Alternative Folk Awards

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 07:43 AM

no leveller, if you are a republican, you believe in a republic, if you are an anarchist you believe the notion of a state to be undesirable, whether the state be a monarchy or a republic, leveller you cant have it both ways, you are eiuther an anarchist or a republican it is a contradiction to try and both at the same time.
as for the rest of your post it is similiar cods wallop, i am not putiing folk lovers into boxes , but i am saying that most folk music lovers are middle class.
go to a working mens club ask them what kind of music they like unfortunately most of them will not say matty groves or the famous flower of serving men, and you know it, start being honest.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Mavis Enderby
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 07:47 AM

You might be right Spleen, but it's perhaps best to move the thread drift to this thread

I'd echo Crowsisters comments also. Kinda got lost in the above but one of the good things about these awards is it introduces you to new artists - I'm very impressed with Emily Barker & the Red Clay Halo. Also very glad to see Rapunzel and Sedayne and Walsh and Pound in there.

PS - voting is open. Just done mine...

PPS - I agree with a lot of what you say about the BBC Big Al, but I don't think this is the right thread for it...

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Vic Smith
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 07:51 AM

Big Al Whittle wrote -
"Carthy, Gillian Welch, Courtney Pine.

Can you imagine any of these people handling a new years eve gig, where people get up and boogie?"

Well, as it happens, Martin Carthy spent New Year's Eve last night playing for his daughter's Motown Ceilidh at London's South Bank where hundreds of people danced all night and the whole thing was a huge success.

So, yes, Mr. Whittle, it is very easy to imagine that people boogie the old year away with two generations of Carthys - because very many were doing just that last night.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 08:22 AM

Obviously the points I am trying to make are incommunicable to those with limited experience of life.

I'm done with trying.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: evansakes
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 08:31 AM

Big Al Whittle wrote -
"Carthy, Gillian Welch, Courtney Pine.

Can you imagine any of these people handling a new years eve gig, where people get up and boogie?"

To debunk another of Big Al's myths, Gillian Welch and her partner David Rawlings can do it too, Vic. A few years back I saw them with Buddy Miller's band running through a bunch of standards in a bar (including Chuck Berry's 'Nadine' and Dylan's 'Highway 61). Rawlings was playing electric guitar solos reminiscent of Eddie van Halen...

....and while I'm on, Gillian Welch wasn't automatically elevated into arts centres and theatres either. There was no silver spoon in her mouth or red carpet treatment. On her first visit to the UK she played pubs and small clubs in front of 40 or 50 people and worked her way up from there (I saw her at Dingwalls then Shepherd's Bush Empire then Hammersmith Odeon). It's all possible.....you just need need a shed load of talent coupled with the right attitude and a bit of determination.

Can't comment about Courtney Pine but I suspect it's a similar story.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Vic Smith
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 08:56 AM

TwickFolk wrote:-
"Can't comment about Courtney Pine but I suspect it's a similar story."

Well, I can! Courtney is one of my great heroes. He came into jazz after playing in reggae and pop groups as a young man. Courtney Pine's interest in jazz was fostered when he participated in workshops run by John Stevens and although he is now known mainly as an outstanding jazz reedsman, he still plays reggae, soul and pop gigs. Listen to his Closer To Home album and try and convince me that parts of it are not the most sublime dance music. It was not all that long ago that he played a "home town" gig at the Brixton Astoria and there were not all that many people in their seats that night.....

So, I reckon that apart from Carthy, Gillian Welch and Courtney Pine, his list of non-danceable acts may be accurate.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: evansakes
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 08:57 AM

Obviously the points I am trying to make are incommunicable to those with limited experience of life

Big Al, you're the one making all sorts of wild assumptions about people on the folk scene not having paid their dues or fulfilled various rites of passage in shitty pubs and workingmen's clubs. You don't have a monopoly on this. I'm sure many of us have been there, done that and written the book. For myself, I did the best part of a thousand gigs in these places over a ten year period (including every New Years Eve). Like you, I know what it's like to have a rat-arsed individual spitting in my face and bellowing out for Hi-ho Silver Lining etc. We played it too (of course) along with Johnny B Goode and all the others.....and everyone got up to dance (once they'd had enough to drink anyway). All this gave me the satisfaction of being a working musician and earning reasonable recompense....but it's not a scene I'd care to return to these days and not anything I'm particularly proud of either. It's certainly not anything I'd consider an essential apprenticeship for getting up onstage with an acoustic instrument and entertaining a listening audience in a folk club (as you seem to be implying)

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 09:07 AM

Can't comment about Courtney Pine but I suspect it's a similar story...

It is. Whilst Courtney Pine isn't really my cup of tea, you have to hand it to him that he's an accomplished and versatile musician who can turn his hand to all sorts of things - soul, funk and reggae as well as the jazz he's known for, as I discovered when I was dragged out to see him play live.

*********

I do wonder why Al thinks that being able to win over a hostile or indifferent crowd at one of the few remaining working men's clubs is some sort of barometer of whether you're any good, though. Is it about some sort of notion of musicians havinga duty to give the people what you assume they want? Personally, I think if someone wants to sit through another pissed-up rendition of Crystal Chandaliers and other boozy favourites in a dismal hall with crap acoustics, fair play to them. Don't be suprised when not everyone thinks of that as a good night out, though - including most ordinary working class British people, if the terminal decline of the WMC and of live music in pubs is anything to go by. And for the vast majority of musicians of any genre, being the background noise at a WMC isn't even on their radar, and why should it be? Mosrt musicians are going to look for audiences who might enjoy what they are playing, not some sort of macho, gladiatoral showdown. Or some illusory lower common denominator set list of tried and tested favourites. It the Beatles had done that chances are they'd still be playing Chuck Berry and Little Richard covers in some back room and we wouldn't have Revolver and Sgt Pepper and all the music that inspired.

Here's a for instance: Harp and a Monkey, whose album Folk Police put out in 2011, are gig monsters who'll play anywhere and always get asked back. One of the things they do is to gig in towns in the back of beyond that don't get many visiting bands. Even they don't make a point of doing these allegedly essential WMC style retro-gigs, though. And they probably tick a lot of Al's boxes - ordinary northern lads who write very hummable songs that actually say something.

*********

Drat. I seem to have allowed myself to get sucked in.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: GUEST,Spleen Cringe
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 09:11 AM

Ooops! Cross posted with Vic 'n' Twick who have said the same sort of thing more succinctly.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 09:55 AM

Well I'm sucked out - along with the 95% of the population. I'm accused of ranting and abused if I have a divergent opinion about folk music.

Theres no conversation here. But remember what goes around etc. Next time they close down one of your radio programmes, or one of your sacred cows goes bankrupt. This is the isolation from your fellow men that you sought out.

As you say Spleen, many musicians work in appalling conditions. probably the 95%, that i identify with. still we can always sing about what a bugger it is to be press ganged, and theres always bang up to date subjects youre allowed to sing about - like World War 1 and being transported for poaching.

And who knows perhaps one of your heroes will let you buy them a drink and they'll let you in on their new concept album, soon to be an unwatched programme on BBC4.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: GUEST
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 11:28 AM

This "isolation" business - what do you mean, exactly? Are you suggesting that everyone should play music that is manufactured with the intention of appealing to the widest possible cross section of people? If so, I can think of very few songs that 'everyone' likes and even fewer acts where 'everyone' likes their entire repetoire. And where's the room in this for variety and innovation and progress and minority taste? Or is even thinking of such things elitist? What are you suggesting that musicians should be doing as an alternative to what they are doing? As far asI can see, there's more variety of music out there than ever and there were some brilliant albums out this yaer in all sorts of genres and styles - whether the people making them are getting by is another matter - a lot more people seem to be doing it for the love of the music rather than to be jobbing musicians. I reckon that's a good thing, unless you think that all musicians should be able to do a set of 'classic' pop and rock standards at the drop of a hat - whether they want to or not. You do lots of sniping at people who might have middle class fans and haven't 'paid their dues' (whatever that means). But what do you want instead? Imagine for a moment that I'm really dense and you have to spell it out to me simply and clearly. Then I might understand what you're saying, Al. I know what I want - and that's to hear music that moves me. Whether on not it moves anyone else is up to them. But I don't think we should try to impose any sorts of imaginary absolutes on musicians or listeners even if we could, which we can't.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Acorn4
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 11:35 AM

I think quite a few of us play in fringe sessions at pubs during festivals and have had the experience of an audience gathering round. Very often people will come up and say that they've not enjoyed listening to something so much for a long time, and they weren't aware that this kind of thing existed.

It's perhaps that some folk don't realise things exist unless they're on television, and these are often those who wouldn't dream of going to a folk gig.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 12:20 PM

well of course guest you are right, there are no absolutes.

Its a schizoid sort of thing. I always knew when I was doing both sorts of gigs, that both sides were missing out.

Easy enough to see what the plebs are missing out on - their cultural roots etc.

I always felt the prole musicians though had SO MUCH that the folkie crowd took no cognisance of. And i felt that folk music was poorer for that.

Of course you also right that recording has never been easier. You can buy a twenty four track digital recorder and burn cds off for less that five hundred quid these days. Brilliant! and good quality musical instruments at entry level have never been cheaper.

However just perambulating in my senior years round the open mics, folk clubs etc, pub gigs - I find this sullen acceptance that all of this brilliant music will just languish and stay here - subterranean almost. And hand on heart - do the Transatlantic Sessions move anyone - except to boredom? Wouldn't it be great if some new music and musicians emerged, someone who'd attack folk music from another direction. You often see it in the clubs - but never on the telly.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Mavis Enderby
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 01:36 PM

Of course you also right that recording has never been easier. You can buy a twenty four track digital recorder and burn cds off for less that five hundred quid these days. Brilliant! and good quality musical instruments at entry level have never been cheaper.

That's more like it! The internet is also a major resource - type in nearly any song you can think of and someone's put their version on youtube.

You might not see it on the telly but it is out there.

Wouldn't it be great if some new music and musicians emerged, someone who'd attack folk music from another direction.

Well I reckon it is, some of whom are nominees for the Spiral Earth awards. It's one of the reasons why I'm bemused at your attacks Al. I think you've been firing at the wrong targets...

Pete.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 01:46 PM

I can't recollect attacking Spiral Earth. anyway, who am I to mount an attack on anyone?

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 01:54 PM

I may have mis interpreted what Al is saying, but this is what i think he is saying... a really outgoing performer with a versatile repertoire, can play folk clubs and also play in working mens clubs and pubs and still captivate a non folk audience, but that most people who play in folk clubs are limited with their repertoire and presentation,and are lost outside the folk revival.
I have seen some exceptions, one was john foreman playing to a caravan and camping club, all his one liners appeared spontaneous and he went down a storm.
on another occasion Andy Kenna [who was on before me] and myself managed to win over a hostile pub audience at lancaster maritime festival, when other folk performers had given up.
but we are taking about two different things, Idont doubt CARTHYS AND JIM MORAY HAD A GOOD GIG, but those people were there specifically to see them, being able to entertain a no folk pub audience is different, in fact i did it last night, but in ireland it is easier because tradtional music is more part of the mainstream culture than it is in england, but i had to take a different approach than the normal folk club approach[i still did some serious and social comment songs]

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 02:12 PM

yes but part of the reason that traditional is more part of mainstream culture is the fact that the expertise that pub entertainers have is considered infra dig this side of the Irish Sea.

Some folk dj's flatly refuse to play original work by people who gig pubs.

Its a class thing Dick. These people think we're their inferior. Is it jealousy when we go down well, or suceed with an audience they would die in front of. I dunno. Stopped caring years ago. I just accept the fact.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 02:18 PM

Like I say - I stopped caring back in the days of cassette albums - so should you stop caring. That way lies madness!

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: GUEST,Class War Warrior
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 02:24 PM

Don't back down Al, you're right to have a go at Gillian Welch, Sebastian Coe and whoever the third one was as they are ALL middle class spongers, sponging off you and me.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Mavis Enderby
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 02:55 PM

I can't recollect attacking Spiral Earth

didn't say you did. Fair to say your tone towards the awards has been less than positive though? I was referring mainly to your attacks on musicians who you think don't deserve the recognition they get. In this respect Carthy, Welch and Pine seem very odd targets indeed!

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Vic Smith
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 02:55 PM

Idont doubt CARTHYS AND JIM MORAY HAD A GOOD GIG, but those people were there specifically to see them,

This would seem to betray a misunderstanding of the make-up of this particular event. The very expensive tickets entitled those who attended to a wide range of events ranging from the classics to silent discos in virtually every nook and cranny of the South Bank Centre. All of these presentations had to compete for their own audiences. A pick-up Britfolk band asking people to ceilidh dance to Detroit sounds was hardly going out of its way to attract its core audience. I would think that it was chosen because it had every chance of having a wide appeal amongst very attractive events featuring a good range of top performers.

Jim is mentioned in my quotation at the top and he has contributed to this thread so is clearly aware of what is being written. It would be interesting to hear his view on the make-up of those who danced at the Motown Ceilidh - and if it did involve people who would not usually be seen at a folk dance, then bloody good for them.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 03:07 PM

Vic, I am not criticising any event or any artist, i did in fact ask jim to correct me if i was wrong., he has not commented
but yet again, we are no comparing like with like dancing and bopping around, is not the same as asking a folk club revival singer to see how his repertoire would go down in a working mens club is it?and i tell you why its not the same Vic,because folk club material requires people to listen to words[it is not and should not be wall paper music] bopping about does not require the same mental concentration, it is not the same as asking a working mens club audience to listen to matty groves.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Vic Smith
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 03:20 PM

No suggestion that you were indulging in any criticism of any artist or act. No suggestion that folk dance and folk club material call for the same response - though my view is that they are closer than some would suggest. Merely trying to suggest that "people were there specifically to see them," might not be accurate on this particular occasion.

.... and Working Men's Clubs... well, I called and played for ceilidhs/barn dances for quite a number over the years at clubs where the committee take a broader view of what entertainment should be provided. They can be hard work and they can be quite rewarding. The most bizarre one was quite a few years ago when there was bingo during the interval.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 04:42 PM

ok vic, but you are still missing my point, yes barn dances might work in working mens clubs on occasions, but you know very well, you could not sing matty groves, on one april morning,willy of the winsbury,tam linn, reynardine, barbara allen,thomas the rhymer,claudy banks etc, without getting at best [what the f## is this turn]

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: GUEST,Guest Vivienne
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 05:35 PM

I think I've lost the plot of this argument! Are BAW and GSS trying to say that Working Men's Club audiences are "real" folk music and folk clubs are not?

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 06:06 PM

I prefer the music that i hear in folk clubs.
but as folk music is a minority taste it is a misnomer to call it folk music, because the vast majority[and particularly people who attend working mens clubs do not appear to like folk song]
now since a couple of the forefathers[Lloyd/ MacColl] of the UK folk revival had this idea that they wanted to further[for political purposes]That folk music was the music of the proletariat, this clearly not true, because the proletariat as demonstrated in working mens clubs clearly prefer other music, but not matty groves, or anything that requires much thought.
there are several reasons for this , the uk capatalist system does not want a well educated working class that analyses and thinks, the establishment believes a diet of bums tits sport and commercial musak is the best thing for EVERYBODY including the working class,
The establishment have stopped folk music in primary schools[when i was at school it was part of the national curriculum], the last reason might be that it is unfamiliar, requires concentration on lyrics, and is very strange compared to the popular music of the charts, so is rejected because of its unfamilarity.
let me tell you a story, i was giggng in the midlands some years ago, the bonny lass of anglesea[carthy],was on the jukebox, so i put it on......the reaction was interesting, the pool players in the pub stopped what the f###is this, reply o its that jazz singer

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 07:27 PM

A bunch of us went to do some songs and tunes at a local social club a couple of years ago. It was a free event, but it was a weeknight and nobody had done any advertising, so the audience consisted of regulars plus whoever wandered in. I was a bit greener than I am now, and when I did my song I went on with a bit of a "sod what you want, this is Folk Music" attitude; I did the Bonny Hind, unaccompanied. I wouldn't do that now - but you know what? I bloody nailed it. They all listened, and they all clapped. You can find an audience in some surprising places if you try.

But I honestly don't know what you're complaining about any more, Al. You seem to be setting up some kind of opposition between working-class songwriters who play pubs and clubs and know how to work their audiences, on one hand, and a middle-class traddie mafia selling theatre tickets to Guardian readers on the other. But that's not reality - it's a caricature of a caricature. To throw in a couple of names I know you and I both appreciate, which side of the line would you put John Kelly, or Tony Capstick? John's set is as trad as it comes, and Capstick never wrote a song of his own. Effete middle-class awfully-nice traddies?

Just make the music and take it to whoever will listen. That's all that any of us are doing.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Jan 12 - 10:14 PM

Pip. I'l explain, or should I say expand on what the resentment is about.

Please take note still not ranting, despite having to state and restate what is obvious to anyone inhabiting this goldfishbowl we call the folkscene.

There is a folkscene and they appear. Taylor and Lowden guitars, sometines a Martin. The lowlier members of the club perhaps have Gibsons or Fyldes. They have an exercise book, with the words in -they have busy lives, and frankly whats the point of knowing a song all the way through. Some of them have stands to attach their I-pad with the words to the mic. stand.

Needless to say most of them have kids at university, a new car, a pension plan, a big house.

And they hate us.

Because we have devoted our lives to folksong and worked as musicians anywhere we could. Because we can do our stuff with a modicum of grace and expertise. because for us a ten minute spot in a folk club is like driving a racing car - audience intelligent, not completely pissed - and we eat those places. Piss rings round their crummy efforts.

Because there are no brownie points in saying, I was getting pissed with Dick Miles and Big Al Whittle. Because we've never been on the Mike Harding Show and appeared on the mainstage at Cambridge.

Get it...? I doubt it. Well at least I tried. and tried, and tried, and tried....

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Howard Jones
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 04:59 AM

Al, the reason you keep having to restate it is because it isn't obvious to the rest of us. In fact, I think this is the first time you've actually set out clearly what your gripe is - perhaps you'd assumed it was all too clear. Sorry, but to me at least it wasn't.

If that's been your experience, then I'm sorry for you; I think you've been unfortunate. It's certainly not been mine - I've found the folk scene to be friendly and welcoming. As a novice, with not much technique and little performing experience, I found that club organisers and more experienced musicians were welcoming and encouraging - Geoff and Pennie Harris in particular, and also Dick Miles. Even the top-flight professionals have always been accessible, and similarly free with advice and encouragement. Audiences are attentive and appreciative, and on the whole I've found that both punters and fellow musicians respect talent when they see it. Of course, folk has its share of arseholes, and perhaps you've encountered more than your fair share of these.

I've never considered trying to make a living from music, but I've been semi-pro for 30 years and during that time I've appeared on the same stage as many of the musicians I most admire. I've never played the main stage at Cambridge either, but I've performed at many of the country's other leading festivals. How many other genres can offer those opportunities to ordinary musicians?

What I don't accept is your implied assertion that playing to an audience which doesn't get the music is somehow more "real" than playing to an appreciative one, or that the skills this requires (which I acknowledge are both difficult and hard-won) are the most important measure of a musician.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 05:21 AM

Yes as a novice - it is welcoming. that's how it should be.

Howard - how do you think these songs with their enduring qualities were forged and created. Its not because they were stored in a library somewhere. Its because they had such importance to someone unlettered that they decided to create dynamic performances of them. That takes technique and determination. Stuff you don't acquire unless its REALLY important to you.

Most people have got more in their lives nowadays - families - stuff like that.

The muso is an aberrant strain of human kind. Not sure I like him myself - despite being one.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Howard Jones
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 05:51 AM

I'm not sure what you're trying to say regarding your second paragraph. I agree with every word of it.

The ordinary people gave up folk music of their own free will. No one is keeping it from them, not even the BBC. With the internet, there's now masses of it out there, on YouTube, Spotify and a hundred other websites, most of it for free. When people come across folk music, at a wedding ceilidh or when they find a pub session in full flow, they always seem to enjoy it. But, apart from a tiny minority of us, it doesn't resonate, it doesn't become music they seek out or put on their ipods.

If you really prefer to take the music to the sort of venues you describe, then good luck to you. I'm sure it's very rewarding when you do manage to make a connection. As a musician in a ceilidh band I often play to non-folk audiences, and it's great to see people who start the evening rather cautiously having a great time by the end. However it's even better to play to a folk audience which understands and enjoys the music.

Folk audiences are easy to please, and are perhaps too forgiving of poor performances (as has been discussed endlessly on here, so let's not start that one again), so it's true that many folk performers won't have the skills needed to handle a tough and hostile audience. That doesn't make what they do any less valid. And they do it for the same reasons that you set out - because the songs are important to them.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Spleen Cringe
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 06:26 AM

Al, if you think there's a traditional folk conspiracy against singer songwriters, you're living on a different planet to me. You only have to look at the charts, listen to the radio, look at sales figures and so on to see that as a whole, singer songwriter stuff is far more popular and accepted by the mainstream media and music industry than traditional music. There's far more of it about too. Your gripe seems to be about the small corner of the world where there is a space for traditional music (some folk clubs, some folk festivals, one national radio show) and you seem to think that singer songwriters should have that too. Why should they?

I'm by no means a traddie (I'd put money on my tastes being far more eclectic than yours!), but even I can see that there's nothing wrong with people who like traditional folk having somewhere to play it and listen to it and a small music industry to support it. Where's the problem?

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Vic Smith
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 06:38 AM

"you know very well, you could not sing matty groves, on one april morning,willy of the winsbury,tam linn, reynardine, barbara allen,thomas the rhymer,claudy banks etc, without getting at best [what the f## is this turn]

Sadly, I have been in places that call themselves folk clubs where you might get a similar reaction. We were asked to finish an Open Night at one such establishment in Sussex not all that long ago - and I started off by asking if it was all right to sing a couple of traditional songs as there hadn't been any in the evening up until that point.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Vic Smith
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 07:04 AM

Howard Jones posts:-
"I think this is the first time you've actually set out clearly what your gripe is" about Al Whittle's clarification of his position.

Yes, I would agree that he makes his position more clear, though there is still confusion in his thinking. We can see that his gripe is with those who "have kids at university, a new car, a pension plan, a big house" along with their expensive instruments. One of their characteristics - he claims - is that "They have an exercise book, with the words in -they have busy lives, and frankly whats the point of knowing a song all the way through. Some of them have stands to attach their I-pad with the words to the mic. stand."
I would have to agree with him that performing a song in public whilst reading the words is simply not good enough, especially where an audience has paid money to be entertained, but if Al thinks that this practice is confined to the better off people who attend folk clubs, open mics etc. then in my experience he is wrong.

Let those who need to read their lyrics go where they belong - to karaoke nights.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 07:27 AM

Strangely enough I was in an open mic last night and a youngish quartet played Matty Groves. Complete with Djimba drum, heavy metal guitar, words on an i-pad!

Noisy room - young men giving it large at the bar.

went down great!

no absolutes means no absolutes!

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 08:06 AM

PS Did I say I had a gripe....?

The world is so full of a number of things
I'm sure that we all should be happy as kings.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 08:52 AM

as far i am concerned, my problem lies with the education system, i believe folk music[ a misnomer,maybe its better called roots music] should be on the primary school national curriculum, i mean the roots music of these islands, plus roots music from other countries, an international approach that includes[english scottish irish welsh].
i look at the irish education system, and i notice irish trad music is included

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 10:02 AM

yeh, but being sodomised be the priest used to be on that curriculum not long ago.

Dangerous example!

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: GUEST
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 10:18 AM

Dear Sir

I have a very fixed view of what I like in music and have decided to call this type of music "Folk music". Unfortunately I find this term has been used incorrectly and extensively for the last century by everybody else and they now refuse to accept my definition and fall in with my views as to what is good and acceptable. Since I am not prepared to listen to other peoples views and insist that they all listen to me instead I am finding this very irritating. I also believe that these people are conspiring against me to prevent my perfectly reasonable take-over of the term and, what is worse, they are not exactly the sort of people that I would wish my servants to mix with.

Do you think that this is the right forum for me to feel at home?

Yours

Top Folk Music Expert



P.S. Don't take this personally.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 11:45 AM

Dear GUEST,

I think you should fit right in. In fact, I think you have already been posting here for some time, although you've been using the name of

%!%%%%£%%

NO CARRIER

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 11:52 AM

anonymous guest, what a ridiculous post.
no Al, it explains why trad music is closer to the mainstream in ireland,
secondly you express your ignorance of the irish education system, there are protestant schools and catholic schools, protestant vicars are allowed to marry, catholic priests are not,irish trad music is encouraged in protestant primary schools as well as catholic ones, finally it is a minority of catholic priests who have abused children, and sodomy has never been on anyones curriculum.
for example in this area there are both protestant and catholic schools, in ballydehob, schull durrus, etc etc, furthermore it is in the irish constitution, that minority christian denominations such as protestant [in mainly catholic areas and vice versa]are bussed to thenearest school of their religion, so your remark is inaccurate and irrelevant

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 12:00 PM

for us a ten minute spot in a folk club is like driving a racing car - audience intelligent, not completely pissed - and we eat those places. Piss rings round their crummy efforts.

Do you? I've known folk clubs where apologising in advance ("I only finished it this afternoon"), reading the words off a bit of paper, mumbling into your chest because you're concentrating on getting the chords right, forgetting the chords halfway through anyway (and so on) isn't just tolerated - it's actually welcomed: that's the kind of thing the regulars expect. Hitting the back wall, doing ten or twelve verses straight through, engaging the audience with witty banter and so on is all very well, but it's a bit like showing off. (And heaven forfend that you should try and get a chorus out of them.)

But this doesn't have anything to do with traddie vs singer-songwriter, or with Harding-Folk vs alt-folk, or with class for that matter.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Stringsinger
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 12:14 PM

It appears that this is a Brit thing. It also smacks of a folk-star system which seems oxymoronic. Most real folk singers who have a traditional cultural background are not known by the general public.

That said, I don't think the "traddie" view works either. You can't be something that you're not and an attempt to be that is specious.

I think folk awards are doomed to interpretive failure.

Why not give awards for quality in performance as singers, songwriters or interpreters?
And what would they be alternative to? And who are the judges, here? Are they qualified to designate awards?

This sounds to me like a house of cards.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Howard Jones
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 12:30 PM

I think most people who might be labelled "traddie" recognise a distinction between revival singers performing traditional songs and "proper" traditional singers. "Traddie" is just a convenient label to distinguish intepreters of traditional songs from singer-songwriters.

Why not give awards for quality in performance as singers, songwriters or interpreters?" Isn't that what all the awards are aiming to do?

And what would they be alternative to? In this context, alternative to the BBC awards

And who are the judges, here? Are they qualified to designate awards? It depends on the award. Some are awarded by committees or panels, some by a handful of individuals, some by public vote. All have their strengths and weaknesses and no system is perfect. This being the folk world, no one is going to agree however the awards are chosen.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 02:06 PM

And who are the judges, here? Are they qualified to designate awards? It depends on the award. Some are awarded by committees or panels, some by a handful of individuals, some by public vote. All have their strengths and weaknesses and no system is perfect. This being the folk world, no one is going to agree however the awards are chosen.
   in other words the awards do not count for very much, however I would like to congratulate all the winners, I am sure they are all good performers, I know of Lucy Ward, but not all the others.
as for anonymous guest,if you understand anglo saxon, then go and F###Off

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 02 Jan 12 - 02:23 PM

perhaps I'll get an award one day for being the biggest folksinger.

so far , there doesn't seem to be an award based on size.

Personally speaking I think the basis for these awards are naively qualitative - focussing merely on abstract and notional views such as talent and originality.

If a more quantitative method of deciding how to distribute these awards was used - I think I would be a strong contender in terms of mass and density.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: GUEST,Suibhne Astray
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 05:04 AM

From a post-revival perspective the term Traddy (to give it its official spelling) is used by those whose muse is embedded in the old singers rather than the new ones. The orthodoxy of folk is a revival orthodoxy however - lumpen and conservative on one hand; easy listening MOR on the other - which sits uneasy with the essentially fluid & feral nature of traditional song as far as we may understand it from the available taxidermy & fossil record. Problem is, the Academic Approach is concerned with a taxonomy of the taxidermy rather than a more philosophical speculation on the nature of the beast itself and how that intersects with other forms of Popular Music which one could argue evolved directly from them. This approach sees Tradition as a dynamic, fluid, and constantly evolving phenomenon, a living process rather than something which endlessly repeats itself out of a sense of reverence for something which, in all probability, never existed in the first place. It's like seeing BIRDS as creatures that evolved from DINOSAURS; it celebrates continuance rather than bemoaning extinction. As a Post-Revival Traddy I believe in the Traditional Nature of all music, with the possible exception of Folk, which is perhaps too a little self-consciously precious in respect of its own correctness to be truly dynamic and, therefore, truly traditional in a way that other musics just are in terms their constantly shifting idiom / genre / call it what you will. How else might me compare (say) Freddy and the Dreamers to Joy Division? They were both Manchester rock 'n' roll bands with lead singers who were noted for their onstage antics, but otherwise...

At the end of the day, it's all a matter of pragmatics and preference. To many Traditional simply means Old Fashioned, as in Traditional Fish and Chips or In the Tradition and that's fine too, so there'll be some Traddys who'll see things differently. That's they key - seeing things differently, or at least appreciating that there will always be different ways of seeing things; new ways, old ways, but all them traditional, one would hope.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: John P
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 02:09 PM

Hmmm . . . I grew up poor as dirt -- definitely lower class working-man stuff. Now I'm sort of middle class, in that I own a home and have a job.

I have played extensively in crappy little working-man pubs (where I leaned to deal with drunkenly rude audiences), at festivals (where I learned to deal with short sets with no sound check), at concerts (where I learned to put a song across), in the street (where I learned that it's a terrible way to make money), at folk dances (where I really learned how the tunes are supposed to work), in the living room (where I have learned most of my music from other musicians), etc etc etc. I have played rock, blues, jazz, folk (of many kinds), medieval, swing, and new age.

I don't get my music from the radio, don't give a damn about music awards, don't care if the person who books a venue doesn't want what I offer. I don't pay any attention to the "folk establishment". I just play the music I love wherever and whenever I can.

These days I play almost entirely traditional folk music but don't consider myself a revivalist, in that I have no interest in reviving anything. I have played traditional music at house concerts with no amplification, and have played it on stages with electric guitar, bass, drums and synthesizers, and everything in between.

I think the idea of folk "stars" and awards is silly, so I don't pay any attention to all of that, either.

So, Al, where do I fit into your world view? If I'm understanding you correctly, I'm exactly the kind of musician you think is "real" or properly experienced, or whatever, and I completely disagree with your perceptions.

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: Acorn4
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 02:13 PM

Sorry, actually clicked on "send" due to trying to use "Mudcat" at same time as "Facebook" - should have known better than to attempt such multi-tasking at my age!

Subject: RE: Alternative Folk Awards
From: The Sandman
Date: 03 Jan 12 - 02:31 PM

acorn 4 and your not even 21, out of little acorns oak trees grow