Singer Song Writer or Wronger?

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Larry The Radio Guy
Date: 20 May 10 - 01:54 AM

I find it interesting that we get so emotional over words and categories. I like it when people push against the boundary of a term, and get upset when autocrats who think they know exactly what a term means decide to restrict the music that can be be performed. I find it upsetting that a folklore group (The Seattle Folklore Society)would actually refuse to allow performers to perform songs they haven't written.

I posted a comment earlier (surprised it got no reaction) about how the demands for everybody to be "singer-songwriter" is creating song pollution---lots of songs sung by only one person, and nobody to sing other people's great songs---thereby ensuring that "traditional" music will eventually wither up and die--because it can't expand if nobody ever sings the many great, meaningful songs (traditional or otherwise) that already have been written.

I would love to see more people searching for and performing songs that mean something and/or reflect a way of life (past or present). An example? I was looking for possible songs to perform at the traditional music festival and came up with some great truly "traditional" songs. But I also came up with a terrific song by John Stewart called Draft Age--that beautifully depicts the experience of young men in the U.S.A. when they still had the draft. Maybe if enough people start singing songs like that, we'll forget who wrote it, change a few words and voila---a traditional song of the 60's and 70's.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: GUEST,Marcus
Date: 18 May 10 - 07:35 PM

"Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Little Hawk
Date: 05 May 10 - 02:33 PM

Or egotism. ;-) It's a far more common problem, I think, than mere stupidity. After all, most of the people I know are not basically stupid...but they all have a strong ego, and it is that which tends to make them exhibit prejudice toward this and that."


Which really makes them basically uh,,,, stupid.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don Firth
Date: 18 May 10 - 03:26 PM

". . . beyond the flame covered as it is now by a basket kept there by stubborn folkies unwilling to let it shine."

I presume that what Conrad is alluding to is that "stubborn folkies" (such as ?) are hiding the candle of folk music under a bushel because they are "unwilling to let it shine."

And why in the hell would anybody do that, pray tell? It's certainly not in the interest of performing singers of folk songs to do anything like that and limit our potential audiences. Conrad is making this accusation against some of the very people who are not just drawing new audiences in and entertaining them, but are teaching them, in a relaxed and non-didactic way, about folk music.

Bob Nelson (Deckman) has put together a series of classes in "American History in Folk Songs," in which he talks of various historical incidents and eras and sings the songs that came out of those incidents. There has been considerable interest expressed in Bob's classes by various libraries, college lectures and concerts departments, and other institutions.

In addition to our other performances, Bob, Patti McLaughlin, and I used to sing Northwest songs regularly for Washington State History classes at colleges and universities in this area.

When Jeff Warner, son of collectors Frank and Anne Warner, was turned down by the Seattle Folklore Society because he didn't write his own songs, he sang only traditional songs, Stewart Hendrickson, Bob Nelson, and I reorganized the long defunct Pacific Northwest Folklore Society (first organized in 1953 by Walt Robertson and several others, including a very neophyte me—history of the PNW Folklore Society HERE) in order to sponsor performances by singers of traditional songs—in addition to collecting and making available folk songs and other material from and about this area.

So, Conrad. WHO are these "stubborn folkies" who are unwilling to let the light of folk music shine?

I'll tell you who is actually hiding folk music's light under a bushel:    it's those people who run open mics who want only singer-songwriters, not singers of traditional songs, those who run "folklore societies" that will not sponsor concerts by singers of traditional songs—in short, those who are trying to "manage" what they insist on calling "folk music."

Which you keep saying is what is needed.

Traditional folk music is a) alive and well where I live; and b) if it is suffering at all, it's suffering from too damned much "management!"

Don Firth

P. S. "Higher level" = "Market share." Now, there's a good Madison Avenue term!

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 18 May 10 - 01:44 PM

"It is "all music" in the end. "
Only in the clubs Ron; elsewhere it has a very specific definition, identity and literature. The clubs seem to have arrived at where they are by totally ignoring these facts and making a U.D.I.
To my mind the 'go it alone' policy of many of the clubs has led to total confusion, the death of many clubs and the exodus of audiences en masse. The folk scene no longer has a media presence, most of its literature has died a death and its major outlets (bar a tiny handful) have disappeared (looks like Rounder is about to ride off into the sunset), What headway that it had in the education and academic world has been whittled down to next to nothing.
You said earlier that things were different in the US, but somehow, I doubt it when performers can be turned away from a raditional song festival because "they don't write their own stuff" (I thought I'd dozed off and fallen down a rabbit-hole when I read this).
Compare this with what has happened in Ireland where the preformance of music is thriving, is accepted as a serious art, it has wall-to-wall media coverage and, certainly up to now, is supported and financed by the establishment (there are five folk music centres and a theatre dedicated to the traditional arts in this county alone.
Somebody here got a grip, decded that it wasn't "all music", but was a very specific music with a specific identity, history and place in the national culture.
In the long run, it really doen't matter; the music I call folk will survive in archives and on bookshelves and it will remain as probably the most researched musical form ever - it's just a pity that the next generation won't have the same opportunities we had to listen to it at its best.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 18 May 10 - 01:43 PM

not arguing that Ron just that there is a variety of singer songwriter that is not under the folk umbrella because it is basically different, does not sound like folk. For my purposes it is outside of folk.

Again an entire class of music that does not resemble trad folk in the least needs its own identity and trad folk needs its space and time back.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 18 May 10 - 01:08 PM

It is "all music" in the end. You are the one who has been unable to define "folk" for us. Folk music is plural, not singular, and you have so far failed to recognize that.

You accept your BRAND of what you grew up with as "FOLK MUSIC" - an apparently singular style based on your previous posts. You fail to realize that every nation has various folk styles that fit under the umbrella. Again, folk music is more like an encyclopedia set, not an individual volume.   Singer-songwriter, as defined by the contemporary folk community, is merely another entry.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 18 May 10 - 11:49 AM

Ok ron heres one for you

if it is all music why use the word folk

lets just call it all music

that means you can play anything!

all depends on the purpose of the definition and it is at times useful to split and sometimes useful to lump

I say accurate splitting is necessary to fairly allocate scarce veneu and air time.

Conrad

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 18 May 10 - 09:01 AM

"so many S.S songs are personal enough to be 'private' songs "

There is no denying that there are "personal" songs among singer-songwriters, but the better artists are creating songs that do fit the universal theme.   Love is probably the most personal, yet universal theme there is. Barbara Allen is an artifact of the style of its time, and contemporary singer-songwriters are writing on the same theme in similar terms that can be touched by all.

No one likes to sit through someones therapy session, and writers get that.   

It is too easy to generalize about singer-songwriters, I admit to falling trap to it too. I used to call them singer-songwhiners. Then I started to pay attention. I was wrong to use such stereotypes. When you really start to listen you will find a body of work that can be considered folk of it's time - depending on how you interpret the definition.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 18 May 10 - 04:05 AM

""If you persist in using the title "singer/songwriter" to describe that very narrow band of introspective creation, then you are lumping all the very fine singer/songwriters in every other branch and root of music into that category.

If you think that makes any kind of sense, you are as big a fool as you try to appear.

By all means put that kind of music into a space of its own, but (excuse the shout) FIND ANOTHER NAME FOR IT.

It isn't about the method of creation, it's about the emotions.

Why not call it autobiographical music, which would be closer, and at least wouldn't debase and devalue the work of thousands who both write and perform with their gaze far removed from their navels.

In fact Conrad, I'm inclined to think that your gaze needs adjusting to encompass something outside of your own navel, as all your threads have a "whining about the way things are because the way things are doesn't suit you" quality.

Don T.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 18 May 10 - 02:56 AM

"Introspective? You are saying that folk music isn't?"
There is a difference Ron - Barbara Allen is on a universal theme and set in such general terms as to enable it to survive for centuries and to take root wherever it landed, so becoming a 'Norfolk', 'Suffolk', 'Connemara', 'Aberdeenshire', 'Appalachian'.... song, whereas, so many S.S songs are personal enough to be 'private' songs (hence allowing them to be referred to on occasion as 'armpit songs', as that is where they appear to be directed).
A friend writing in a music journal here summed many of them up for me with "You feel you want to tap the singer on the shoulder and ask for permission to come in".
MacColl's premise for songwriting was, "to move the song from the specific to the general". A song might be about the singer's own experiences, their lover, wife, friend, mother.... but for it to survive and be taken up, it had to be open-ended enough to become everybody's. This is how his best songs, even his most 'private' such as 'My Old Man' and 'Nobody Knew She Was There', worked for me. They never left me with the feeling that I was intruding on a private experience, as many S. S. compositions do (not all of them - don't want to generalise).
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don Firth
Date: 18 May 10 - 12:44 AM

More and more, I'm beginning to think our friend Conrad is nothing but a wind-up artist.

Or, perhaps, a CLICKY

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 18 May 10 - 12:14 AM

No need to come up with a better name - it is part of folk music.

You keep calling it "it's own thing" - but there is NO SINGLE FOLK MUSIC STYLE. All of folk music is subgenres so adding "singer-songwriter" or "contemporary" has already been done. It is a folk music.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 May 10 - 11:34 PM

don
"And this "easy listening" label that you keep tossing around is a category primarily invented by radio stations that play, essentially, background music, which is to say, music that allows you to have some jolly pleasant noise in the background to drown out the sound of the termites eating away the support beams of your house, but not so obtrusive and you have to pay any attention to it. Also it's usually so bland that it doesn't detract from the four-minute commercial breaks that come every eleven minutes."

On the nose. Contemporary singer songwriter (non folk variety)

Higher level- better word is larger market share
beyond the flame covered as it is now by a basket kept there by stubborn folkies unwilling to let it shine

Conrad

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 May 10 - 11:30 PM

Ron- we all know what we are talking about you are welcome to come up with a better name- non folk singer songwriter perhaps.

It is its own thing recognizable so needs a better name and even singer songwriter is not helpful so wondering why singer songwriters chose it if they insist all of them, in being included in folk

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 May 10 - 10:40 PM

Conrad, sometimes it's a bit hard to determine from your opaque prose, but you seem to have completely misinterpreted what I wrote.

"Much of the highly introspective whining that is not traditional sounding, muttering into a coffee cup contemporary singer songwriter fits your definition perfectly and that is why it is not folk traditional or even close."

That is completely confused mish-mash of what I really said, and bears no resemblance to it. Fits my definition? Were you actually referring to something I wrote? I certainly don't recognize it.

I will not repeat what I have already written, because you obvious have not read it, or if you have read it, you didn't understand a thing I said.

No, folk songs do not sing themselves. So in that sense, folk music "does not have a life of its own." But it does have a life of its own in the sense that people have always sung folk songs. Not everyone, of course, because musical tastes differ. But a sufficient percentage of people do sing folk songs and ballads that this form of expression has lasted for millennia—and that is without anyone having to "manage" it. And it will continue to last the same way.

Conrad, what do you mean by bringing folk music "to a higher level?" A "higher level" in what respect?

And no singer of folk songs that I know or know of is not interested in creating greater interest in what they sing and expanding the audiences for folk music. As I, and others here, have said, it's already being done. You apparently simply can't see it, but it is there. None of us are "leaving it be."

But if you want to get a good idea of what kind of general damage that hard-sell promotion and "management" of folk music can do—and in some cases, has done—take a good look at this thread:    CLICKY.   I rarely participate in this anymore because of the way it's being managed.

And DO try to read more carefully, will you?

Don Firth

P. S. That little YouTube cartoon must be about something going on on Mars.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 17 May 10 - 10:12 PM

What a load of crap. It is so easy to stereotype something you obviously know very little about.

Introspective? You are saying that folk music isn't? Take a closer look at "Barbara Allen". Ever listen to the blues, or perhaps you do not consider that a form of folk music? It is easy to be selective.

Once again you are being selective in your opinions and views and not using sound reasoning or realistic criteria. You feel that "Hee Haw" was folk music and you ignore the same qualities and persective that exist in contemporary singer-songwriters. It all boils down to your own perspective, and anything that you do not like becomes exempt from folk music, regardless of any historic precedence. '

Folk music DOES have a life of it's own - that is one of the attributes of folk music. The sky is not falling, folk music is alive and well - and thriving.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 May 10 - 09:23 PM

Perhaps you will find my creative piece on Contemporary folk festivals of interest.

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

Contemporary Folk Festivals

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 May 10 - 08:48 PM

I was born in 53 so am familiar with those performers.

Much of the highly introspective whining that is not traditional sounding, muttering into a coffee cup contemporary singer songwriter fits your definition perfectly and that is why it is not folk traditional or even close. You can listen to it while having a root canal- white noise neutral like someone crying in the corner but a bit too far away about something that is really inconsequential.....

Undercurrent....always will be there....not where my music should be.
Traditional music like all other music needs to find stability. The ups and downs are hard on it creating loss, necessitating costly re-discovery. When I find a song in some obscure place I want it played and not pre-empted by some trendy hardly folk anything substitute.

I do not know why people are content to simply pretend that folk music has a life of its own. Actually it is a wonder that it has survived. If not for a select few of persistent individuals picking it up and giving it life when almost dead it would be gone now.

Even though you may still believe it is still there will be there does not need hope is there really anything wrong with bringing it to a higher level and bigger audience? Not really imho.

Leaving it be seems to me to be an excuse rather than a purposeful helpful response.

Conrad

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 May 10 - 08:15 PM

Conrad, to get a clue as to what it's all about, you might get a copy of The Rainbow Quest, by Ronald D. Cohen, University of Massachusetts Press (2002) and read it.

And here's another clue:   The Hee Haw shows that RFD cable is running are reruns from as far back as nearly forty years ago. The show first aired in 1969.

It was a comedy show and featured "country" music, which is more of a Nashville invention than traditional American folk music, along with a whole bunch of screwin' around in the corn field. Co-hosts were Buck Owens and Roy Clark, and they had a lot of guest stars passing through, such as Garth Brooks, Reba McEntire, Merle Haggard, and Dolly Parton, not to mention people like Regis Philbin and Sammy Davis Jr., along with occasional visitations by Loretta Lynn.

It is hardly what much of anybody who is interested in American folk music would think of as "American folk music."

Really!

And, yes, I did watch a lot of the shows back in the early 1970s. Some good country music when they weren't spraying corn out of their ears, but that was pretty funny. The show started as a summer replacement for The Smothers Brothers Show.

I didn't mistake it for "folk music," nor did many other people.

Are you sure you know folk music when you hear it?

And this "easy listening" label that you keep tossing around is a category primarily invented by radio stations that play, essentially, background music, which is to say, music that allows you to have some jolly pleasant noise in the background to drown out the sound of the termites eating away the support beams of your house, but not so obtrusive and you have to pay any attention to it. Also it's usually so bland that it doesn't detract from the four-minute commercial breaks that come every eleven minutes.

I would not like to see folk music be used as "easy listening" music. If you want to spark peoples' interest in folk music, trying to use it for "easy listening" is a completely bass-ackwards way of going about it. Downright counterproductive, in fact!

How do I know this? In the early 1970s, I broke into broadcasting by working for a year as a board announcer in an "easy listening" radio station before I got a job as an announcer at a classic music station. As a result of these broadcasting jobs, I learned quite a bit about categories and genres of music because I had to check the labels on record bins and on the record library shelves to find the music I was looking for to play on the air.

If you want to listen to folk music, you would stand a much greater chance if you turn off Hee Haw and try surfing the various college-sited radio stations and NPR affiliates (often one and the same). You can find them by dial-twisting on your radio, or if that fails, many of them stream live on the internet. Many of them play a fair amount of folk music. Genuine traditional folk music. There is such a station where I live. The station also plays what they refer to as "contemporary folk," which is "singer-songwriter" material. But the announcers usually make it clear which is which.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 May 10 - 02:59 PM

"Did any of the collectors publishers of folk as per the definition you apply take any thing from their work?"
Not sure I understand your question Tim; if you mean amatures like us, certainly not; though we did make sure we had full agreement from the singers before we did anything with the recordings other than archive them.
Personally, we were in a position were we could not afford to be seen making money from what we did so, again with the agreement of the singers, we signed over all royalties to organisations such as The Irish Traditional Archive in Dublin so that they were ploughed back into the music. I'm pretty sure other collectors, such as Mike Yates adopted a similar attitude.
There have been accusations that some collectors made a considerable sum by selling (and copyrighting) their recodings - I only know for certain of one case where this happened.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 May 10 - 02:53 PM

Conrad, if you had been around during the first half of the 1960s, you would have heard folk music—i.e.The Kingston Trio, The New Christy Minstrels, Peter Paul and Mary, Trini Lopez, Jimmy Rodgers, The Gateway Singers, Bill Brewer, Jan Stewer, Peter Gurney, Peter Davey, Daniel Widdon, Harry Hawk, Old Uncle Tom Cobbley and all pouring out of juke boxes, the windows of passing automobiles, in elevators, and gawd knows where all else!!

Most of this was very slick and quite commercial, and gave a rather warped impression to the general public about what folk and traditional music is really like. I'm not that all-fired sure that presenting folk music in that manner is a good thing. Besides, that put folk music into the general tides of popular music, which meant it was subject to "Tin Pan Alley" commercialism, general market forces, and the vicissitudes of popular taste, in which all things are subject to obsolescence and ultimate replacement by something else.

And that's exactly what happened. The so-called folk music revival of the Sixties was swamped and replaced by what became known as "The British Invasion" with The Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Petula Clark, Gary and the Pacemakers, et al.

The main good that the "Folk Music Revival" of the 1960s accomplished was that it got a percentage of people interested in actual folk music. I have former guitar students who came to me for lessons because they had heard Peter Paul and Mary and wanted to play guitar like Peter Yarrow and sing songs like "500 Miles" and "Leaving on a Jet Plane." But when popular, commercial "folk music" faded in the shadow of The Beatles, some of them went on (with a little nudging from me) to investigate the records of singers like Doc Watson or Jean Ritchie. I have several students who went on to become quite accomplished performers of traditional folk music, and some of them are teaching.

Except for blips like the 1960s "Folk Music Revival" (or "The Great Folk Scare"), folk music is like an underlying stream. It's always there and does not need promotion or "management" or people trying to steer it this way or that.

It is—and always has been—best to let if follow its own course.

And if you want to hear folk music pouring out of speakers, go buy some records!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 May 10 - 02:18 PM

Lots of exceptions of course don and good ones but not a national trend

you need to listen to a bit more hee haw catch it on cable rfd station.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don Firth
Date: 17 May 10 - 02:03 PM

I've heard a lot of commercial country music on "Hee Haw," but damned little folk music!!

Conrad, following on Jim Carroll's comments about Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger's efforts to spread enthusiasm for singing traditional and related songs, how do you explain Pete Seeger's constant urging people to sing folk songs and if so moved, pick up a portable musical instrument and learn to play it? Pete went so far as to write "How to Play the 5-String Banjo" and "The Folk Singer's Guitar Guide," both of which have companion instruction records.

Elizabeth Lomax Hawes used to teach folk guitar techniques to classes of up to 60 people at a time. Frank Hamilton (who posts here as Stringsinger) was a co-founder, along with Win Stracke, of the Old Town School of Music in Chicago.

Locally, Bob Nelson taught folk guitar classes in Everett some forty miles north of Seattle and I taught folk guitar classes three evenings a week here in Seattle. I know that such classes were being taught all over the country by people who were, at the same time, active performers of folk music.

Really, Conrad, you need to get out more, and while you're out, look around!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 May 10 - 08:31 AM

Hee Haw has more folk music than you will find on any other broadcast program. Some good guitar and banjo and in some instances some very good folk humor some of it quite old. Also country but new , at the time country, that sounded like country not some sort of other singer songwriter forms that sound nothing like country. These extreme contemporary easy listening forms dont get on country shows but they sneak into folk programming and imho shouldn't.

As for the "nothing is wrong with the way things are and have been" well that is not good. Folk music must have a bigger place in the market and it would if people kept it straight and promoted it properly in the proper presentation settings. We can not rest until the treasures we are the caretakers of and have stored on line and in books and libaries are in the minds and souls of the people at large as they have to be for the best shot at preservation.

I have yet to see anything resembling folk music coming out of the extra loud speakers of the hundreds of cars that pass me daily. It is not in the malls, It is under represented in the record bins of best buy it is not on local radio.

So I guess that minimal market penetration is great and as it should be? Sure. It means fewer folk musicians are employed as well. Fewer instruments are sold fewer cds are sold.

Why?

Because simply for the past several decades people have been doing something wrong. Demand for music does not evolve on its own any more than the demand for an antacid- demand is created by effective manipulation of the market place, teaching and effective transmission at festivals. At festivals you get effective entertainment and that should not be confused with transmission.

When you embrace the view that folk is all things then you confuse the issue for the listener they cant find the folk for the clutter adding to the other existing problems blocking transmission and narrowing the market place.

Yes at one level it is perfectly reasonable to employ the definition that everything created by a human being is therefore folk. However using that paradigm you can never solve the problems we need to solve to fulfill our obligations as caretakers of the traditions.

Conrad

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 17 May 10 - 08:27 AM

I see what you mean JC. Did any of the collectors publishers of folk as per the definition you apply take any thing from their work?

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 May 10 - 08:19 AM

as for

©

The rule is remembered thusly:

C circle see all let it be!

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 17 May 10 - 08:16 AM

hey don whats the evidence

If I can separate it out as a genre in a darkened room from folk then its a genre.

Contemporary easy listening singer songwriter

for lack of a better term

it has been pointed out that it does not sound like folk just doesnt just like country, jazz, blues, Bluegrass

Ok if you want sub genres depending on how you define folk wide or narrow. It is not trad sounding however.

If anything it is personal confession, introspective whine sounding

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 17 May 10 - 05:36 AM

""Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT* - PM
Date: 15 May 10 - 08:02 AM

the
Contemporary or "easy listening" Singer Songwriter Style"

you missed it.....this is a genre and distinct from others""

NO! IT ISN'T!

There are plenty of easy listening performers out there who have never put two words together or composed a bar of music.

The GENRE is "Easy listening"

The singer songwriter part of it, is simply an example of songs within that genre which are original compositions by the performer. It is not a genre, nor even a sub genre.

Why do you, in the face of all the evidence presented, persist in sustaining a totally untenable position.

Don T.

Don T.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 May 10 - 04:51 AM

"I try to put that Little thing (like a c inside an o)on my stuff."
I agree with you Tim - I was making a point about the ownership of the song - yours and not folk - not a criticism.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 17 May 10 - 04:31 AM

I try to put that Little thing (like a c inside an o)on my stuff.
I thought it just meant that If there was gonna be any money available at some point I might get some.
It doesn't seem to stop other people performing said stuff,and changing it to suit themselves.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 17 May 10 - 03:43 AM

". . . folkies do not want things to expand "
MacColl was the archetype 'finger-in-ear' folkie - the term referred to his and others' (and millenia of traditional singers) practice of cupping the hand over the ear to stay in pitch.
Yet, while introducing many hundreds of traditional songs onto the scene, including 137 Child ballads, he wrote more contemporary songs than any single revival singer and encouraged the writing of new songs to the extent of running songwriting workshops.
Peggy Seeger, (another finger-in-earer) published New City Songster, which ran into twenty odd editions and several hundred songs, to promote songwriting.
A little different from your avarge S.Ser, who carefully puts a little (c) next to his/her song to ascertain that it will always be 'their' composition, and never that of the folk.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don Firth
Date: 16 May 10 - 10:51 PM

Hee Haw.

Hmm. . . .

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 16 May 10 - 09:49 PM

So you consider Hee Haw folk, but you do not see "singer-songwriters" as folk.   Interesting logic.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 16 May 10 - 09:23 PM

Just watched Hee Haw on RFD

Reminded me that there is no form of folk programming on cable at all unless it is an ancient rerun

I suppose that is because what has been done for 20-30 years has been great stuff

not to say that hee haw is trad folk but it is closer in some aspects than much.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Don Firth
Date: 16 May 10 - 08:30 PM

Conrad:    ". . . folkies do not want things to expand and wont demand that people learn how to play traditionally."

WHAT!??

This makes no sense whatsoever.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 16 May 10 - 07:30 PM

"Ron the issue is not if we have them or not but why there is not sufficient growth.

We introduce more people to traditional music by making it more available and not dumbing it down."

But you just showed an example of how it is growing and how you are not dumbing it down. How can you turn around and say the opposite when you give us proof that your statement is wrong???

You are repeating yourself again Conrad. No one is dumbing it down. You fail to explain why people were drawn to trad music in the first place, which we discussed a few hours ago. When the need and interest arises, it will be as popular as it needs to be.

The sky is not falling.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Stringsinger
Date: 16 May 10 - 07:21 PM

A song speaks for itself.    It is its own category.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 16 May 10 - 07:13 PM

Ron the issue is not if we have them or not but why there is not sufficient growth.

We introduce more people to traditional music by making it more available and not dumbing it down.

We have three or four annual events here at the Center for fawkesian pursuits = free for all no money involved numbers ranging from 120 to 20 and growing. Trad music as well as foods as well as traditions available to anyone who turns up rain or shine. FREE

It is easier to water down a tradition than to maintain it.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 16 May 10 - 06:57 PM

Sorry Conrad, no one is holding anything back. We do have trad participatory and singer-songwriter.

You are focusing on an issue that does not exist.   The real question is "how do we introduce more people to traditional music?"   Instead of writing diatribes about what it isn't, spend time constructively and talk about what is good about traditional music. Not happy with with a clubs decision to avoid trad music?   Get off your ass and start your own? Can't do it? Then you have no one to blame but yourself.

There is no "dumbing down". You are dead wrong.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 16 May 10 - 06:39 PM

Ron fact is that it is not entering either tradition commercial or other it is held back by a few who simply want to dillute it in the name of evolution. Not necesary. You can have trad participatory as well as commercial versions.

Look at the breakfast cerial isle in your supermarket. Each one of those products no matter how terrible are sold. Trouble is that folkies do not want things to expand and wont demand that people learn how to play traditionally.

Fusion and excessive adaptations are not progress they are full retreat and dumbing down.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: glueman
Date: 16 May 10 - 12:52 PM

Is it the case that songwriters in the folk idiom aspire for their work to pass into the tradition? That's never been my impression.

If we remove the necessity for change and emphasise widespread adoption there are any number of popular songs that meet the criteria. If we take away adoption and stress change there are numerous football songs that fit the bill.
I don't believe singer-songwriters are awaiting immortality, I reckon they'd like to be paid well for their talent and failing remuneration, would like to hear other people perform their work.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: GUEST,999
Date: 16 May 10 - 12:50 PM

Bien dit, Monsieur Olesko. Bien dit!

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 16 May 10 - 12:48 PM

Conrad - you want everything, you just do not want to pay for it. What you fail to realize is that you have what you need already.

Why would you want a mall to be playing border ballads? What purpose would that serve?

At one point folk music was a participatory form of entertainment, but you seem to wish it to enter the commercial mainstream but you do not want to subject it to the changes that would occur to do so.   Folk music is right where it always has been. IF you wish to find it as a commercial source of entertainment, it is there - you just have to pay for it. If you want to save your nickels and dimes, simply make the music the way it always has been done.   You cannot have your cake and eat it too if you think the way you do.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 16 May 10 - 12:35 PM

The other thing is that everything is bigger everything is on line and accessible in a larger way still I dont see lots of trad folk venues springing up all over the place here in Maryland- the ones that were there are shutting down and getting prohibitively expensive- so if people are doing things right and properly transmitting the folk musical culture then the picture should be much different so then whats wrong if all is ok.? I suppose where you are everyone in the mall is humming one of the grand airs of connemara and border ballads are being performed in all the fast food places....

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 16 May 10 - 12:28 PM

No folk music radio in the DC md area these days. I listen only to BBC
and no I am not getting a digital radio

listening to the bbc programming I find that it is getting to be 2/3 singer songwriter contemporary and fusion thats only 1/3 traditional performance or less- perhaps I should do the stats no I just enjoy what I can....

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 16 May 10 - 12:06 PM

I refuse to contribute to this thread as it was started by the Idiot-non-savant.

But if people would bother to understand what "folk song" or "folk music" meant they might stand a chance of a dialogue.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 16 May 10 - 10:07 AM

Conrad - I think you are missing the picture.   If we were to go with public opinion, we would not be sharing singer-songwriters or traditional folk. Watch "American Idol" or listen to commercial radio and you won't hear much of either.   

You are asking for "fair space". No problem with that, but in the real world that "fair space" is not "free space". Fair space is providing equal OPPORTUNITY for a product (in this case music) to be shared and consumed. Water finds its own level and audiences discover their own music.

When the folk revival began, there were far LESS opportunities to hear this music. Radio offered little, the recording industry was NOT offering extensive traditional releases and the general public was not aware of folk music. Individuals sought out this music and collected their own - sharing with friends and eventually the commerical interests took notice and nearly ruined it for all.

Today, we reap the benefits of the past. I could spend 10 minutes and download hundreds of traditional songs and tunes - for free. I see more and more CD's of traditional music available than ever before - I would say more than when LP's were in fasion. Because of lower costs of production, CD's are able to be released without the huge expense of LP's, and the opportunties are out there.

You fall into the trap of believing what inspired and enriched your life (as well as mine and many of the posters Mudcat) should equally inspire and enrich the lives of future generations IN THE SAME FASHION.   You fail to realize that the singer-songwriters that you brush off as "easy listening" are creating the same inspiration and enriching the lives of others in EXACTLY THE SAME FASHION that your life was enriched in the previous century. The quality of writing, the subject matter AND the place in the lives of the community they are part of is probably higher than it has ever been.

The sky is not falling. Traditional music is alive and well.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: *#1 PEASANT*
Date: 16 May 10 - 07:28 AM

Ron-

Our job is to be above constantly shifting sands of public opinion and the demand of the market and make sure that the treasures of folk music are protected and kept in the arena. A little intervention. Just their fair space. They can not go on to inspire and enrich if they are not heard and now that the floodgates are open allowing contemporary easy listening singer songwriter music an exceedingly large portion of air time and venue time traditional folk has to make due with minimal space.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: GUEST,Steamin' Willie
Date: 16 May 10 - 05:27 AM

All this tosh around pedantic interpretation of sheer semantics.

Folk is what you think it is. Singer / songwriter can conjure up whatever you want it to conjure up.


You know what? You are right. And so is the guy writing the exact opposite.

They are subjective terms so make excellent subjects for people to claim they hold the holy grail.

If you feel so strongly that you know what a singer / songwriter is. If your interpretation of folk is so precious you are willing to push the point... may I make a suggestion?

Try getting out a bit more.

Subject: RE: Singer Song Writer or Wronger?
From: Larry The Radio Guy
Date: 16 May 10 - 01:48 AM

While I admit that I still find the occasional great new song, my complaint is that every singer is now being pressured to write his or her own songs. And every great songwriter is pressured to sing his or her own songs. This means that nobody is doing anybody else's songs, no matter how great they are. The entertainment "business" now consists of a glut of (mostly bad) songs that nobody else will ever do other than the singer-songwriter who wrote it.

Hence, our landfills are starting to overflow with songs, and we are suffering from serious song pollution. The solution?   Stop writing songs and instead look for great ones that have already been written and recycle it.