nobody who goes to a FC knowing they want to sing trad is being discouraged from doing so (except possibly at Sandbach). My point is that people who don't know much about trad songs, but are curious about them, aren't being encouraged to sing them - or even being made aware that they exist. Effectively folk doesn't include trad, or only includes it as a slightly embarrassing distant relation.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Banjiman
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 03:42 AM

"Effectively folk doesn't include trad, or only includes it as a slightly embarrassing distant relation."

With respect Pip I just don't see evidence of this in my neck of the woods or other places we get to around the UK (which includes alot of "performance clubs and festivals).

Most clubs present a good mix of trad and other stuff in my experience.

I can also point to a couple of clubs who have turned my better half down for gigs on the basis that she is not Trad enough (50%+ of her repertoire is trad & her own songs are generally trad styled)..... of course this might just have been a polite way of sayiong they didn't like her!

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Will Fly
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 03:42 AM

Sandbach doesn't discourage folk at all - you can do what you like there, as long as you do it well, as I know from personal experience. Winston Baldwin, who helps to run it, MCs and plays a mean blues harp, is a great character. He's also very particular about who guests or not - unlike some club MCs - and I've seen one or two performers who were less than competent get a gentle talking to in a quiet corner. There are some very accomplished musical resident musicians and it's a very nice little club.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,Tom Bliss
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 03:54 AM

"traditional music deserves to be kept alive by somebody, and folk clubs seem like the obvious candidate"

Agreed. And put like that it's an entirely reasonable suggestion. But it's entirely wrong to blame the organisers, participants or guest artists of non-trad-favouring clubs for the status quo.

Even the (very few) clubs where trad is actively discouraged are blameless in this.

My experience mirrors that of Tootler, and I'm completely certain that the drop in club attendance in the 80s was down to the core audience settling down and having kids, plus 'poaching' by the punk DIY movement (to which I was myself a victim). Folk just went out of fashion. It happens.

As the numbers of attendees dropped, clubs were naturally glad to have new people arriving, and these people brought with them broader cultural ideas of 'folk,' (which of course had been widespread in the club movement from the outset - it certainly was in the ones I visited in the early 70s).

That said, I'll go on record that I think 80% of clubs in the UK are happily mainly trad/trad-informed, and from a heritage repertoire point of view things are reasonably healthy.

The demographic is, however, becoming an issue once more.

If it turns out that the solution is for more clubs to embrace more 'anything goes' music, to bring up the numbers (specially of youngsters), and for trad education to be championed within that context, as well as in schools and the wider media, then I say; so be it. I'm also hopeful that people will find a way to trad through open mics - and there is some evidence that this is happening.

Trad music is, unfortunately, something of an acquired taste. It needs to be done just so for people raised on mainstream pop and rock to 'get' it.

I've been told that some clubs who discourage trad music don't do it because they dislike trad per se, but because they've been over exposed to singers who don't do justice to the genre, and so are actually putting people off. It's a moot point, and one that individual organisers must be free to handle as they see fit.

In term of booked guests, again it's a matter of personal taste/ education. I love unaccompanied song, but I can see why some audiences would find a whole evening of it difficult. Book too much of any style of music that your core audience doesn't like, and you'll soon have no audience, rather than a converted one.

So back to Pip's original point:

Folk clubs are indeed the obvious candidate, but it's not as simple as it sounds, and it's completely counter productive, and unfair, to embark on any kind of blame game.

Tom

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 04:16 AM

traditional music deserves to be kept alive by somebody, and folk clubs seem like the obvious candidate.

It is one of the great revival conceits that singing traditional songs in folk clubs is somehow keeping them alive, rather than simply serving as a hobbyist recreation for a tiny minority of like-minded cultural Luddites. Whilst being great fun for those who like it, it is wholly irrelevant to the life of traditional song and quite possibly counter productive to its wider appreciation which is, in effect, ruined by the association.

I think much the problem is the legacy of the bourgeois patronisation that defined the principles of Traditional Culture as being essentially collective, communal, anonymous, ill-educated and, therefore, entirely innocent of its own significance, much less that of the songs they made and sang as anonymous members of a rural proletariat passively perpetuating the folklore which was hungrily harvested by members of an guilt-ridden antiquarian obsessed aristocracy fearful of their own impending demise, much less that of the Traditional Culture which was, after all, but the consequence of a millennia of inhumane subjugation, poverty and squalor. We don't think of these songs as being the work of creative individuals, much a less as a springboard to further individual creativity; indeed, when such creativity does occur it is invariably reactive to a perceived purist orthodoxy inherent in the revival itself. Thus creativity is not endemic in the nature of the beast, which is both purist and orthodox - qualities which are anathema to Traditional Song in its natural habitat. The repletion of functionalist shibboleths (such as the 1954 Definition and The Folk Process) are as indicative of its mythic status as the social demographic that has made up the revival over the last 100 years, and continues to do so.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: GUEST,TB
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 04:18 AM

Bother it's doing that non-posting thing again.

I meant to say

"As the numbers of attendees dropped, clubs were naturally glad to have new people arriving, and these people brought with them broader cultural ideas of 'folk,'"

I should have added for Jim's sake if he's still watching.

It must have seemed to some people that the place was being overrun with 'anything goes,' but we need to stand back and look at the full picture of what was really happening and why, accept it, and move on from there.

Tom

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Crow Sister (off with the fairies)
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 04:22 AM

"Yes, we do need to do a big education job around Trad song - of course we do, but that's as much around schools and the media as about clubs where people have no real interest in or knowledge of Trad."

Your posts making a great deal of sense to me Tom.

And I agree partly with Pip too, that:

"My point is that people who don't know much about trad songs, but are curious about them, aren't being encouraged to sing them - or even being made aware that they exist. Effectively folk doesn't include trad,"

But I differ on the encouragement. At one of the clubs I go to - I'm pretty much the only person there singin an unaccompanied trad-song - and for all my turns. Despite others doing their thing differently, I still get a great deal of support for my choice.

If I needed that local club to help me discover traditional song in the first place, well no. Others do them sometimes, but trad is not a striking presence.

I was frustrated at never knowing this treasury of song existed - I found it on-line after fumbling in the dark for something a bit more err more 'English' than Sean Nos singing (which I'd been considering as an option - having Irish family) which I vaguely suspected must presumably be 'out there'.

It was a case of deduction: 'Well, there are these old Irish songs, so surely there must be something like it from here too?'
Of course if I hadn't been interested in researching my Irish cultural heritage in the first place, I wouldn't have discovered Sean Nos singing... But I guess the reason I started looking into my Irish cultural heritage, was simply because I knew it was there. It has a presence. It's in broad public view - even if only because of Riverdance!

It still beggars belief though, that it took a light-bulb going on for me to make the leap from old Irish songs... to hmmm old English songs? And *that* I think is entirely down to education (ie: absence of) and support (absence of likewise) of English cultural heritage of *the people* as opposed to Lordy's in their vast ruins with nice gardens. I wonder if this could be a consequence of old Empire type thinking drip-dripping down from the top maybe? But while us proles are busy demontrating our love of this "great nation's" heritage and history by trapesing around great houses and eating cream teas next to the the walled garden in our thousands every Sunday, English people don't really know that they have any *folk* heritage, and in my humble, just how much more interesting it is than follys and arboretums.

By way of illustrating my point - I was at an alternative music fest some time back, singing a few E. Trads to myself, and the girl with me said: "Wow, that gives me goosebumps. Those old Irish songs are amazing!" If it's old music, it must be Irish... I think she made a perfectly valid assumption though, based on the evidence.

Subject: RE: Is traditional song finished?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Mar 10 - 04:26 AM

Hi y'all,
First - my apologies to Paul Banjiman - I misunderstood his comment, hence the hissy-fit - the result of trying to do this on the move (which I still am) - sorry (until the next time it happens, at least).
Anyhoo; I'll have a try with this as long as I can.
Tom:
Thank you for your list of 'definitions' - it made my point far better than I ever could. You missed several, by the way. A couple of weeks ago on this forum (of informed folkies) somebody offered 'love songs' as a definition making 'Your Tiny Hand Is Frozen......?"
What you gave us as 'definitions' are 'misconceptions' of what folk is; it's The 'Six Blind Men of Hindustan Who Went To See The Elephant', writ large and underlines perfectly the need for consensus if all of our musics are to survive.
There are loads of questions here hanging unanswered, but I suggest we cut to the chase and deal with those later. Maybe by then Glueman will have provided me with his list of those I have deliberately avoided - but I can only hold my breath for so long nowadays.
The '54 definition, flawed as it might be, pulled together most of the salient points of the music I came into in the early sixties so that we knew roughly what we were getting when we went out to enjoy a night of 'folk song'. No, we didn't go running for our dictionary before we went down to the Pack Horse, or the Union Tavern, or The Fox, or The Empress of Russia - we didn't have to, there was a degree of consensus and we could choose our music on the basis of whether it pleased us aesthetically, rather than we heard what we had been told we were going to. I may have wildly misjudged to what extent that this is no longer the case, but a couple of clips put up on this thread serve to convince me - not too wildly. The cuckoo in the nest has not only, to a large degree, thrown out many of the other birds, but is now demanding that those remaining change their names to something else altogether. There has been no re-definition as far as I can see, by those involved or by the public at large, just a (deliberate?) blurring of the existing one to provide a convenient peg to hang a too diffuse a selection of music - try to please all of the people all of the time and you end up pleasing no one.
Personally I feel my understanding of 'folk' is flexible enough to provide me with a guide to what I want to listen to (as an evening of 'folk')
"If clubs don't actually use the F word, does Jim mind what they put on?"
No - of course I bloody don't; why on earth should I? When I lived in Manchester I was a regular at Terry Whelan's Wayfarers, residented at a couple of Harry Boardman's clubs, and visited several others that supplied my folk 'habit'. On Thursday nights I often went to a pub along the Stretford Road where the landlord put up a few quid as a prize and I listened to the locals singing or reciting their own stuff, or the blasts from the past or present, or whatever took their fancy, just like a number of folk clubs I have visited recently - only they didn't call themselves that - good days.
The term 'folk' has a significance way beyond what goes on in clubs; it indicates its origins, its social, historical and artistic standing - it is essential to any understanding of our music - it is what we were and are. It provides, I believe, the key to our being more widely accepted, to our gaining air time, funding for our projects, and some chance that following generations will have the great advantage we were given of enjoying and becoming part of our heritage. This I KNOW from present experience here in Ireland, where the fortunes of the music have been changed radically and dramatically.
To answer the op's original question "Is traditional song finished?" - I believe it is unless something is done to change the present situation.      
Tom again;
"Please don't bring the quality issue in here. It's highly subjective and is completely separate to the debate over material"
I wasn't aware I had brought it in; on the contrary; I don't believe that we can alter definitions on the basis of our personal tastes or conveniences; dictionaries don't work like that.
If I have (please point it out) I apologise.
Must go - but a final thought.
You mentioned 'public domain' in your list of 'definitions'; am I to take it that you are happy to relinquish all claims to your own compositions?
Best to all,
Jim Carroll
E&OE