should folk music be called fake music

Subject: should folk music be called fake music
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 03:22 AM

Is folk music an inadequate description?is fake music a better description?

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Joe Offer
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 03:46 AM

No, I think we should call folk music "Bill."
Why?
Because I like the name Bill.

Then we can rename this Website The Mudcat Cafe Bill Forum.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Hamish
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 04:06 AM

Sounds like you've had a bad experience, GSS. And/or too much to drink.

But I'm pretty sure you'll find that the only music that isn't fake is made by horses.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 04:09 AM

Bill? I'm more of a William fan myself, though I appreciate the Wilhelms and Guillaumes of this world, and have a fondness all the Wills, Billys, Willies, Liams, Willems & Wims, not to mention the Guillermos, Guglielmos, Guilhermes, and Gwilyms - and not forgetting the Billies, Willas, Wilhelminas, Twylas, Wilmas, Willows, Vilmas, Wildas, Wilonas, Willenes and Willettas. But - Bill will do. Which puts me in mind of this, which is as real a piece of Bill as any I've ever heard...

Laura Nyro - Wedding Bell Blues

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 04:39 AM

Anyhow, the assonantal semi-rhyming feeble pun is not even original. Dave Harker used it as the title for his more-than-somewhat far·from·brilliant book, Fakesong, to which I afforded '2 cheers from the ranks of Tuscany' in my Times review, exactly 30 years ago.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 04:50 AM

well now lets go towards the direction of A L Lloyd he apparantly did some master fakes, in fact his songs are the equivalent of Keatings artistic forgeries indistinguishable from the real thing, so a good reason for calling them fake songs?
mgm. please stop being a booby,"Anyhow, the assonantal semi-rhyming feeble pun is not even original". what relevance does lack of originality in alliteration have to do with it, the point is you and that other booby[awkward fellow], Jim Carroll, are unable to fight your corner about the definition of folk music, so you come on here in like a cross patch crabby crustacean.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Musket
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 05:13 AM

Dunno. The only TV channel guaranteed to have something worth watching these days changed its name from UK Gold to Dave, on the basis everybody has a mate called Dave..

"Cross patch crabby crustacean..." Nice one Dick.

So long as we can carry on calling contemporary folk "folk" which of course it is.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 05:23 AM

Right. And call your glass cabinet a chair and sit on it while you're about it. Hope the shards cut your ɷ

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 05:26 AM

...and Dick, you better keep yours away from my lobster-claws!

〠·M·〠

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 05:44 AM

And yet Peter Bellamy spent much of his time treating folk as a medium for creative expression - an idiom indeed, rather than an theoretical perspective regarding non-idiomatic communal song adoption and adaptation. Peter Bellamy not folk? Any what about all those Jake Thackray* fans out there? Or most of the topics under discussion here on Mudcat, precious few of which have anything to do with folk in its purest, pedantic sense, rather one based on the pragmatics of usage which is the more - er - folkloric of the two wouldn't you say? Unless we stray into the murky realms of Meta-lore**?

* As a kid the very sight of JT on TV would have me hiding behind the sofa in a cold sweat; nothing on Dr Who was ever so terrifying! I heard a chap once calling himself Fake Thackray and the traumas came flooding back as I bid a hasty retreat to the bar.      

** Or the folklore of folklore. For example - how came it about that generations of us kids were taught that ring-a-roses was a reportage on the symptoms of the black death? And at one point did Lady Raglan's fantastic thesis about Green Men become entrenched as an orthodoxy in the popular consciousness? Similarly entrenched : a lot of notions regarding your common-or-garden Folk Song, as Harker strove to point out much as Galileo did with his notions of heliocentricity for which he's only lately been granted a Walter by the Vatican.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Musket
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 05:47 AM

I wonder if Newcastle University does a taster course for people like Michael who doesn't understand what folk music is? OAP discount if you are lucky too...

King Canute had nothing on these two, Michael and Jim.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 05:54 AM

Well, that's a thoroughly appropriate backfiring would-be insult as ever was!

What King Canute did was to demonstrate to all around him that they were in grievous error, you fool! Don't you even know that!

As my late wife Valerie wrote in her novel Culture Shock (Duckworth 1988): "History has given Canute the wrong footnote". Rather well put, I always thought.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Musket
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 05:57 AM

Yeah, but some of us prefer folklore, being interested in folk and all that.

Ha Ha Ha

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 06:06 AM

... and some of you, demonstrably, don't.

Oh we could go on like this for hours, eh? Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Musket
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 06:18 AM

Oh dear, I hope you got there in time...

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Vic Smith
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 06:34 AM

Is folk music an inadequate description?
No, although traditional music may convey the concept more clearly.
is fake music a better description?
No

Next thread, please.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MartinRyan
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 06:37 AM

Zzzzzzzzzzz.............

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Vic Smith
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 06:42 AM

Zzzzzzzzzzz............. 

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 06:43 AM

Michael, on the subject of king cnut, i know you are old but presumably you were not there, so his intentions on your part are speculation.Vic wHy is fake music not a better description?after all many people are now saying Lloyd wrote fake songs.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Vic Smith
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 06:49 AM

Joe Offer -

"No, I think we should call folk music "Bill."
Why?
Because I like the name Bill."

I have an instrument called "Nelson".
Why?
Well, it's full name is "Nelson Mandola".

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 06:55 AM

Don't be silly, Dick. You obviously don't really know the story. Canute's flattering courtiers kept assuring him he had absolute power. So he said, "No I haven't. Come with me to the seashore and I'll show you." So he sat on the beach as the tide came in, and made his flattering courtiers stand all around him, & as the sea came in he shouted at it to 'keep back! keep back! keep back!' And only relented and let them go when they were all ankle-deep in water, saying to them "Now you see how absolute my powers are! so stop your stupid flattery."

So the idea, which you seem to be pursuing in re Jim & me, that Canute made a fool of himself by trying to hold back the tide, misses completely the point that he only pretended to attempt to do so, in order to demonstrate to the courtiers that he couldn't.

As Valerie said, "history has given him the wrong footnote". Obviously so, when fools like you can't even get the point of the story.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:14 AM

I had a Nelson Mandola once too - wonder if it's related?

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:16 AM

history has given him the wrong footnote

Canute's place in history is assured; it's folklore that's wrong-footnoted him.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:21 AM

no michael you re wrong there is absolutely no proof to your theory, you have accepted some propoganda that cannot be proved.it is you that is a gullible fool that believes history as it is taught is fact.fake dictionary defintions ..made up, do upmake presentable or specious,contrive out of poor material.
here are some examples, 3 score and ten a broadsheet that was greatly improved by anonymous people
gentle annie a sentimental baalad by stephen foster became an australian folk song, and in my opinion was improved.
next we come to the sad fact that nearly all folk or tradtional style songs to be accepted as tradtional style by the uk folk revival are limited in their chioce of melodies, using three or occasionally 4 modes, an exception being Goulders composotion Walrus and the carpenter., so they are faked or composed with a simple goal in mind to be accepted as trad style,
2 people on this forum reject that other newly composed songs that do not fit into this category are folk songs, so since one of the definitions of fake is to do up make presentable, specious [of good appearance or plausible, then fake is absolutely appropriate]for songs written in a tradtional style these songs are faked for a certain kind of market.,[ a part of the uk folk revival] and to appeal to a certain taste.to enable the performers to make money and sell cds etc to the uk folk revival.
MacColl started it all with the rules for his club and with writing songs in this melodic style and with an anti american back lash [unless the person was american, convenient for his residents paley and seeger], both of whom are very good performers, the problem with this attempt at identifying and creating a style is that it is limited musically to a few modes, hence i frequently hear several tunes being used over and over again, this applies to songs on around the hills of clare[ which is outside the uk] but closelty associated with culturally with the uk , so it is fair to say we never hear traditional style songs in english using the hijaz scale, and very rarely the locrian mode

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Vic Smith
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:24 AM

Jack Blandiver -
Galileo did with his notions of heliocentricity for which he's only lately been granted a Walter by the Vatican.

Why a "Walter"? Why not a "Bill"? After all, Joe Offer has pointed out that he likes that name.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:32 AM

Is there a Bill Pardon, Vic?

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Jack Campin
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:34 AM

how came it about that generations of us kids were taught that ring-a-roses was a reportage on the symptoms of the black death?

Not many generations. Snopes thinks this idea dates to a book by James Leasor, The Plague and the Fire (1961).

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Vic Smith
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:41 AM

Is there a Bill Pardon, Vic?
Oh yes.... and his middle name is Clinton. You can read all about Bill Clinton Pardon and the controversy he caused by clicking here.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:42 AM

next point, the songs we like to call folk songs are not the songs that most of the folk in the uk like to hear , so how can they be folk songs, tey are laughed at by the majority of british people, and even to some extent by irish people , who on occassions refer to their instrumental music as diddley music or even "its just one tune", in my opinion irish instrumental music is more varied chordally than english music , but that is not the opinion of at least half the irish people whop prefer country and irish

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:50 AM

......as long as we can agree to call rockabilly and punk rock 'real music'.........

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 07:59 AM

Not many generations. Snopes thinks this idea dates to a book by James Leasor, The Plague and the Fire (1961).

Well - I was born in 1961 and we were taught it as fact! I suppose in popular culture a generation is only three years or four years; and I still meet people today in education who are only too happy propagate the plague myth, just as many people believe the Green Man to be pagan.

There is folklore, there is fakelore; happily there is QI as well, who delight in pricking this sort of thing, like the old Camel and the Eye of the Needle and other myth-conceptions, which we might pass of as folklore if we're feeling generous.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Vic Smith
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 08:07 AM

......as long as we can agree to call rockabilly and punk rock 'real music'.........

That's fine, but what about the problem of fakeabilly and fake punk as implied in the opening post?

Vic Smith

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 08:10 AM

Not the least idea what you on about, Dick; which makes two of us. You completely miss the point of the Canute legend, so any other examples which you adduce of similar [alleged by you] misapprehensions become pointless. I am not going on about this. You have just missed the entire point of the story, that's all.

I sometimes wonder why you chose your nickname. Schweik was either an idiot or a devious deceiver using his apparent idiocy to his own advantage -- neither way a particularly admirable character: the apotheosis of the antihero. What make you choose it, I wonder?

≈M≈

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 08:14 AM

Jack: Snopes talking nonsense. See the Opies' Ox Dict of Nursery Rhymes; and my Folk Review interview with them, July 1974, in which Peter Opie used to me the defining words that the plague interpretation of Ring o' Roses was "one of those pieces of folklore about folklore".

≈M≈

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 08:24 AM

one of those pieces of folklore about folklore

Meta-Lore. Like the Green Man. It's worth a study in itself.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 08:31 AM

fair do's Vic...

Though back in my youth, we were well aware of the distinction between
real punk and plastic punks / real teddy boys and plastic teds..



Plastic is a great word innit..

Who can forget the inundating wave of yuppie era 'plastic paddy' franchised Irish Pubs,
sweeping across the UK and Europe as far as Prague and beyond...

A lot of perfectly good musical instruments got ruined, screwed to those pub walls..


so... Plastic Folk...???

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Vic Smith
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 09:17 AM

yuppie era 'plastic paddy' franchised Irish Pubs

But the thing about these Irish pubs is that they are always so authentic. Let me give you an example:-
Here   is a photo of Tina and I taken in O'Neill's Irish Bar in St. Peter's Street, New Orleans.
Everything about the place - the huge illuminated fire & water fountain that you can see in the photo, the vast outdoor seating area in a sub-tropical garden, the tall black diva crooning sophisticated jazz ballads to grand piano accompaniment - all made us think how exactly typical this was of all the bars in Ireland that we have been in from Dungloe in the north to..... shall we say.... Ballydehob in the south.

Vic Smith

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 09:34 AM

We are the plastic generation.

The folks of today they would far sooner pay
For a thing that's been made out of plastic.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 10:17 AM

MGM of course you would not understand because you are the sort of person who accepts the establishment version of history or propoganda without question.IT IS YOU THAT MISSES THE POINT OF the myth ofCnut

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 10:32 AM

So expound it to me, Dick. No good just being assertive; let's hear your interpretation, and your assertion of what the 'point' is, based on the accepted versions of the legend:-

Canute demonstrates to his flattering courtiers that he has no control over the elements (the incoming tide)
····························Wikipedia

Your use of the term re Jim & me suggests that you accept the vulgar analogy of one who really thought that he could halt the tide; when that was not the point he was making at all.

Over to you...

≈M≈

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 10:50 AM

There's only one Cnut around here. It's the Cnut who could start an argument in an empty room.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 10:57 AM

The point is that neither of us know what actually happened its all just mythology..
Backwoodsman you must be referring to yourself.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 11:05 AM

Nope.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 11:21 AM

"The point is that neither of us know what actually happened its all just mythology"

HOW PATHETIC!

You are in resolutely point-missing mood today, Dick. We know it's all mythology.

The point is that you, and no-one else, adduced that myth in support of your arguments.

I asserted that this interpretation was based on an erroneous knowledge of the myth [WHICH YOU HAD INTRODUCED INTO THE ARGUMENT], and a misinterpretation of its symbolic significance.

You asserted that I had it wrong, so I invited you to demonstrate where I had the myth wrong THAT YOU HAD INTRODUCED INTO THE ARGUMENT; whereupon you now fall back on a "What does it matter, it's only a myth anyhow" escape-hatch.

Well, sorry, Dick; but that's more than somewhat feeble and pathetic on your part. I am surprised at you.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 11:35 AM

well Backwoodsman, that is precisely what you are trying to do, start an argument.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 11:39 AM

'The point is' {as you began your evasive and fatuous post}, that it doesn't matter "what actually happened". It is what the myth alleges to have happened, and how it is to be interpreted, that matters.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 11:40 AM

Funny thing is, Squeak, I thought someone else had already done that. I just passed a lighthearted comment.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 11:53 AM

This place just gets sillier and sillier.
No wonder so many have left.

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: GUEST,punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 11:57 AM

I left......[ approx 12 months passing ]......... and came back.

Maybe they might too !!!???

The world carries on regardless.........

Subject: RE: should folk music be called fake music
From: GUEST,punkfolkrockker
Date: 09 Oct 14 - 12:04 PM

Those who's absence really leaves mudcat a much diminished place
are folks such as Ralph, Diane, and John who sadly can't come back.

At least some of those other missing mudcatters might eventually outgrow their hissy fits...