Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Joe_F
Date: 04 Jan 16 - 08:48 PM

Right wing, left wing, same bird.

Stan Rogers, in "The Idiot", gives a vivid picture of the attitude a young single man might take. He is too proud to go on welfare. Does that make the song "off message" and Rogers a rightist? I don't care. It's a good song and makes me feel I've been there.

And then there's Kipling, the racist, imperialist, & sexist, who was in touch with reality & could put words together. As Orwell remarked many years ago, he is with us yet, while more politically correct people have been forgotten.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,HiLo
Date: 04 Jan 16 - 09:06 PM

Interesting concept, " political correctness", I always thought it a bit scary.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,mauvepink
Date: 04 Jan 16 - 09:53 PM

@ jack campin    Scary huh? I confess at being shocked reading that article and comments below it. Maybe he wants a gig in the White House though I can think of better ways to get one!

However, I remain steadfast in believing most country songwriters are not right wing and, even if they are in mind, would they really be so in practice? I certainly would hope not.

Would it be too liberal to show concern for a wotld that looks bleaker by the day? I certainlg have to wish to see a whole creed of people ostracised and rounded on because of the actions of a few. Have we learned nothing from the late 30s and early 40s when someone else wanted a whole creed exterminated? Is this not how it started?

Forgive my thread creep and digression. This would be for an entirely different thread

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,HiLo
Date: 04 Jan 16 - 10:20 PM

I think it suits this thread quite well.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: michaelr
Date: 04 Jan 16 - 10:56 PM

Arlo Guthrie a Republican? Say it isn't soo!!!

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 04 Jan 16 - 11:57 PM

Joe F: "Right wing, left wing, same bird."

I've been saying that on Mudcat for about 8 years...thank God it's catching on!!....sorta like folk music!!

GfS

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,Jon Bartlett
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 12:38 AM

I am intensely conservative. I'd like to conserve people's jobs, soldiers' lives, the clean air (what remains of it) and clean land (ditto): most of all, clean speech, which is one of the nicer things found on Mudcat and not found everywhere (and not found always here).

FORWARD WITH CONSERVATISM!

Jon Bartlett

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,Musket
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 03:23 AM

Clean speech?

Well you can *^%**!!!! for starters.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 03:47 AM

"I think that Dick is right in challenging the statement that Peter Bellamy was "politically rightward leaning"."
We met Peter at a concert he did with Walter Pardon at Cecil Sharp House, not too long before he died.
We had a long and somewhat sad conversation with him during the break where he expressed his alarm at not getting enough bookings.
The reasons he gave were, "My right-wing views and my Larry the Lamb impressions".
Sorry Vic; it doesn't come closer to the horse's mouth than that.
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Brian Peters
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 04:23 AM

"My right-wing views and my Larry the Lamb impressions"

Jim, that sounds to me more like a parody of what he felt were the views of others, than his own opinion of himself. Like Vic I had some late-night arguments with Peter over politics (amongst other topics) when he stayed over after the folk club, and he was always most insistent that he was not of the political right, but studiously apolitical. What he did claim was that the folk club network was run by lefties who wouldn't book him because they perceived him to be right-wing, a claim I disputed.

He certainly was a contrarian, who loved arguing for the sake of it. "What's this second-rate music you're playing me?" was typical - and you were expected to justify your choice. It was easy to make the assumption that someone who unleashed such vitriol on the political left was in fact of the right, but he claimed it was merely Devil's Advocacy. I was never entirely sure, though.

"I would just add that most "professional" folk singers that I have encountered have been grasping skinflints"

Ooh dear, bang to rights there!

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 05:57 AM

"more like a parody of what he felt were the views of others, than his own opinion of himself",,,

Perhaps so, but I can't see quite what difference that would make. Pragmatically and practically, the outcome would be the same -- no bookings. It is others' perceptions which count, surely, in such situations. & I still feel that Pete's views really were quite rightward-leaning & not quite as apolitical/MOR as has been theorised or represented above (or as, according to some, he might have claimed for himself). As an example, I remember him once, on a visit to us, speaking vehemently in disfavour of any sort of 'positive discrimination', which he said was inevitably bound to have the effect of arousing envy & resentment.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Wesley S
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 08:13 AM

Ted Nugent. He's a right wing folk singer. There you go - stereotype shattered.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Vic Smith
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 08:45 AM

Jim wrote:-
'We had a long and somewhat sad conversation with him during the break where he expressed his alarm at not getting enough bookings.
The reasons he gave were, "My right-wing views and my Larry the Lamb impressions."

If Peter perceived you as a leftie (and who know? in conversation you may possibly have come across as such!) that is exactly the sort of awkward cuss comment that I would have expected from him. He has been described above as oppositional (V. Smith) and a contrarian (B. Peters). I'm sure that Brian will have had that I don't get all the bookings I deserve conversation with Peter as regularly as I did. It was fairly useless to tell him that in spite of his huge talent, his strange manner in font of an audience and because of the qualities that that have been ascribed to him earlier in this paragraph, he wasn't the easiest person to present at your club or have staying in your home. It was only because he was such a fascinating and unique performer that we continued to book him.

Brian wrote:-
"....loved arguing for the sake of it. "What's this second-rate music you're playing me? was typical - and you were expected to justify your choice."
Spot on, Mr. Peters! In my case, he would pick up copies of fRoots, ED&S etc. lying around the house and search for articles or reviews by me and then berate my opinions, particularly my enthusiasms, the style of my writing, my choice of words, sentence construction and anything else that came into his mind. The only way to remain on an even keel was to change the conversation to every awful action that I felt he had displayed - and there were many of them going back to the days before YT when I had met him for the first time in Norwich when I was still at school.

Now mention of Brian Peters beings us to the case currently before the courts of:-
THE CROWN v. BRIAN PETERS on a charge of BEING A GRASPING SKINFLINT.
We have already heard the defendant admit "Ooh dear, bang to rights there!" and I would to present to the court this photograph taken of a merchandising desk at Lewes Folk Festival 2013. The court will call this Exhibit A.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 09:01 AM

Interesting thing, this right or left wing.

In any other social gathering other than a folk club, you could point to the predominance of white middle aged men and make a socio political statement.

Being a bit of a collector of guitars, I sat recently and added up the insurance claim should the pub catch fire during a club night in a nearby town. Eleven guitars, combined value, about £18k, give or take. Slightly different to the clubs thirty five years ago..

I doubt affluence is related to chippy whinging, which some people substitute for pointing out injustice.

Just to add to the Bellamy bit. I only met him to speak to once when we booked him for a festival. Other than getting it off his chest regarding the folk market not being able to sustain full time careers, he didn't come over as right wing to me. Although, I doubt I have ever judged people based on a preconception of their views.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 09:20 AM

I must have been peculiarly blest; but I seldom, if ever, had the sort of difficulties rubricated here with Pete. He stayed with us many times, and my late wife Valerie [who was not much into folk, in fact] always looked forward to his visits, regarding him as a courteous, charming and exemplary guest, as did I. The same applied as a v.v, if you see what I mean, when I, or once or twice we, stayed over with him, either in Norwich when he was with Anthea, or later in Keighley with Jenny. As to his hypocritical readings of one's writings; one of the nicest things I remember ever being said to me came from him, when he once read something I had written, and said of it, "Oh, I like that; I wish I'd written that."

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 09:22 AM

Sorry -- I meant"hypercritical" not "hypocritical". What a terrible mondegreen! Profound apologies again!

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Vic Smith
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 09:41 AM

It seems to me, Mike, that your comments only enhance what Brian and I have been saying about the way PB presented himself differently in different circumstances. I often saw him in the early days in the company of Bob Copper and he was always on his best behaviour then as well.
About my writing, I don't even think that he really disliked it. It was just as Brian describes. "Right, the gig is over and what I need now to relax is a good argument." He was a truly complex person.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: rosma
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 09:50 AM

I don't care about the politics of the singer as long as they sing good songs well - and I don't even have to agree with the message of the song to like it. I know there are singers with whom I would strongly disagree if we got into a political discussion but I don't care as long as they don't shove the message (even one I agree with to be honest) down my throat during performances.

The possible suggestion by some in folk that you have to be left wing to sing folk is rubbish. I think most traditional folk songs can be broken down into the following groups:
- A bit of fun with no political leaning
- Irrelevant to current politics
- About historical events
- Social history

Then there's the occasional one which might present an "issue" - so you either don't sing it or sing it because it's a good song never mind the message.

Presumably if you are writing your own songs or using more modern political songs you will have to use your judgement.

Either way, if you're not going to get into a political diatribe in concert (and I'd implore you not to whatever your leaning - I'd suggest it will put off 3/4 of your audience, not 1/2) then no one will be the wiser unless they start to look into your background.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 10:26 AM

There are one or two British and Irish folk singers who are unashamedly left-wing and that's always fine by me, but what I don't like is a song that's too directly polemical. I think that's a misjudgement occasionally made. A folk singer is a talented musician but that doesn't necessarily earn him a public platform from which to beat us about our heads with his personal politics. I feel the same about army generals pontificating on the telly about defence policy or Prince BigEars regaling us with his wacky notions about architecture or homeopathy. What I love so much about Woody Guthrie and his songs is that he could communicate a simple message far more powerfully via a story or a description of people - his people - than by pushing a political standpoint down our throats. That's true art in my book.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 10:26 AM

I suppose it depends on what you mean by the phrase politicaly conservative I think that unlike his father he did not believe in political dogma. That would rule out him being either communist or fascist.
In my opinion he was unconventional and he liked to argue a point as a means of intellectual stimulation,I think he would have loved the fact we were duscussing him 24 years after his death.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Brian Peters
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 10:36 AM

Vic wrote:
"I'm sure that Brian will have had that 'I don't get all the bookings I deserve' conversation with Peter as regularly as I did."

Indeed I did. On one occasion he leafed through the empty pages of his diary with an expression of such desolation that it was hard to know what to say.

"It was fairly useless to tell him that in spite of his huge talent, his strange manner in font of an audience and because of the qualities that that have been ascribed to him earlier in this paragraph, he wasn't the easiest person to present at your club or have staying in your home. It was only because he was such a fascinating and unique performer that we continued to book him."

I always thought it was those other attributes, rather than his (perceived) politics that put people off booking him. My local club organizers were very resistant to the idea until I twisted their arms hard. He went down a storm and they were completely converted.

I should say, by the way, that despite all his contrariness I got on well with Peter, and was once invited to dinner at his and Jenny's house with my wife. Once we'd got beyond the initial greeting: "Do you mind if I smoke dope? Because if you do you can always leave," he was the most wonderful host.

"THE CROWN v. BRIAN PETERS on a charge of BEING A GRASPING SKINFLINT... Exhibit A M' Lud."

All publicity is good publicity, thank you Vic.

On a more general note, given the origins of the UK Folk Revival, it's hardly surprising that many of those drawn to it have been of the left. Rosma is quite right that the traditional repertoire is on the whole politically neutral, but the idea that this was the music of the have-nots made it attractive from a left perspective. Leaving aside the many singers who have drafted modern songs into their repertoire in order to make the kind of statement that traditional songs don't usually provide I can think of several performers whose politics are firmly socialist, but whose repertoires barely hint at it.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 11:23 AM

We have had the story of the empty diary before. Still seems a mystery to me. I experienced it following the success of The Transports, which, along with pretty well all the critics, I listed in my Guardian roundup as my "Folk Record of the year" (jointly with Topic's Martin Carthy reissues). I recall here yet again his saying to me soon after that, "The Transports was a runaway success. All of you [critics] gave it raves. And after that my career went phhhhttttt". And then he showed me those empty diary pages.

Was it just the politics? Or his often abrasive personality, which those who knew him took at the ironic value he gave it, but I remember Anthea telling me that not everyone made such allowances and many were rubbed up the wrong way. Or what?

As I said -- I remain mystified...

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,Doc John
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 11:39 AM

Bascom Lamar Lunsford held such views, and quite extreme ones, so I hear. A folksinger by any definition

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 11:57 AM

Erik Darling was fairly conservative I hear.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 12:13 PM

MGM, I cannot recall him mentioning politics at any gigs, so you can rule that out.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 12:28 PM

Word gets around, Dick. You know that.

≈M≈

Anyhow, I can't see that your personal recollection of what somebody might have said at such gigs as you happen to have attended is an unarguable definitive cast-iron incontrovertible knockdown argument to "rule·it·out"


-- is it now?

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Brian Peters
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 12:50 PM

"many were rubbed up the wrong way"

I met one club organiser who had never forgiven him for ridiculing his record collection. Others who had found him unreasonably argumentative or arrogant.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 01:10 PM

Something Vic wrote some hours back has been ticking slowburn-wise in my head -- "in the company of Bob Copper and he was always on his best behaviour then as well" -- following on from how Valerie & I always found him. But I wonder why "as well". Why should he have been on "best behaviour" with us, I wonder? He would have had a different sort of feeling for Bob, an older & respected mentor; but he wasn't the sort to suck up to one who just happened to be a critic, I should have thought,

Ah, well: these things are mysteries, my children...

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 01:29 PM

I was running a club, he rang me for a booking and in the course of it asked me what i thought of his publicity, he had drawn and designed it himself.
I replied that the illustration was good but that my impression overall was one of arrogance, we discussed it amicably, I accepted what he said,and I gave him a gig.I think he was a good performer.
I think the majority of club or festival organisers had no idea of his politics and most of them would not have cared a damn.
I think it was a number of other things, but nothing to do with politics.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: The Sandman
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 01:38 PM

MGM, not all folk club organisers are of the left, some are non political, some are centre, some do not want any political discussion at all. I have been around doing gigs for 49 years.
I have seen a lot of changes, most organisers are decent people who organise for a lot of different reasons, most of them do not want someone who is going to be cranky.
I remember one organiser complaining to me about a fat womman who complained about the bed she was offered, and another organiser who complained about the singer[still alive] who puked up and turned the mattress over, organisers dont want that shit.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 05:12 PM

Absolutely agree with all that, Dick. I was a folk club organiser myself for a while -- ran the Sawston Folk Club, near Cambridge, for several years in early 1970s. Not sure where you think I have suggested that folk club organisers are all lefties or whatever. The whole point of this thread, from title onwards, is that folk people tend to be left of centre rather than otherwise; but that there are plenty of exceptions. It isn't my thread! Guest Rita was the OP.

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Cool Beans
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 06:38 PM

Probably time to dust this one off, a hit for Johnny Cash, written by Shel Silverstein:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDSN1F72QU4

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,henryp
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 06:58 PM

Colin Irwin wrote in Properganda;

Certainly those already suspicious of his background weren't especially enamoured by his fascination with Kipling, an India-born writer whose work became so closely identified with British imperialism that he was often accused of being a reactionary and thus anathema to the left-wing dominated folk movement. This bothered Peter – who regarded winding up the folk world's most popular and cherished precepts as something of a personal sport – not a jot.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 07:50 PM

From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity
Date: 04 Jan 16 - 03:55 PM

"Any singer, or musician, who jumps out and makes political identity, either on the 'right' or 'left' can count on losing half their audiences"

Try telling that to John Tams, Jez Lowe, Billy Bragg........

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,HiLo
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 09:04 PM

May I just ask why it matters if a musician is a conservative .

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Joe Offer
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 10:53 PM

Maybe it shouldn't matter, HiLo, but I think it does. I have heard comments from people who say they feel uncomfortable at folk gatherings because the group is too uniformly liberal, and remarks are made that make them feel excluded - so they stay away.

I've heard the opposite about religion. Some friends of mine stay away from some groups because too many people choose to sing religious songs.

Doesn't seem like there should be a political litmus test to be admitted to a group singing Child ballads, but maybe that's something that happens. It's a question to explore.

I think people should sing songs that appeal to them, and that everybody needs to be a bit more accepting of other people, a bit less fussy about what gets sung and not song, said and not said.


-Joe-

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,HiLo
Date: 05 Jan 16 - 11:12 PM

I agree with you Joe, that is why I asked the question. I find there is a growing attitude of intolerance in some quarters on the left, there also seems to be an assumption that those who are conservative are bad people and ought to be ostracized, stereotyped, and marginalized, thier beliefs and opinions scoffed at. I find this trend worrisome as it seem so opposite to what" liberal " values claim to be !

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 12:40 AM

The point in this exchange is surely that there is not one sole motivation that directs anyone to folk [or to any other cultural or such manifestation at that], but many. Some, like me, will come in because they have always liked the noise and vibe of folk music, and wish to pursue both its acoustic and its aesthetic aspects intellectually and academically as well. Others, however, to some extent agenda-driven, will regard it additionally as an opportunity to get some of their ideas over to an audience -- and folk, being the 'music of the people', could by some be exploited as ready-made for the postulation of a leftist agenda. Can it be denied that that has been, at least to some degree, the motivation of many, from Seeger to Lloyd to MacColl to Bragg?

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 12:44 AM

... and those of my sort will tend to deplore, albeit aware of the motivations, such politicisation of their beloved æsthetic, and wish they could just be left to enjoy their (our) beloved artefact in peace!

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Joe Offer
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 01:39 AM

...and of course, there have been attempts from the extreme right to co-opt folk music for their own propaganda. Folk music still hasn't recovered from what Hitler did to it in Germany.
The leftists don't seem to use traditional music for propaganda - they write their own songs in the "folk genre." To my mind, that's a more honest way to do it.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 03:17 AM

Not sure about that, tho, Joe. Think of the implications behind songbooks like Ewan's Shuttle·&·Cage & Lloyd's Coaldust·Ballads. Excellent, indispensable books that singers of my generation could hardly do without; but with a clear tendentiousness of selection & approach notwithstanding. Published, at that, by the explicitly & self-avowedly Marxist Workers' Music Association.

≈Michael≈

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 03:19 AM

And did you really never perceive any sort of agenda in the repertoire and approach of Pete Seeger? Come, now...

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 03:20 AM

Whiche side are you on?
Which side are you on!

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,Musket
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 03:43 AM

Push your bed up to the wall, then it doesn't matter which side you are on.

The gutter press, a few years ago, tried to find some link between folk artistes and the fact that a far right neo Nazi political party sang "John Barleycorn" at their conferences and, as with Marmite, slipped in their leader's speech an admiration for Martin Carthy.

Notwithstanding Marmite had the financial muscle to sue them, the unfortunate plug for Martin also died down. But.. Imagine your introduction to folk had been attending their conference. What impression would you have?

A band I occasionally played with many moons ago once wondered if traditional songs in the repertoire that glorified fox hunting should be dropped. All rather depressing and pc. Mind you, following on from Joe Offer's point, there are a couple of men who drop in at singarounds locally who sing religious songs. You'd be surprised how many people, some of whom are church goers, who feel it inappropriate. Me? My glass seems to be just about empty and needing a trip to the bar when they start.

I doubt even The Archbishop of Canterbury could sit and listen to new words applied to a Neil Young song... Considering one such venue is 200 yds from the birthplace of Charles Wesley, you'd have thought at least they could use the excuse of local songwriting hero if they must share their irritating joy.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: Joe Offer
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 03:44 AM

Hi, Michael -

No question that Pete Seeger had an agenda. Note what I said: The leftists don't seem to use traditional music for propaganda - they write their own songs in the "folk genre."

Same with MacColl. I don't think he or Seeger used traditional songs to promote their political agenda, but they certainly wrote lots of songs to support their agenda.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 03:54 AM

Still disagree, Joe. See if you can get hold of copies of those two collections of TRADITIONAL industrial songs which I named above — tho I fear they might not be too easy to come by at this time of day. But, take my word for it: 'Traditional' I repeat; not written by MacColl or Lloyd themselves, but carefully selected to fulfil an agenda: the avowedly Marxist one of the publishers, the Workers Music Assocn.

{Nice to chat with you, as ever. Have a good year!}

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 04:00 AM

And consider the mix of traditional and contemporary songs which would appear in 'Sing Out', & its UK equivalent 'Sing' {edited by my good [but certainly Marxist] friend, the late Eric Winter}. Not all the traditional songs, certainly, would be appropriate to the 'class struggle' & such; but I think you will find that a fair proportion would be such as, eg The Durham Strike and so forth; or mine-disaster songs like The Blantyre Explosion. All part of the rich tapestry of folklore, of course; but capable of tendentious selection even so, perhaps?

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 04:12 AM

And would it be unreasonable to point out the great favour shown by Seegers Pete & Peggy to a particular traditional song, The House Carpenter, which tells of the infidelity of the wife of the eponymous working man, seduced by her former lover, a ship's captain who could have married a king's daughter, one undeniably of the officer class? A version omitting the supernatural element present in earlier variants, but instead foregrounding these class elements {"If you could have married a king's daughter ... I've lately been married to a house carpenter, And I think he's a nice young man!"}

≈M≈

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: GUEST,Phil d'Conch
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 04:49 AM

Joe: "The leftists don't seem to use traditional music for propaganda..."

Seeger disagreed with you. He was of the opinion ALL songs are propaganda of one sort or another (tho the logic was a bit stretched as I recall) and all folk songs are political in nature.

He was just very, very smooth at misdirecting the introductions. Unless you were there and heard the "party line" that came between the songs, the playlist itself seemed fairly apolitical.

Subject: RE: Folk Singers who are Politically Conservative
From: akenaton
Date: 06 Jan 16 - 05:05 AM

I think you are absolutely correct M.
Modern "contemporary folk" is agony to listen to unless one is a dedicated ideologue....It started when the left started adopting the popular folkies of the sixties as banner carriers for the revolution, especially Dylan.

How upset they were when these egoists refused to be compartmentalised.
Most modern folksingers are just as wedded to aspirational capitalism as any political conservative.

Radicals are few and far between, I assisted in running one of the largest folk clubs in Scotland in the sixties, and could number radicals on the fingers of one hand.
I have conversed with all the "big names" from that time in Scotland and some from England.....their driving force was almost always self promotion..... and some were musical geniuses like Gerry Rafferty, some used the popularity of a folk scene which they despised (singing pullovers), to advance a career in show business.....like Billy Connelly. The great Alex Campbell was another who saw his music as a job of work...a transient worker, driven by the need to provide a living for himself rather than any political conviction.