UK Folk Revival 2018

Subject: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Despondent of Slough
Date: 17 Aug 18 - 09:07 AM

How much do is it now propelled by Commercial pressures and what are the advantages and disadvantages of Commercialisation

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 17 Aug 18 - 11:25 AM

It was much better when it was propelled by beer and sex...

But we are all used to paying for beer,
and in the 21st century paying for sex has become more socially mainstream;
so the prostitution of folk music for £££$$$ was inevitable...

I know which of the 3 I prefer most - and can still get for free...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 17 Aug 18 - 12:47 PM

I don't think that commercialism plays much part in folk music for most of us. I don't begrudge buying cds to help out with the cost of producing them -or dvds.


If a friend manages to interest a major artist in their songwriting. I don't feel jealousy. Just very pleased for them.

Once the people with major recording contracts get involved, very often the artist and songwriter lose artistic control. But ironically the commercial decisions often increase the songs exposure to the public, and the likelihood of the song entering the folk repertoire.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 17 Aug 18 - 01:51 PM

I don't think it has changed that much since the 60s. There was always a certain percentage at the top of the tree making money out of it. We live in a capitalist society. Bound to happen. As far as the UK is concerned the only thing different that has happened is a group of indifferent lively chantey singers got a million quid contract, but they've probably spent that on holidays by now and things are back to normal. To hit the very top in folk you really have to sell your soul to the devil, but thankfully not many do that.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Modette
Date: 17 Aug 18 - 02:52 PM

The OP's writing style is very familiar. I don't think s/he lives anywhere near Slough.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 17 Aug 18 - 03:06 PM

Advantage:
Those who keep the wolf from the door by charging to entertain spend many hours practising and improving their product. If they had to keep the wolf from the door in other ways they would find it hard to do this.
I don't have a problem with this.

Without those at the top being paid and pushing the boundaries the standard would be much lower (in theory).

There are many layers of commercialism and non-commercialism in folk music. They are all part of the fabric and we'd be poorer aesthetically without them. (And that's from a died-in-the-wool socialist.)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Aug 18 - 03:14 PM

What "revival" ?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: r.padgett
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 02:17 AM

Very much a move to promote the "young thruster" many with great musical talents as well as the established folk professionals

Attitudes tend to be becoming entrenched by the "hobbyist" as opposed to the professionals who are of course looking to make a living

Any EFDSS views available?

Ray

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Mr Red
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 03:22 AM

What I object to is the kind of faded Punk performers who feel the best way to revive their career is to claim Folkdom. And charge more for one badly sung performance (and playing punk guitar regardless of skill) than the same weekend of top notch ceilidh bands all put together.

And then have the effrontery to harrang and hector the audience on who to vote for - in one party!

And Bragg they have been true Folkies all along.
Not on that stipend Billy boy! You is in it for what it pays, and it ain't just "covering costs".

Rant over - I am off to a folk festival where they have a pleasant weekend AND a ceilidh with a decent band.

The White Horse Folk Festival.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 05:14 AM

GUEST, Date: 17 Aug 18 - 03:14 PM, good question, it is one I would have asked myself had you not beaten me to it. Don't expect an answer though. Mr Red above has got the measure of it, very few real Folk Festivals around these days they are all now "Music" Festivals where anything goes. As has been pointed out in another thread there is a whale of a difference between a real "Folk Song" and what the folk sing.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jag
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 05:39 AM

Observer. Isn't commercialism about what the folk listen to rather than what the folk sing?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 07:31 AM

Mr Red - somehow we get the impression you might not be that keen on Barking Billy
or his musical abilities and politics...???

Live and let live I'd say... my big gripe is that after his conversion to folk,
the media and BBC in particular
have elevated him to the staus of grey beared authority and spokesman of folk...

No he aint, and neither does he deserve to be so feted... yet...

But this aint entirely Billy's fault,
even though he was not so slow in oportunistically making most
of this middle aged/class 2nd career boost...

..surely the high tories of Brit folk should applaud him for such brazen grasping 'me-firstism'...???

Though, it's not that far fetched to posit that the 1970s punk generation
were the true heirs and evolution of authentic amateurish working class trad folk spirit...

btw.. his main punk guitar was a Burns Steer... can't really get more trad patriotic British than that...
and still retain credibility as a good socialist internationalist electric punkfolk guitarist,
without a single taint of xenophobic petty Englander brexiteer in his character...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 09:05 AM

GUEST,jag.

1. What people (folk) listen to has got nothing to do with folk music.

2. Commercialism, strictly speaking, is ALL about what people (folk) PART WITH MONEY to listen to.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 10:47 AM

As one who was there in the first revival, the biggest differences are the lack of participation and the social status of the "folkies".
There seems to be a comparatively youthful academic elite who kno0w absolutely nothing about traditional music, how or why it used to be performed.
In my youth, all folk music was amateur, builders, farmers, labourers, women and children were all expected to contribute to the general wellbeing of society, either by singing, dancing, reciting, or simply joining in.
The present revival ...if there is such a thing, is a different beast.
The audience expected to listen in silence to the personal woes of singer songwriters, or bee indoctrinated by the likes of Mr Bragg into the wonders of an heroic "working class" which no longer exists.
If we survive all that, the coup de grace will be the orchestral genre of folk music, a thousand bloody fiddles, five drum kits, and Christ knows what else, walloping along at breakneck speed, while some psuedo artistic twat

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 10:51 AM

Sorry that was Ake

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 11:07 AM

My contention why so much current televised folk is so bland & boring,
is that it has become dominated by 'tastefull' sophisticated music college
instrumental virtuosity and arrangements...???

but then again.. public schoolboys also infiltrated and pulled strings in classic era rock and punk...
Just, they hid themselves a bit more efectively...

I'll also state my educated opinion
that the punk indie self recording and distribution ethic
owed much to preceding and parallell cottage industry folk music vanity press record lables...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 11:09 AM

The first revival had just about petered out by the 30s. Blimey, Ake, you must be knocking a century! I know plenty of youthful academic and non-academic folksingers trying to scrape a few bob who know more about the tradition than a lot of the old farts around.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 11:21 AM

I thought the first "revival" started in the fifties with the Carter family, MacColl, The Clancy Bros etc......Before that it was just Traditional Music since time immemorial.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 11:26 AM

Nope. What is commonly referred to as the First Revival started in about 1888 with the collecting activities of the likes of Baring-Gould, Lucy Broadwood and Frank Kidson reaching a peak in the 1910s after the formation of the Folk Song Society and the English Folk Dance Society. As I said it started to wane in the 20s after some of the pioneers had died. The Second Revival started in the 50s with the impetus created by American influences and Ewan MacColl and Bert Lloyd, and is still in progress, not in decline as some like to think.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 11:35 AM

Thanks for that information Steve.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 11:39 AM

Revived almost as much as Dracula in the Hammer series of movie sequels...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: gillymor
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 11:44 AM

By the '50's the Carter Family was a mainstream country music act that was comprised of Maybelle and her daughters. A.P. and Sara from the original trio weren't involved (although Sara and Maybelle reunited later on to do some of the old songs).

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Ged Fox
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 02:36 PM

"As one who was there in the first revival …"


Wow! Did you ever get to meet Tom Ravenscroft?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 02:52 PM

Don't be silly, Ged, that was the Renaissance wasn't it?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 04:18 PM

Generally on this forum when people talk about the "folk revival" they are referring to the revival in the 1950s and 1960s.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 04:55 PM

The audience expected to listen in silence to the personal woes of singer songwriters, or be indoctrinated by the likes of Mr Bragg into the wonders of an heroic "working class" which no longer exists.
If we survive all that, the coup de grace will be the orchestral genre of folk music, a thousand bloody fiddles, five drum kits, and Christ knows what else, walloping along at breakneck speed, while some psuedo artistic twat

Sums the modern trend up perfectly GUEST Akenaton.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Andy7
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 05:29 PM

I enjoy many different kinds of music.

But I got into folk music, many years ago, because a friend introduced me to a folk club that was held weekly (and still is!) in a pub on the south coast.

Wow! I thought ... where else could you hear such a variety of singing and music - from expert to beginner - all having a go? And wow again, a place where I might even try a song myself, after a few weeks!

This, to me, is what sets folk music apart from other genres. Is there a local jazz club, operatic club, heavy metal club, rock club, where I could just turn up and have a go, with my amateurish tries, among a group of friendly and welcoming people?

While newcomers and beginners are still so welcome at the clubs, there will always be a place for folk music. And so, I hope, and believe, there will always be folk revivals. There are not so very many places nowadays, where ordinary people can still play and sing.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 05:59 PM

Amen to that, Andy!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 06:06 PM

There is room for all types of folk - I go to the occasional singaround or session but the quality is variable with, it has to be said, a few people who will never be able to sing or play well - I don't mind that in that context but I prefer to pay money and see good quality amateurs or professionals - I am just pleased that we have such a wealth of talent and lots of young people who want to get involved in the music that I love.

I also love it when people take folk music in new directions, whether that be by introducing electronica or orchestras into folk - as an example Jim Moray has done both and is one of the artists I admire most. There is room for it all as far as I am concerned and people who try to limit, or who complain about, experimentation and new initiatives should, quite frankly, be more open minded (you don't have to like it but don't complain about it). Fortunately thanks to the efforts of younger artists and some wiser older ones the negative and cliched attitude to folk in the wider community is, I think, changing slowly and long may it continue. We need young people to get involved and be encouraged.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 03:13 AM

I disagree with Joe's conclusion. I feel if traditional music is twisted beyond recognitions and the emotional content jettisoned, it would be preferable to see the music sleep for a few decades until the "third revival"

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 03:14 AM

Apologies, that was Ake.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 03:56 AM

Stick trad folk in a time capsule 6 feet under concrete...

When the post nuclear apocalypse super intelligent cockroaches dig it up many centuries from now,
they can scratch their antenna and argue what the f@ck that was all about...

Of course... they'll probably still be gathering one evening a week under the rubble
singing Beetles songs...





[respect to Basil Brush's joke writer..]

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 05:08 AM

I used to feel very touched at the little group of pink and spiky haired, body-pierced fossilised Malcolm McLaren saddos who used to hang around the top of Royal Avenue on the Kings Road, PFR
Do you think there would be room in your time capsule for them?
I do hoe you are joking, but judging by the way the UK folk revival has gone, I fear not
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 05:32 AM

It is sad that you feel that way Ake. You'd rather the music disappeared unless all of it only survived in your preferred version of it? There is plenty of emotional content in the songs and music of younger people. In any case no-one is saying trade should disappear so why should only your preferred incarnation of folk survive. I suppose we shouldn't have modern jazz, contemporary classical music etc either then. Music has to open to change to remain relevant. I for one don't want to spend all night listening to songs about milkmaids and handloom maids

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 05:41 AM

A good, though not recent, example. My earliest experience of folk music was based around the mining songs of the north east. I loved those songs and still do. The Whiskey Priests took those songs, keeping the lyrics and melodies intact and put them into a folk rock context. They played those songs to thousands, perhaps millions of people across Europe. Many of those people I suspect may have grown to love folk music through their exposure to the songs in a different setting.

Incidentally the WP are staging a few reunion gigs around the country and I am very much looking forward to seeing them at Musicport Festival in Whitby in October - a great festival which celebrates music from across the world

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 06:26 AM

I feel if traditional music is twisted beyond recognition and the emotional content jettisoned, it would be preferable to see the music sleep for a few decades until it is rediscovered and appreciated for what it is and for what it represents - well said, I agree entirely, far too many people who know spout about "folk music" have forgotten, or worse have never realised, what it represents.

You can have all the "innovation", so-called "new initiatives" and "new directions" you like. BUT in doing so by introducing electronica or orchestras into folk you automatically make it more elitist and make it far less likely that "folk" can do anything other than just listen to it. As perfectly stated by Andy7 - "Is there a local jazz club, operatic club, heavy metal club, rock club, where I could just turn up and have a go, with my amateurish tries, among a group of friendly and welcoming people?

While newcomers and beginners are still so welcome at the clubs, there will always be a place for folk music."

The wonderful thing about TRADITIONAL Folk music, about TRADITIONAL Jazz and CLASSICAL music is that singers and musicians can perform it exactly as it was first heard without the need for 1 Watt of electrical power. The great thing about the music that apparently most posting here would seem to rather see adulterated than listen to CAN be performed by ordinary people of wildly varying talents for pleasure. As a musical genre IT HAS NEVER had to chase an audience to guarantee its survival, those wishing to do so, do so in the hope of making money out of it. The vast bulk of singer/songwriters do not write "folk songs", they write, record and offer up for sale what they hope will be a "hit" and that has got nothing whatsoever to do with "folk music".

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 06:37 AM

There is room for both. That is what I am saying. How many young people do you see at singarounds? Without people doing new things with the music it will die. We would all be the poorer for that

Most people who write their own songs in the folk idiom do so from the heart. If they happen to be successful then that's a bonus

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 06:49 AM

By 'in the folk idiom' I mean story songs or songs about social justice

Are you suggesting that people like Jez Lowe, Reg Neurosis, Jon Boden, Jim Moray, Steve Knightly, Megson, Kathryn Roberts & Sean Lakeman are just trying to have a 'hit'?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 07:07 AM

If you rip traditional music up by the roots as it has been in the clubs and as it is bow being in academic circles it will never revive
Traditional music is now being lumped in with all other forms of popular music by a small group of researchers - take your eye off the ball now and that is how it will be seen py the general public
The club scene was established largely on the basis of the folk songs that were being collected in the 1950s, that is why thousands of British clubs were established - to listen to those songs and ones being made using traditional forms.
When it became possible to leave a folk club without hearing a folk song, thousands waled away from the scene, club numbers were decimated, labels, magazines and shps dedicated to selling folk albums, instruments and books disappeared - go count them now to see how many are left
It's not as anybody has won out over the change of policy - there are no audiences for music hal, Victorian Parlour Ballads, Music Hall renditions or whatever passed for folk songs in the New Age folk clubs.

The Irish traditional music scene is throbbing aat present with thousands of youngsters pouring in to listen and play
The British scene isn't, in my opinion, because people can no longer choose what they want to listen to
If you walk away from that situation you may as well hold a Requiem Mass for British folk song
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 07:26 AM

I suspect that the reason people have left folk clubs is that there are far more ways of spending an evening listening to good quality live music nowadays (and I am speaking as a folk club attendee of over 40 years!). When I started going to the Hartlepool Folk Club in the late 70's there were few other outlets for affordable live music in the town - now, although I have moved away and don't know the exact details of the local scene, there are many more. Similarly in York where I live now the folk club is only one option in a city full of live music - I attend occasionally but I also go to gigs in pubs and formal concerts - as well as running a folk / Americana concert series at a pub in the city

I think it is important that clubs and singarounds survive but I do not think that they are for everyone who enjoys folk music -clearly my definition of folk music - as I have outlined re song above - is much broader than some of those here.

The places where young people are engaging are the diverse festivals such as Shrewsbury where they can listen to an amazing range of music from trad to Americana, European etc and also play or sing in sessions.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 07:42 AM

Clubs took a nosedive in the eighties before the advent of the technology that gives us access to as much as we have now
There's just as much of that access here but youngsters would rather have their their music as a shared experience as they always have, not by retreating into their private shells
Here we have the best of both worlds - good sessions and traditional music on the media seven nights a week
Rather than festivals, the most successful events are we-end or week long schools for learning to play and understand the music - and hundreds of musicians teaching newbies to play
Song has some way to go to catch up but it's getting there
Of course, a recognation that the music is important enough to work at it to make sure it's played or sung well has helped
You seldom see anybody singing from a crib-sheet or mobile phone here
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 08:14 AM

That all sounds great Jim - good to hear that things are going well in Ireland

I think folk is in the ascendancy again in England just perhaps in a different form from what some people on here would like. More young people getting involved in the music has helped this clearly - also in the 80's through to the 90's recorded music (eg dj sets) were more popular than live music with young people but since then live music has thrived in most genres and long may it do so

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 08:22 AM

Thanks GUEST Joe G - you have put it better than I could in the first part of your opening sentence:

I suspect that the reason people have left folk clubs is that there are far more ways of spending an evening LISTENING to good quality live music nowadays

THAT is what has been achieved by the experimentation you seem to favour. It has turned an audience who used to PARTICIPATE into an audience that by now can only LISTEN.

Well said Jim Carroll - When it became possible to leave a folk club without hearing a folk song, thousands walked away from the scene, club numbers were decimated, labels, magazines and shops dedicated to selling folk albums, instruments and books disappeared - That is exactly what I have seen unfold as well.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 08:57 AM

I personally believe that the only way forward is for those who know and care what folk song is to retrench and scream from the housetops how good and important it is
If you respect what you do, so will others, even if they may not necessarily like it
THat is the way air tim and acceptance will be won back
If we don't know what music we represent, how can we expect anybody else to?
One of the great changes here if to have witnessed over the last three decades the turnaround of the music outside its immediate circle of followers
The media now fills its airtime with music it once regarded as "diddley-di nonsense"
Pubs that once body-searched people to make sure they weren't carrying a traditional musical instrument have begun to realise that there is commercial gain to be had from good dedicated traditional sessions rather 'Oirish knees-ups'
Up to the time the bankers ruined our economy, it was pushing on an open door to apply for a research grant or making a CD of your work
Even the tourist industry has come to terms with the long-term draw of our music

It would be lying to claim this is happening everywhere, but it's happening enough to know that the music has been guaranteed at least a two/three generation future
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Jim Martin
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 09:36 AM

Jim "over the last three decades" - do you think it was beginning to happen before the'Riverdance' phenomena in the mid 90's?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 09:48 AM

Observer - I still sing along to the choruses! So are you saying that folk music is the exclusive preserve of people who sing or play an instrument - surely that is far more 'elitist' than music that can be enjoyed by a wide range of people. To be honest the quality of singing at some singarounds I have attended has been appalling (it has also been very good at times). I don't have a problem with that but you cannot insist that to like folk music you have to be prepared to put up with often boring songs badly sung

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 09:52 AM

Even worse is when an appalling singer gets up at a guest night at a folk club when people have paid to attend - that is what is likely to have driven many from folk clubs when a more consistently enjoyable night of music is available elsewhere

My partner would generally not attend our local folk club if she knew that a particular MC would be hogging the stage with his turgid singing. If she did attend she and half of the audience would disappear to the bar until he had finished. That is the kind of thing that empties folk clubs

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 10:15 AM

But Jim..

"the little group of pink and spiky haired, body-pierced fossilised Malcolm McLaren saddos who used to hang around the top of Royal Avenue on the Kings Road"

were more likely as not unimaginative knobheads, the sheeplike followers of fashion and new orthodoxies;
McLaren and Westwood, the oportunistic self promoters and conveniently accesable and quotable figureheads
for lazy hack media writers and TV producers...

The equivalent of 1960/70s beards, aran sweaters, and fisherman's caps,
and the Sunday lifestyle/arts supplements and BBC's favoured folk artists and promoters...

What you percieve as 'punk' is long dead and gone - as it should be...
and in common with folk, there are still moribund spikey haired pockets of resistance, in their late middle age and dotage;
and the occasional bunch of teenagers who discover retro punk hair and fashions for a few months dressing up...

My idea of trad folk/punk is quite austere and minimalist,
pure in essence and intent, and devoid of unneccesary ornementation and vanity...
yets still with some creative fertile life burning in it's core...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 11:10 AM

"I personally believe that the only way forward is for those who know and care what folk song is to retrench and scream from the housetops how good and important it is"
yes and to try and help raise standards and encourage participation, and encourage people to play or sing for the love of it, not for winning competitions or for becoming a folk "STAR". IF I WAS RUNNING A FOLK CLUB NOW MY PRIORITY WOULD BE TO GATHER AT LEAST FOUR OR FIVE STRONG SINGERS AS RESIDENTS, SO THAT GUEST BOOKING WAS NOT ALWAYS NEEDED

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 11:18 AM

"The equivalent of 1960/70s beards, aran sweaters, and fisherman's caps,"
That's a stereotype of the music industry's presentation of traditional folk song and it died sometime in the mid-1960s when the boom ended
The traditional clubs were not like that
The Liverpool clubs were full of dock and various types of workers, as were the Mancester clubs
Folk had its posers, as did punk and Jazz and Classical music - that has nothing to do with the various musics themselves
I've never particularly liked punk (or most forms of pop music) but I would not detract from those who do
I don't understand how narrative song of the English folk type can fit in with music based, rhythm dominated punk - probably too old in the tooth to learn now

"do you think it was beginning to happen before the'Riverdance' phenomena in the mid 90's?"
I do Jim
I think it began to happen when the Clancy School began to have an effect (that's now in its 46th year) and a foundation began to be built in 1987 when the foundations were laid with the setting up of the Irish Traditional Music Archive in Merrion Square
Whatever the youngsters coming fresh into the music decide to do with it, they will always have a foundation to return to.
The fact that the children and grandchildren of those who attended the first classes at the early Clancy Weeks are now themselves teaching speaks for itself
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 11:56 AM

What entertains me about these threads is how much folks with an interest in common,
and who agree on so much,
can find so much more to argue and fall out with each other about...

..mudcat.. eh... infighting at it's finest...

It also highlights just how little many mudcatters understand or respect
diverse and popular outside world music culture...

I'm off to the bog to listen to a soothing 'music to evacuate your bowels to' playlist...

might be some random folk tracks included...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 12:34 PM

The songs of the second revival were for the most part hundreds of years old when they were rediscovered....they were still relevant, still addressed the same emotions of love, hate, life, the timeless emotions of humanity and as Guest Observer has correctly noted they could still be sung or played by everyone regardless of musical skill.
Participation is what is missing from modern folk music its not about clubs or marketing ...its about everyone of us...for gods sake!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 12:37 PM

That's three times I've forgotten to sign in!! I think it's getting gey near "Doo-lahlly Time".

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 12:41 PM

..that wasn't at all soothing..
pokey litle echo dot speaker, and an annoying funk rock rendition of Blackleg Miner...

the bathroom playlist needs further working on...

Right then, all Steelye related artist versions of this song I've found on youtube,
are less or more annoying depending which bass player and guitarist are involved.
The acapella into was spot on, until the band kicks in...

Took a while, but here's a version I've never heard before and immediately like...


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDnxq34fyVA

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 12:47 PM

Ake - these days participation can also include a lone unsociable hermit multitrack recording
an interpretation of a trad folk song, just for the fun of it...

Who needs an audience...

Modern folk music no longer requiring 'folks'...???

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 12:53 PM

That's a trad folk revival for a post thather Britain of alienation and isolation...

When the working classes, community and society, have become mere romanticised nostalgic memories...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 12:58 PM

Fragmented Folk Music...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Spot
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 12:59 PM

Music for the bog?

'She came in through the bathroom window'

'At Last' by Etta James

'Ring of Fire'

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: theleveller
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 01:22 PM

I well remember that what hooked me into folk music in 1964 (or was it 65?) at the age of 15 or 16 was sitting a few feet away from the Watersons in a tiny folk club not far from Hull while they sang Three-score and Ten. That was a radical new sound in those days (well, it was to me) and I seem to remember many of the traddies hating it, saying that harmonies weren't authentic. At a later date, Mike was kind enough to give me the words and guide me through the singing of that song.

What Joe G says sums up the joys of folk music for me. That variety is its life-blood. What Ake said sums up why I stopped performing in folk venues and singarounds. I just couldn't be arsed with the snide comments from a bunch of barber-dodging, nasty individuals with egos as big as their bellies and minds as small as their talent.

Fortunately, there's still some great young musicians to see live, and Oysterband and The Levellers are a good as ever. Oh, and the wonderful Steve Ashley has a new album out, though sadly he says it will be his last.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 01:53 PM

There is always room for traditional music but the fact remains that unless you move with the times, you stand still and get overtaken by something better. If you want to keep traditional music as it was in 1800 then you are fighting a losing battle. And rightly so. Times change, people change, tastes change. In all too short a time, we will not be here. The world belongs to the younger generation and always has. By all means carry on doing your own thing, but don't try to impose it on your children.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 02:38 PM

GUEST Joe G asks - are you saying that folk music is the exclusive preserve of people who sing or play an instrument?

Yes, but there again it always has been, exactly as with any other form of music (I'd love to see a Jazz Combo comprising of people who can neither sing or play an instrument). But where you and I happen to be at odds is that with your suggested electrification and orchestration, to participate you MUST be able to both play AND sing to quite a high degree of competency as well as having all the necessary equipment, and if you can't then you are consigned to the listening audience with no hope of participating in what is going on. Your preferred innovations and experimentation also only really works on a stage in rather large venues, which further restricts who does what.

As to the description of your folk club, if people are paying to come through the door, then of course it is the responsibility of those running the club to make sure that those who will be performing are of a suitably high standard (See The Sandman's comments). But there again anyone who is prepared to pay to enter a club that states that it is a "Folk Club" should expect to hear "Folk Music" not some mumbled, mediocre rehash of some 50s or 60s hit.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 02:46 PM

Evangelical ....[select religion] bringing up their children in a house with no Television,
determining and supervising what outside culteral influences, if any,
the children are permitted to be moderately polluted by...

Family entertainment is readings from the....[select religious book],
and singing of that faith's hymns...

[not joking, that's how a religious relative brought up his kids since the 1990s...]

For 'select religion' substitute trad folk...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 02:52 PM

Observer - it's the 21st Century...

electic guitars and amps, keyboards, microphones, virtual software instruments, etc
have never been cheaper, better quality, and more easily accesible to most ordinary families...

A kid who learns a few chords on an acoustic and still sounds shit,
might actually sound slighty more listenable on an electric...???

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 03:08 PM

"There is always room for traditional music but the fact remains that unless you move with the times, you stand still and get overtaken by something better."
That's a very subjective statement Dave,
Not only does it wipe out anything older that - (how long exactly/) including jazz, classical, blues.... but it presumes that what you assume to be "better is in fact better
but you presume that new-= "better"
I've listened to and performed folk most of my life - did I "move on" from the Jazz I used to play, or did I decide I cold like both?
Before that I listened to the current pop songs and the old type of Country and Western
You attach yourself to the music you like and if you get fed up with it, you move on
That doesn't mean those who you leave behind have to
Once more I find myself totally in agreement with Observer
If you want to cater for modern tastes open a "music club" - that enables you to listen and play anything that takes your fancy at any particular time
WE're only discussing this because of the disaster caused by trying to please too many people all the time and pleasing no-one
Wonder what would happen if you went to a string quartet or a classical orchestra and suggested what you have to them
Shame on you
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 03:31 PM

Basically we can all of us quite easily find what we want to listen to,
mostly when and where we want to listen to it,
and in certain situations join in...

So what's the problem...

I'm still experimenting with the Amazon Echo Dot I installed 2 days ago in the bathroom for the mrs..

So I just sat there, said "Alexa shufle my music library"..

..and after Adam and the Ant, Bernard Cribbins, and David Bowie, which I wasn't in the mood for,
she came up with Richie Valens followed By Shirley and Dolly Collins..

Then it's as easy as saying "Alexa stop shuffle, Play Shirley and Dolly Collins Harvest Years CD.."

Now that portative organ and their voices are glorious bathroom mood music..

So again, why do we think we have a problem with any music surviving, let alone just Folk...???

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 04:32 PM

it's the 21st Century...

electic guitars and amps, keyboards, microphones, virtual software instruments, etc
have never been cheaper, better quality, and more easily accesible to most ordinary families...

A kid who learns a few chords on an acoustic and still sounds shit,
might actually sound slightly more listenable on an electric...???

There you go pfr - what you have described is exactly what I said. On the path that you and GUEST Joe G seem to want to tread you HAVE TO be able to play to participate.

Taking your forum name literally, what punk-folk/folk-rock material can you perform a cappella? What material can you perform without there being a band behind you? What material can you perform totally acoustically? Now in complete contrast to all of that any old "Traddie" can sing any traditional song a cappella, he/she can do so entirely on their own, and they normally do that acoustically - the same applies to anyone who can hold a tune that walks into a folk club that supports traditional folk.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 04:38 PM

"what punk-folk/folk-rock material can you perform a cappella? What material can you perform without there being a band behind you? What material can you perform totally acoustically?"

all of it...

a song is a song... you hum it, I'll try to remember the words...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 04:40 PM

Unfortunately there are many traddies who can't hold a tune, or have any idea of tempo or dynamics thus making for often very tedious nights. There are of course also lots of wonderful singers but they are in the minority in my experience

Nobody is saying clubs shouldn't support traditional folk it's just that it is only one element. Songs being written in the folk idiom today have as much right to be heard and usually more relevance to life today

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 04:47 PM

Observer you appear to be suggesting that if you can't sing there is no place for you in a folk club. I can't sing and can only play keyboard badly in the privacy of my own home but I have been involved in supporting folk music much of my life by attending clubs and festivals, helping to run clubs, venues and festivals and promoting music through reviews and writing for several magazines and on line music pages. I'm not having someone say that what I love, in it's myriad and marvellous forms isn't folk. It is and it always will be. In fact much of it will form part of the tradition in years hence

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 05:12 PM

"There you go pfr - what you have described is exactly what I said. On the path that you and GUEST Joe G seem to want to tread you HAVE TO be able to play to participate."

As I mentioned earlier further up the thread..

The only thing I hinted I might want, is for folks to live and let live....

Observer - dunno what name you used to use, or if we got on..

but the only observing you seem to be doing today is myopically gazing into the interior of your bum...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 06:52 PM

pfr, let me know when and where your next a cappella, solo, acoustic punk-folk-rock PERFORMANCE is going to happen. Don't worry about learning the words - you can just read 'em (As you've pointed out tablets and smart phones are as cheap as chips now).

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 07:20 PM

I am close to despair.
"There is always room for traditional music but the fact remains that unless you move with the times, you stand still and get overtaken by something better"
does this mean we have to follow the latst fad or fashion, sorry I am not going to be a dedicated follower of fashion, neither am i convinced that it automatically follows that moving with the times is always an indication of improved quality.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 08:28 PM

I think the thing is....

tradition...the word comes from the Latin....traditio....I hand over.

Joseph Taylor and Sam Larner surely didn't say to themselves, 'I am working in a tradition'. They created with what was handed over to them.

If you can't get your head around the fact that today people are handed over something rather different, you might as well abandon the idea of folk music as a vital form created with the grace of free human beings,

The idea of kids having paraded before them the music of a hundred years ago as offering a means of self expression - well it works for classical music. But it has bugger all to do with the spirit of the guys who created our folk songs.

The essence of folk music is folk, and the technology and society they are situated inside, The men aboard Nelson's ships wrote different styles of songs from people marching to Aldermaston to protest about the bomb,

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 19 Aug 18 - 08:42 PM

Observer - What is extra hilarious about grumpy stick-in-the-mudcatters
is how their lack of tolerance
paints them into inescapable corners of their own making...

When all is said and done, my personal tastes in trad folk are probably just as fundementalist as 'yours',
perhaps even more so..
Yet I can balance it with a healthy respect for other genres of music...

The 'punk' & 'rocker' in my mudcat ID still triggers some mudcatters into irrational kneejerks
that the outside world is beisieging their inpenetrable acoustic folk safe-room...???
Their paranoia locks them into all sorts of obstinate fearful prejudiced misconceptions
regarding modern popular music culture.

..and to think "punkfolkrocker" was just a disposable piss take name I quickly thought up
for a one off post here 15 years ago...
[I didn't even like it much as an ID...]

Then I began to realise the power that name had in weeding out the old miserable sods
who were so ready and quck to overreact and stamp down on all that was new,
threatening and uncomfortable to them...

I soon got to know who was who here...
..and those who deserved to be taken seriously with respect...

I'll be 60 soon, I wonder what will upset me as much in 5 - 10 years
if I'm still a living breathing mudcatter,
and any young people join with their even fresher startling unsettling ideas
about how they enjoy their 'folk' music...???

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 01:34 AM

btw... "As you've pointed out tablets and smart phones are as cheap as chips now"

well, I might have typed something along those lines, if not those exact words..
But buggered if I an rememeber where or when...

The fact that you can quote it back to me here does seem a bit creepy,
as if you have been keeping a scrapbook of clippings in a profile on me,
or investigating my past posting history...?????

Now I'm not vain, but I used to have a mudcat stalker at least once in the past decade and a half...
That was comical... almost flattering...

But enough of that fanciful nonsense, I'm sure you just have a better memory than me...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:50 AM

None of this latter has te slighters to do with English langage folk song and it underlines everything everything that has gone wrong with the English scene
English folk singing requires only one instrument - the voice - and everybody can afford one of those
Flooding the scene with electric paraphernalia not only changed (in my opinion spoiled) the singing but it excluded everybody who couldn't afford or didn't want to lay out for equipment- it also demanded more space
I saw a gang of eight Irish building workers once come into a pub in Kentish Town, obviously straight from the site, stand in the middle of the bar and sing to each other for an hour - some of the most exquisite traditional singing I have heard, off-the-cuff.

We have a proliferation (some say infestation) of 'Singing Circles' here
A landlord throws the pub open to singers or someone with the space throws open their home - and a night of singing is had by all - there are a dozen (I am told) within half an hour's driving distance of my home
We don't go to them because they tend to have an anything-goes policy and you have to sit through half a dozen songs you don't like to hear one you do
I want to sing and listen to FOLK SONGS

I see no reason why a small group of like-minded people can't operate on the same basis, agree between them on a type of song they all want to hear and operate on the same basis, expanding by word-of-mouth rather than by open invtation.
Maybe the days of the big, organised clubs with guests are a thing of the past - they were great while they lasted (some of them), but time to move on seems to be a general consensus.

Singing in a social rather than forman session was the way the tradition operated - maybe it will work again (with a pinch of organisation and sense of direction thrown in)
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:03 AM

pfr - stop it with the insults and the personal attack.

1. the only observing you seem to be doing today is myopically gazing into the interior of your bum...

I have my opinions that I am perfectly entitled to. I have stated what points I wished to make and the rejoinders from both GUEST Joe G and yourself actually supported the points I made. People are perfectly free to "like" whatever music they like. What I object to is the way it has all somehow been lumped together as "folk" because "folk clubs" are, or were, the only place those people could go to play.

2. What is extra hilarious about grumpy stick-in-the-mudcatters
is how their lack of tolerance paints them into inescapable corners of their own making...

You mean corners like the one you have painted yourself into in this discussion?

3. I began to realise the power that name had in weeding out the old miserable sods who were so ready and quck to overreact and stamp down on all that was new, threatening and uncomfortable to them...

I soon got to know who was who here...
..and those who deserved to be taken seriously with respect...

So pfr you see yourself as being a man on a mission - good luck with that, but you will get further if you carry out your mission with less name-calling and insults.

4. To my - "As you've pointed out tablets and smart phones are as cheap as chips now" - you come back with:

well, I might have typed something along those lines, if not those exact words..
But buggered if I an rememeber where or when...

The fact that you can quote it back to me here does seem a bit creepy, as if you have been keeping a scrapbook of clippings in a profile on me, or investigating my past posting history...?????

Nothing creepy about it at all pfr. All YOU need to do is read THIS thread and go back to your post - punkfolkrocker Date: 19 Aug 18 - 02:52 PM.

Going back to your Mudcat name. I did say IF I WERE TO TAKE IT LITERALLY.

The Sandman again has it nailed in his post dated 19 Aug 18 - 07:20 PM

I am close to despair.

"There is always room for traditional music but the fact remains that unless you move with the times, you stand still and get overtaken by something better"

does this mean we have to follow the latest fad or fashion, sorry I am not going to be a dedicated follower of fashion, neither am i convinced that it automatically follows that moving with the times is always an indication of improved quality.

I happen to agree wholeheartedly with him.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:10 AM

Jim Carroll, Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:50 AM.

Thank you Jim, you have put the basis of what I tried to get across perfectly.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:17 AM

Jim - Now then, hold on...

when have I ever proselytized that everyone should take up electric guitar,
and play them at every gathering...
..and that all that is good about trad should be replaced and discarded...???

Short answer - Never...!!!

Remember, we are mostly in accord above and below the BS line...
You are one of the remaining mudcatters I hold in high esteem.
We cannot agree about everything, that's healthy and fair enough...
But despite my tongue in cheek winding up of the old miseries,
my personal tastes in Trad are very austerely minimalist.

I enjoy a voice with character that engages with a song,
with sparse unintrusive instrumental drone accompaniment..
ie.. reed instrument/simple strings/such like.. nothing flash or fancy...

But I will never dictate what other folks should do to conform to my own peculiar personal tastes...

Nor refrain from experimenting with folk, recording for my own curiosity and amusement,
employing any kind of instrument/noise generator at my disposal..

..and that also don't mean I won't stop taking the piss out of the bland middle class toss the beeb serves up as 'folk'...

My ideal might be something like Ivor cutler and his harmonium, if he'd been a trad folkie...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:18 AM

Observer = Keith... just a plausible observation...???

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:29 AM

"So pfr you see yourself as being a man on a mission"

mission impossible... this tape will self-destruct in five seconds...

"19 Aug 18 - 02:52 - As you've pointed out tablets and smart phones are as cheap as chips now".. utter bollocks...

that's a total distortion and misrepresentaion of what I actually typed..

No wonder you had me mystified...

Are you sure you are not Keith...!!!???

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:50 AM

Al has hit the nail on the head a few posts back.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Mr Red
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:57 AM

I thought the first "revival" started in the fifties with the Carter family, MacColl, The Clancy Bros etc......Before that it was just Traditional Music since time immemorial.

defining the first is like defining Folk. Child was arguably a datum and C# spearheaded a massive revival and he was certainly a significant revival IMNSHO. But that is my perspective, others will posit Baring-Gould or Frank Kidson no doubt. Certainly there have been peaks and troughs in the fashion of Folk.

And as for the Braggard guy - claiming to be only a messenger as he tells you how to think - he can't even use his own language properly. Opinions they ain't. Let me see - how would you feel if he started telling you who to pray for instead of the religion** he does proselytise. His delivery is like his music - insensitive.

**or would you prefer - belief system?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 04:08 AM

Jim - the long gone era of workers bursting into spontaneous song
to cordinate team tasks, or relieve the drudgery,
really ought to be revived...

Particularly in Telephone call centres and McDonalds...

We can all come up with other suitable modern day gig economy occupations..

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 04:17 AM

Mr Red - I've never been a Billy Bragg fan...

I like and respect the idea of him, but never really clicked with his records.
Though not from want of trying...
I bought some of his CDs in sales over the years...

I don't enjoy being preached at by anyone,
even if they are preaching to the converted...
But I got nothing against positive motivating rallying solidarity and enthusiasm...

Seen him live a few times at free festivals, he can work a crowd well...

Same goes for Attila the Stockbroker...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: theleveller
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 04:46 AM

"English folk singing requires only one instrument - the voice"

Does it not also require people who can use it and, most important of all, people who want to listen to it?

Drop in to almost any traddie session, singaround or folk club in the UK and take a look at the average age and physical condition of the people there. If that's what folk music is relying on for survival, better get the life-support machine ready. (Some of us would say a 'do not resuscitate' policy would be kinder.) Fortunately, there are young (and, indeed, not so young) musicians who are taking folk music and adapting it into something that they want to perform and listen to. Thank goodness for them! Whingeing traddies may not like it but, thankfully, there isn't a damn thing they can do about it and there's is, quite literally, a dying voice.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 04:59 AM

Yesterday I said There is always room for traditional music but the fact remains that unless you move with the times, you stand still and get overtaken by something better.

A number of people seem to have picked up on the second part of that statement without reference to the first bit. Let me try and put it more clearly. There is always room for traditional music but the fact remains that unless you move with the times, you stand still and get overtaken by something better.

Or, for those who cannot see it even when I do that, how about I pick up on the bit they missed There is always room for traditional music

Now that is out of the way let me say that I was one of the founding organisers of Swinton folk club almost 40 years ago. The club is still going in pretty much the same format although I have now moved out of the area and am no longer involved. Over the years we have have had thousands through the doors and hundreds of acts. We had traditional artists, still do. I sing mainly traditional songs or songs in the traditional style. We have however moved with the times and did not restrict oursleves to only traditional folk. It is still going strong. On artist nights (one a month) you have to be there early to get a seat. I call that pretty successful but accept that it is not everyones cup of tea. There is room for everyone.

Does that make my position clearer?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 05:17 AM

i suppose that's one of the besetting sins of mudcatters, Dave.

We pick up and magnify our differences rather than accept that we're all decent civilised people trying to make a decent fist of a society that is fraught with complexity.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 05:58 AM

Sorry Leveller, traditional folk music has never, ever, had to chase either those willing to play it or sing it. Neither has it ever had to chase an audience. It is not going to die out so no need for the "life support machine". The songs I have heard and the songs I have sung are in many instances hundreds of years old - so they certainly HAVE survived.

The "youngsters" you refer to. Do you see them in folk clubs? Or on Youtube clips? How about festivals? Concerts? Seen lots of their performances in those venues. They don't appear in folk clubs because folk clubs do not pay them enough. Unlike The Sandman and Big Al, they are not prepared to put in the graft of honing their skills and testing what they have to offer in the grind of travelling round the gamut of folk clubs and their wildly differing audiences. They are the product of university musical degree courses where apart from perfecting their undoubted talents, they are taught marketing and promotion. The "groups/Bands" they form are like mushrooms, constantly changing overnight sensations, once heard instantly forgotten.

Jim Carroll is right all you do need is a voice and the ability, improved over time, to perform the song, which to my mind is the ability to put the words over in a way that portrays and captures the emotion and meaning of the song. With songs I am not interested in anything that does not tell a story, I am not in the least bit interested in gasped or mumbled, indistinct lyrics, interrupted by over extended periods of instrumental masturbation.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: theleveller
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 06:08 AM

"They don't appear in folk clubs because folk clubs do not pay them enough. Unlike The Sandman and Big Al, they are not prepared to put in the graft of honing their skills and testing what they have to offer in the grind of travelling round the gamut of folk clubs and their wildly differing audiences. They are the product of university musical degree courses where apart from perfecting their undoubted talents, they are taught marketing and promotion. The "groups/Bands" they form are like mushrooms, constantly changing overnight sensations, once heard instantly forgotten."

What a complete load of rubbish. It's that attitude that actively discourages youngsters from going to folk clubs. It actively discourages me, and I'm no youngster. There are plenty of young amateur musicians who don't want payment, don't want to study it at university - just want to play where they won't be put down for simply being young and wanting to take things in a different direction. My 18-year old daughter is one of them. She was brought up going to gigs and festivals but wouldn't be seen anywhere near a folk club now.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 06:21 AM

You appear to have condemned the entire youth of this country - well those who are interested in folk music anyway. I would far rather spend a night listening to the incredibly talented young people you seem to despise than to a whole evening of entirely traditional music. As for being 'forgettable' I am afraid you could not be more wrong.

Your attitude is one of the reasons most young people wouldn't be seen dead in a trad club such as you seem to think is the only valid venue for folk. Fortunately at the club I was a member of until we moved recently we had a very supportive attitude to young people and a couple of those who attended regularly recently are starting to do very well with getting gigs across the country.

The club also happens to be the longest continuously running folk club in the world and part of that success has been a result of the fact that it has an open mind to the artists it books and the floor singers who perform. Contemporary, traditional, blues, European & American artists have all featured. Long may it prosper

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Howard Jones
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 06:33 AM

There are plenty of young musicians performing excellent music, they are just not (on the whole) doing it in the folk clubs. They don't want to be part of the turgid and boring folk scene that far too many clubs have turned into, and which are inhabited largely by people old enough to be their parents and grandparents - any more than we did when we were young. They are finding their own opportunities and venues to perform, including festivals, house concerts and the more vibrant folk clubs which still maintain good standards of performance.

Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it isn't happening.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 06:45 AM

Yep!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 06:54 AM

Howard Jones makes my point perfectly in his final line. Far more folk music happening now then there ever was. A decline in the 60’s style folk clubs does not equal a decline in traditional folk music.

Of course looking at the original post from Lizzie Cornish in case you haven’t realised, it was just an attempt to stir up some fertiliser.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 07:13 AM

i'm a semi retired pubsinger, who once had a hit record in Germany. I don't have a horse in this race.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 07:28 AM

No attitude involved Leveller, merely recalling what I have seen.

They do not attend Folk Clubs as they do not get paid what they are told on their courses to expect to be paid.

They do not attend Folk Clubs because they do not want, and are not prepared to listen to others do or perform.

They play superbly, but with absolutely no contact with their audience, no interest in entertaining.

The graft and grind I am talking about is by LEARNING at the coal face how to entertain, how to win an audience over and how to connect with them. That is where the likes of Hamish Imlach, Danny Kyle, learned their craft. I daresay that Dick Miles and Big Al could confirm that, after all that is what they applied themselves to and did over decades of performing.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 07:36 AM

"Far more folk music happening now then there ever was". Debateable - depends very much on where you live. In any case, quality is more important than quantity.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 07:37 AM

"Does it not also require people who can use it and, most important of all, people who want to listen to it?
That is an objective, not a requirement
You can sit in your bath and sing to your rubber duck
The most important audience you will ever have is yourself - please 'im ad you can please anybody
Home is where you practice your skills and make your songs part of yourself
Too many people use an audience to practice on

If there is plenty of traditional singing going on, where is it happening?
You can hear some of those who made it on the media
The open sessions I read up come with the deaded - "no talent required or no restriction on what you sing" logo
The festivals I've been to are usually impersonal, overcrowded (sort-of) organised affairs where you go to watch
I read recently somebody griping at a song-swap venue being taken over by the organisers as an official event

The clubs, for all their problems democratised our music - it was a break from being given our music to making it ourselves.
Nothing has ever replaced that with anything remotely succesful
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 07:57 AM

"The clubs, for all their problems democratised our music - it was a break from being given our music to making it ourselves.
Nothing has ever replaced that with anything remotely succesful
Jim Carroll"
I know this might embarrass you Jim :0)....But WEll said Mr Carroll.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 08:03 AM

They do not attend folk clubs...

Who are you talking about, Observer? There are young performers who may not appear in clubs but that could be for any number of reasons rather than your above list. Not all of them are university graduates either. There are many young people who do appear in folk clubs and I have seen a lot even in my limited experience of clubs. Just because you have not seen any does not mean they do not exist.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 08:13 AM

in my opinion ,the most important issue is to move away from passive consumerism, that people should start making their own music, preferably for the ideal of doing it forcreativitys sake if people canmake money without taking the music far from its roots that is ok

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 08:24 AM

"I know this might embarrass you Jim"
Not in the slightest Ake - we can agree and disagree any time

Where are these singers Dave and why are so many people complaining about not finding them
Soe time ago I was told if I wanted to hear sood singing all I had to deo was jump aon a train and go to Lewes

I have no doubt that there are some good singers and some good clubs - but nowhere near enough of them to make any impact on the everlasting problem of getting our music recognised and taken seriously
The newbies seem to be encouraged to "make a name for themselves" - that was never what it was about for us
Sure - we had our 'showcase' clubs - I was proud to be part of one of the best of them, but at the same time we had ourmore democratic clubs and probably most importantly, we had our workshops to bring on our own singing and help newcomers through their first tottering steps

I was archivist for a long-running workshop and have been bequeathed that archive as the worksop ran its course over fifteen years
I have been trying to pass digitised copies of our recordings on to any British Club who will use it for the same purpose we did - to encourage the singing of traditional songs
So far - not a nibble and it looks like our old singers will be giving their all for Irish listeners in the future
A bleedin' shame, as far as I'm concerned - for me and for the English scene

"does not mean they do not exist."
Your insistence is a litle like a story a friend related about discussing fairies with an old musician's wife
He asked her - "Do you believe in the fairies Cissie?"
"Of course I don't" came the reply, "but they're there all right"
Where is this invisible army of yours?
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 09:28 AM

That's the first time I have ever agreed with you ake!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 09:32 AM

My comment above referred to a blank thread from ake which has disappeared :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 09:38 AM

That was a bit harsh Joe, considering that I am under a tight leash these days......but fear not my time will come. :0)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 10:26 AM

Jim - I could list at least the names of at least 20 performers under the age of 30 that I have seen at Swinton and other clubs that I have attended but what would be the point? You will not have heard of any of them and accuse me of making it up. I could also list the tour dates of people like Jim Moray, which include folk clubs, but again you would brush it off as either 'invisible' or not folk. There is no point discussing it as we will never agree.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 10:45 AM

The army is there Jim, because 'folk'   are there.Folk music is not the hothouse flower requiring seminars from professors and aficionados.

It is a tide arising in breast of humankind. The will to perform, the will to create. And ordinary people from all societies have this within them.


The reason you can't pinpoint who was the original Wild Rover is because he was of no interest to the class of people who attend seminars on folk music.

And somewhere his distant inheritor is writing the follow up with a nose flute a triangle and a synthesiser. And none of us know where he is, or who he is. He's part of the invisible army. Don't sneer at him. His distant relations wrote all your favourite ballads.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 10:49 AM

"I have seen at Swinton and other clubs that"
I know Swinton well
Bit difficult to get to Birmingham or Leeds or London or Brighton - or even Liverpool - and back in one night I seem to remember
I'm not denying there are pockets of good singers - I'm sure there are
I am talking about the picture nationwide

I won't mention Jim Moray - I had a head-to-head with him about the traditional nature of his singing on this forum
He seems not to like constructive criticism
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 10:55 AM

I'm not denying there are pockets of good singers

Good. That's a start.

I have already said that my experience in folk clubs, albeit long in years, is limited geographically. I cannot comment on the nationwide picture and can only go off what other people tell me. From what I see on here there are more people saying that there are good young singers attending clubs in their area than there are saying that young singers do not attend folk clubs. This forum is the closest thing we have to an international picture of what is going on and if the majority are saying there is not an issue, there is no reason to disbelieve them.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Rob Naylor
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 11:18 AM

Howard Jones: There are plenty of young musicians performing excellent music, they are just not (on the whole) doing it in the folk clubs. They don't want to be part of the turgid and boring folk scene that far too many clubs have turned into, and which are inhabited largely by people old enough to be their parents and grandparents - any more than we did when we were young. They are finding their own opportunities and venues to perform, including festivals, house concerts and the more vibrant folk clubs which still maintain good standards of performance.

Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it isn't happening.

Absolutely, a point I've made here many times when this subject comes around for the nth time!

Dave The Gnome: Jim - I could list at least the names of at least 20 performers under the age of 30 that I have seen at Swinton and other clubs that I have attended but what would be the point? You will not have heard of any of them and accuse me of making it up.

I've probably listed at least that number of excellent sub-30 performers here in the last couple of years, often with links to examples of their performances.

Big Al: The army is there Jim, because 'folk'   are there.Folk music is not the hothouse flower requiring seminars from professors and aficionados.

It is a tide arising in breast of humankind. The will to perform, the will to create. And ordinary people from all societies have this within them.

The reason you can't pinpoint who was the original Wild Rover is because he was of no interest to the class of people who attend seminars on folk music.

And somewhere his distant inheritor is writing the follow up with a nose flute a triangle and a synthesiser. And none of us know where he is, or who he is. He's part of the invisible army. Don't sneer at him. His distant relations wrote all your favourite ballads.

Spot on! :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 11:21 AM

"Good. That's a start. "
I've never denied it Dave
I hope there are good young singers but again, the comments here lead me to believe them to be few and far between and the attitude and motivation of some leaves much to be desired - far from the singing for the ove of it approach
So many seem to want to "make it in the folk world" and are prepared to do whatever it takes to the songs to achieve it
The last thing that folk song needs now is another Music Industry led folk scene
One of the problems of aiming for this is attracting the attention of the predatory Performing Right's crown waiting ready to stick a price tag on what you do
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 11:28 AM

DtG - There are no real issues apart from in the minds of out of touch malcontents like KObserverwho
want to kick up a fight for the sake of it...

What else have they got to validate their continued existence...???

Jim excepted, as at least he has credibility, and real intelligence and substance to back up his views,
even though we might not entirely agree with him...

I also tend to agree with some of Ake's position on the middle class appropriation & commodification
of near extict working class folk traditions...

[or Ake agrees with me... whichever.. does it matter..
we are both onto an uncomfortable truth for a folkie elite...???]

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 11:29 AM

the comments here lead me to believe them to be few and far between

Sorry, Jim, but are we reading the same thread? There are far more comments on here saying they do exist tnat they do not. In fact, it is only yourself, Ake and Guest Observer that are saying there is a problem I think.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 11:37 AM

The last thing that folk song needs now is another Music Industry led folk scene."
I agree

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 11:44 AM

..ohhh.. dunno...

..might be interesting seeing the 'mature' Spice Girls and Betty Boo
making Saturday teatime telly comebacks as trad folk singers...???

..should at least be more fun than the polite and sophisticated bland folkie toss on BBC4...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: theleveller
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 11:54 AM

"No attitude involved Leveller, merely recalling what I have seen.

They do not attend Folk Clubs as they do not get paid what they are told on their courses to expect to be paid.

They do not attend Folk Clubs because they do not want, and are not prepared to listen to others do or perform."

:) :) :)!You really do make me laugh, Observer (was that ever a misnomer!). You're so pompous but, as others have said, you've absolutely no idea of how and where the majority of young people make or enjoy music. Who is this 'they' you're talking about? (OK, you probably once talked to a folk performer who'd done a degree course and wanted paying as he/she intended to make it a career). Perhaps you need to get out more and talk to some real kids instead of trying to cite your prejudices as fact. On the other hand, don't bother - if you've nothing good or encouraging to say, they really won't be interested.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 12:14 PM

I remember one regular young attendee at a folk club being told by an MC not to bother bringing her guitar down to the club the following week as it would be busy with other singers - he then hogged about 20 minutes for himself that week to sing unaccompanied (badly) whilst everyone headed to the bar - what great encouragement! Fortunately following those incidents that MC was given his marching orders by the committee shortly afterwards and the young lady in question is doing rather well on the folk and acoustic music circuit :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 12:19 PM

in my case, it wasn't so much I wanted 'to make it in the folk world'. I think the acknowledgement that I was a folk, whose folk music had a degree of validity would have sufficed.

you've got to admit, there were some right snotty buggers around in the 1970's.

That was what was so nice about Peggy and Ewan - they were accepting of what I was, what I did. They were respectful. Couldn't say the say the same for some of their disciples.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: theleveller
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 12:20 PM

"I won't mention Jim Moray - I had a head-to-head with him about the traditional nature of his singing on this forum
He seems not to like constructive criticism
Jim"

Pot. Kettle. Black.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:02 PM

Will you please not nause up this thread
Can you cite any example where I have objected to positive criticism - of course you can't
I may argue strongly - that's commitment - certainly not resentment at being challenged
I thought that was why er are all here
Obviously not
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:05 PM

Daave
I've been arguing this point for many years - I am referring to overall, not this thread
I aked earlier to go anc count the number of lubs and put them up beside the number of people and clubs and everything else we have lost
The math says it all
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,kenny
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:16 PM

"They do not attend Folk Clubs as they do not get paid what they are told on their courses to expect to be paid.

They do not attend Folk Clubs because they do not want, and are not prepared to listen to others do or perform."

:) :) :)!You really do make me laugh, Observer"

Those two statements would be my observations and experience too. It's very sad that someone should find it funny.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:29 PM

and everything else we have lost

It has not been lost Jim. Just changed. The new formats may not suit you. The old formats did not suit others. In the 1960s and 70s there was no such thing as an open mic night. They now abound. 40 or 50 years ago there was nothing like the number of festivals we have now. Things change. If you want to run an old style folk club, fine, no one will stop you. But to decry what is happening now simply because it is not the same as it was then is a fruitless excercise.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:32 PM

Just who are these people who will not attend folk clubs because they will not get paid what their courses told them to expect? Who is it that will not listen to others perform? Come on, name some names! Or, if you don't want to do that, what percenbtage of youngsters do you think are like that? I am sure there must be some but I don't know any.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:37 PM

Dave
The whole thrust of 'making it' is what is driving what is left of the revival
Anybody can get up people's noss by naming names and then people would be upin in arms for belittling (or defending) not the way to go
What have the thousands of people who have desrted the scene "changed to"
Or the clubs or magazines - or the dearth of album.....?
Why not respond to the facts rather ahan blindly defending a sinking ship
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:39 PM

I know
Thay've all changed int empy chairs
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:45 PM

I am not defending anything, Jim. Yes, the old folk club is dying. As are lots of things. They did not keep up with the times and so have been consigned to the grave. We still make our own music. We still listen to traditional songs. Just in a different place and in a different way. Long live the new order!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:54 PM

Simple question...

who really knows what percentage of young folk singers/musicians are graduating from degree courses
and seeking lucrative professional careers..
or what percentage, whether they have studied and qualified or never bothered with formal education,
are just doing it for the fun and sense of aceivement of being a good amateur...???

..or maybe occasional gigs as a semi pro...???

I don't know... Many other more sensible mudcatters probably don't know either..

But KObserver and a muttering minority of similar 'experts',
seems to be absolutely convinced and certain of these statistics...

If bitter jealousy of the opportunities of youth is an issue,
why not set up a U3A course to rival those pesky ambitious student kids...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 02:57 PM

..it's all about networking anyway, and public school folkies will always have that best advantage...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:03 PM

Why not just to the facts odf diminishing number status and future and most importantly You can no longer go to a folk club and be garanteed a folk song during the course of the evening - in fact , in some I have been in, you are guaranteed not to hear one.
Once you have robbed the punter of the right to hear what he has paid for you have robbed him/her of their choice
THat is why the clubs are in the mess they are
"Yes, the old folk club is dying. "
and has been replaced by what - certainly not folk music
If that's what you want from a folk club the scene deserves to die
The very name claims to represent folk music - it the clubs aren't doing that they are operating a con
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:13 PM

"They did not keep up with the times and so have been consigned to the grave."
You really can't have it both ways Dave - one minute you say it's as good as it always was - the next minute it's somebody elses fault that it isn't
Your triumphalist crowing like a cock on a midden is very saddening - especially from you - gou are gloating of a hostile takeover as wopf Goldman Sachs
The real loser her is the poeplee's music that we once tried so hard to promore
That's what your buddies have destroyed
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:49 PM

The sad thing Dave is they nobody ahs gained out of this - folk music hasn't - your music hasn't - your "keeping up with the times " has destroyed the scene
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 03:52 PM

No one has 'destroyed' folk. It is probably in better shape now than it has been for years thanks to the engagement of the very youth you seem to despise so much. Granny's Attic, Young 'Uns (though not so young now), Calan, Sail Pattern to name just a tiny number of outstanding artists who are reinvigorating folk

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 04:10 PM

I have only ever said that the old folk club is being replaced by the new order Jim. There is no "crowing" not have I, or my "buddies" (who you have never met) destroyed anything. I have said specifically that the folk club I was most involved with is still going strong after almost 40 years. That is because we have accepted new ideas and new people without ever excluding traditional music. It is a very broad church with room for everyone and while we can never please everyone, we must have done something right.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 04:52 PM

A question from pfr:

who really knows what percentage of young folk singers/musicians are graduating from degree courses and seeking lucrative professional careers..

Guess round my neck of the woods a friend of mine might - their occupation? Senior Lecturer on one of those University Courses.

Now according to some posting here who are trying to tell us all that things are going so well, I in turn would like to ask them a question.

Are new folk clubs opening where these youngsters are playing and performing. How many of those clubs opened up near you?

So far on this forum there has been a litany bemoaning the number of festivals that are disappearing - not really a sign of a healthy vibrant scene that all these youngsters can take advantage of.

Two venues locally that serve as being indicative of alternatives to the local folk clubs:

The first insists on a very high performance standard, and mainly focuses on playing as opposed to singing, no floor spots, all performers are booked well in advance.

The second is organised as a sort of "Open Mic" run over the course of the summer for the benefit of local charities. Youngsters are encouraged but in the main what they perform are pop covers or self penned material in the pop idiom, perhaps you might consider them to be part of this youth revival - only fly in the ointment there is that they are not the least bit interested in folk music (And probably never will be).

Just to set your mind at ease pfr, I am NOT Keith A of Hertford, apologies if this upsets your mission.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Roger
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 05:22 PM

Perhaps one of you erudite experts can define 'folk music'.
Then the rest of us commoners can just get on with listening to what we enjoy.
Roger

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 05:45 PM

GUEST Joe G - No one has 'destroyed' folk. - taking just one of what in your opinion is a band representative of the outstanding artists who are reinvigorating folk Sail Pattern. They pretty much make a comprehensive job of destroying "Spanish Ladies" a traditional song dating back to around the middle of the 18th century. Guess they didn't appreciate the uniqueness of the song, so they felt compelled to rewrite it along with the seemingly compulsory over extended periods of instrumental masturbation..

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 06:03 PM

That is your opinion to which you are welcome - I've seen Sail Pattern several times - though not for a while. I remember loving their version of Spanish Ladies. I also love the original. Both can exist not just the version you prefer. The Sail Pattern version may pique the interest of people who might not have heard the song before and who may wish to find out more about it and possibly then about other folk songs. That is how the tradition will survive - not through a group of ageing people (of which I count myself as one) sitting round in a room bemoaning the fact no one wants to join their merry crew

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 06:49 PM

Along similar lines - though not a direct comparison. When I was around 19 (and already a folk, classical and rock fan) I didn't think I liked jazz. I had moved to Winchester from Hartlepool (the home of a superb and usually packed folk club with an eclectic booking policy) so initially I spent a lot of evenings alone until I made friends. One night I wandered into a pub where there was a jazz band playing. Thinking I'd have a quick pint then find somewhere else I sat down. The band started playing - a Beatles song, can't remember which, but with improvisations around the melody. 'Ah this isn't too bad I thought' I could understand what they were doing. They played a few more. I never looked back and as I am typing this I am listening to Jazz on 3 :-) Now I dare say I may have got into jazz at some point without that band as I was very open to new experiences but it would not have happened so quickly

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 20 Aug 18 - 06:52 PM

Ha - by an amazing coincidence as I was typing the above there was an interview on Jazz on 3 with Greg Lawson and an extract from his orchestration of Martyn Bennett's Bothy Culture which Ake and I locked horns over earlier this year :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 03:52 AM

"No one has 'destroyed' folk. "#
THen where is it?
We are told by Dave and have been in the past that it is no longer relevant and we have to "keep up with the times"
You can'r be both right
DEspite you claims and protests, the number of people now involved in genuine folk song has shrunk to a dogged few
The term "folk" has been used as a cultural dustbin to cover anything any individual chooses it to cover
You can't plan a night out on that basis, let alone discuss it intelligently
When thousands of folk enthusiasts walked away from the scene we were not replaced by enthusiasts for the "new" folk because there was no identifiable genre to be identified
I've just dug out Sail Pattern - the type of 'fplk rendition' we used to indulge in after a night at the pub - totally lacking in musical and narrative interpretation in a very strange accent
Sorry, if that's the best you can come up with I think my point is made
That is what I would regard as poor pop songs lacking the talent of Rod Stewart, who did similar things with folk songs

Calan - a mish-mash of over-amplified sounds - no reason not to like it but nothing to do with folk singing - as the veteran jazz musician said in 'Round Midnight' - their notes are fine but where's their story?"
If this is what passsses for folk - god help us all

"There is no "crowing"
No?
"Long live the new order!"
If it waddles and quacks....
Maybe I should have said "quacking"
Sorry Dave - you really do disappoint
You've torn our music up by the roots and replaved it with second-rate pop as far as I can see
The performers that have been put up here are those who have obviously made it
Our folk song was never about that - it was about getting together regularly to enjoy it as a group
If your new stuff is what you want you can keep it
Where do you think Harry Cox or Jeannie Robertson or Sam Larner or The Stewarts would have fitted into all that unintelligible noise ?
Sad - sad - sad!!

The point of all pop-sounding music is that it has no continuum - it is as disposable as a cardboard coffee cup and has to be regularly replaced
'The Spanish Lady never did - she was ageless and eternal
That prevents it from being folk if nothing else
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 04:25 AM

Whatever, Jim. You know my position and I am not going to labour the point. I can carry on enjoying the folk music I like as I have done for over 40 years. You, apparently, cannot. You seem to want to blame me for that. Fine, I am broad shouldered and if it makes you feel better, glad I can help. But rather than blame someone who has had no control over the direction of any folk clubs but one, which has never turned anyone away, you may want to think about the comments we regularly see about the nightmarish organisers and MCs who have frightened people off with their overbearing and bombastic attitudes.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 04:47 AM

" You, apparently, cannot. "
Cannot what Dave
I have never ceased both singing and listening to folk songs - never
I don't regard what has been presented here as folk - they have no narrative form, tho they are narrative songs, the cry out for interpretation that simply isn't there
They are 'performed' rather than communicated as stories and experience - that is what makes folk songs 'folk' - they are about people rather than just sounds - that's what makes them
I don't find either particularly good examples of what they are - there are far better and inspired pop-type songs
Tall you what - I bet both of those renditions come with a little (c) - they both belong to somebody

I' not suggesting that you are to blame for what is happening - I am challenging your defending it as 'folk' which it isn't
I don't know anybody who was ever 'frightened off' by bombastic attitudes
When MacColl died the audiences for him and Peggy were as big as they had ever been
It is now possible to get most of the hundred or so albums made thirty years after his death - they are regularly being re-issued
I can't think of a single folk performer that that has happened to - can you?

You don't win people for your music by compromising and changing it to meet their tastes - you win them by doing it well enough for them to realise how enjoyable and important it is so they can enjoy it as uch as you do.
If you don't accept that stop performing and stick in a juke box
The finest art in the world comes from interpretation of inner passion an personal experience - crowd pleasing produces ladies with blue faces and white horses running through foam - chocolate-box art
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 04:53 AM

The case for the defence Jim
The best song ever written about the English class system.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuTMWgOduFM&list=RDyuTMWgOduFM

disposable as a paper cup? Face it people have all but disposed of your view of music. And its not the fault of the music. Its the fault of people who have turned their back on the need for 'folk' to write about their struggles and their society.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 05:06 AM

You say that you no longer go to folk clubs as they no longer present folk music so that is what you can no longer enjoy. Glad you are not blaming me. I do sing mainly traditional and enjoy traditional music along with many other genres. I'll carry on enjoying what I enjoy, you carry on enjoying what you enjoy and everyone will be happy.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 05:27 AM

"folk music so that is what you can no longer enjoy"
No - I said I stopped gong because they stopped presenting folk music - full stop - they no longer did what they claimed to do
Nowadays I'm far more concerned that future generations get as much interest and enjoyment as I have
It's 'a people's art' - the main oe we can lay claim to - that's what makes it important
I have never baled you ro any individual - we all took our eyes off the ball
We can only get it back into play when we recognise that's what we have done
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 05:34 AM

Fine, Jim, so you can no longer enjoy folk clubs. I can and do and hear more traditional folk at them than anything else. I suppose I am just lucky.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guest
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 05:37 AM

"Disposable as a paper cup?" - 100%

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 05:49 AM

As a case for the defence Big Al it is a very poor one!

A band from 1978 that has since broken up. Give them their due they make no pretensions of being "folk", a description I think they would run a mile from.

As for the song - certainly as disposable as a paper cup. God knows I hear more than enough of poorly "performed" 60s & 70s "hits" in what purport to be "folk clubs" but I must admit that, thankfully, I have never heard anyone attempt this candidate of yours. Must admit though the a cappella version would be a hoot, the WTF look on the faces of those present would be priceless.

I'll say it again - traditional folk music has never had to chase either audience or those willing to participate, playing or singing. It's popularity may vary but it has been around for hundreds of years and I dare say it will continue to survive.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 06:03 AM

The folk music scene is apparently dying, the audience has gone.

Ewan MacColl's 100 or so albums are regularly being re-issued.

Assuming that you think of what Ewan performed to be folk music, who is buying these regularly re-issued albums?

How did you re-act to Ewan performing British material accompanied by an American five strung banjo? Apart from Margaret Barry I can't think of any traditional singers on this side of the Atlantic using the instrument. Some might think of it as jumping on the bandwagon brought about by the interest in American music at the time.
You appear to criticise current singers who introduce new methods of accompaniment of folk material.

And please don't go into your usual "grave dancing" phase again.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 06:04 AM

"I suppose I am just lucky."
Would taht everyone were as lucky as you Dave
These threads are started because many aren't and people need to start respecting that fact
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Johnny J
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 06:18 AM

"Nowadays I'm far more concerned that future generations get as much interest and enjoyment as I have"

Mmm, I think future generations will be in a far more fortunate position than we were as regard making choices. They will have access to vast archives, recordings and so on whether it be from libraries, CDs, online resources or wherever. Unlike in our day, they can easily access any genre of music they wish and, if it appeals, they can then go and seek it out. If it isn't being performed in folk clubs or other venues, then they can motivate themselves and peers to do it for themselves.

If they aren't really interested, then fair enough. We can't force them.

I do realise that much of "the tradition" was almost lost and that it took great efforts to "revive" same. Therefore, those of us who lived through the "folk revival" of the fifties and sixties feel very protective of "the folk club scene" with which we grew up.

However, the music and songs will always be there for those who really want them.

Personally, I'm very selective about where I choose to listen to music (and my tastes actually extend beyond trad and and folk). I've never been entirely satisfied with the music policy of any folk club and today is no different. There has always been good, bad, and irrelevant...all in my own opinion, of course.

As others have commented, folk and traditional music is not the exclusive preserve of folk clubs. You can hear it within Arts Centres, Concert Halls, The Pub, Cafes, Community/Church Halls etc. We have a great variety of informal arrangements these days too. From pub sessions and singarounds, community choirs and bands/orchestras, folk music classes and so on.
There is also an abundance of festivals... All fiddle, all harp, all singing, all dancing, and mixtures of all. Some commercial, others not.
Of course, we will all have different views about the validity and usefulness of such things but it is quite clear that much is happening outwith and beyond the narrow confines of the "folk club".

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Johnny J
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 06:20 AM

Further to my last post, was it Karl Dallas who said something along the lines of

"Folk Clubs exist so that one day they will no longer need to exist..." ?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 07:50 AM

I go along with some of what you say, but apart from the very early days there has always been plenty to choose from - some readily accessible, some needing a bit of searching out - worth it, as far as I'm concerned
For me, the search has often been a major part in the pleasure
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 09:06 AM

If you describe Calan as a 'mish mash' of sounds then there really is no point continuing to discuss this with you. One of the finest young bands around and indisputably folk.

You stick to your narrow introverted view of what folk is Jim and Ob and I'll continue to enjoy the huge range of high quality music making by young people who will keep folk alive long after we have gone

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 09:13 AM

"If you describe Calan as a 'mish mash' of sounds then there really is no point continuing to discuss this with you."
I realised that some time ago
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:12 AM

I listened to two tracks of calan, they are competent, but do not particularly do much for me, all a matter of taste, for example apparition a bit over arranged and vocals should be more to the fore and instruments too loud in relation to vocals, difficult to hear what the song is about on occasions, and long instrumental breaks in between imo do nothing to enhance the story line,
Synnwyr Solomon starts off better and vocal balance in reltion to instruments is a little better Calan do seem to be more about creating unusual sound than importance of lyrics
.Whatever happened to folk music being about simplicity.
I would rather listen to donovan singing colours, or jill pidd singing lord bateman unaccompanied than the kind of arrangements that calan do., all a matter of taste.
i believe joe g runs a folk club, is it the topic at bradford? if he does i find it rather sad that an organiser believes this group are the finest folk band, Synnwyr Solomon apparntly is a tradtional song, but the musical balance and treatment needs attention.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:24 AM

Sandman,

Joe G. didn't say Calan "are the finest folk band". He said they are "One of the finest young bands around"

Be sad no more!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:40 AM

well if it classifies as folk rock.in my opinion they are inferior to steeleye span compare it to stteleys span lark in the morning in 1971 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVYGANALIgk, folk rock has not progressed but digressed, calan one of the finest bands around, i depair

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:40 AM

GUEST JoeG - Just listened to Sail Plattern's "The Bonny Ship the Diamond", it would have been better had they let it severely alone, or restricted themselves to playing it as an instrumental number.

On Calan, all I can say is that on the Continent, over in the USA, in Canada and throughout the UK there are similar bands equally as good, the only point of difference is that some of Calan's material is in Welsh. Used to see bands like them right, left and centre at every festival you'd go to. Thankfully not so much now, they all sound exactly the same and after 15-20 minutes the audience goes "fiddle deaf".

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:40 AM

Yes that is correct Guest - I simply used them as an example of the many superb young bands - I've seen them live a number of times and they have always been very enjoyable and contrary to some of the opinions voiced here their stagecraft is excellent. Amusing and informative.

I'll check out your recommendation Dick - sounds interesting

I have been involved in the Topic and was the booking secretary for just over a year but that was a while ago. In that time I maintained the clubs eclectic booking policy inviting trad, contemporary, blues and a folk / jazz fusion band from Denmark to play at the club. I think the success of the club that year (and its continuing success) suggests that my choices of artists were sound :-) )

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:45 AM

I like Blackbeard's Tea Party.

There, I have said it now. Fire away :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:45 AM

I'm sure they'll be pleased to hear your criticism chaps if they can hear it above the enthusiasm of their thousands strong audiences at festivals such as Shrewsbury :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:49 AM

bloody hell.. that was a long dreary read since I last posted here.. I'm exhausted...

The only relief was being introduced to the band Calan - they sound good...

cheers for that Joe...




So basically some folks like their trad folk flavour like a good refreshing pint glass of beer or cider,

Youngsters prefer it sweeter like a can of cola or tizer, sucked through a straw

But an even smaller minority within this small niche minority interest music culture
prefer their trad folk flavoured more like cod liver oil, syrup of figs, and milk of magnesia
all mixed together in the same grubby tarnished pewter tankard...

.. I'll have a pint of rough cider with a tizer top, thanks...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:54 AM

Ha ha! I'll keep to the beer but where music goes anything that sounds good and is well played, sung and arranged will do for me - and a few old blokes sat around singing dirges is not my idea of a good night out - I know I've been to too many in the past!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:55 AM

Sandman,

Is it really fair comparing them to Steeleye Span? How many other bands, in the whole history of folk, would stand up to that comparison?

They are young, making their own way and learning.

Cut them some slack and I'm sure, given 40 years or so, they'll be as boring as the rest of us!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:55 AM

Glad you like Calan pfr - well worth seeing live as I said earlier

Also check out Mabon if you don't know them

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 11:57 AM

Observer - btw.. makes no difference to me if you are keith or not
[a 50/50 guess based on plausible indications..]
or an entire team of obnoxious conceited malcontents posting under the same guest name...

Any of us could log out and post as Observer and claim any old bollocks as the truth... so effin what...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 12:14 PM

Joe - circa 1979, when I was about 20, me and my girlfiend had a night out at a folk club a bus ride outside of Leeds..

We were young, vibrant, enthusiastic for new experiences...

That was enough to put me off 'folk clubs' for the rest of my life..

..it was more like happy clappy sunday school..

I've tried dipping in others a few times in the decades since...
and enjoyed some of what was on offer

but it's just not for me...

I prefer the atmosphere of a proper down to earth unpretentious working man's club...

[but not many of them surviving either, that haven't been tidied up and refurbed to death...]

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 12:19 PM

I caught a bit of Bob Williamson on the Wheeltappers and Shunters social club on YouTube the other day. Now, there was a proper club and proper folk music :-D

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 12:21 PM

"girlfiend"
Should she have been allowed out ?? :-)

"If you describe Calan as a 'mish mash' of sounds then there really is no point continuing to discuss this with you."
Are we not allowed an to hold an opinion
I thought it was only the 'folk police' who objected to tastes other than their own?
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 12:34 PM

Jim - bugger... I just noticed that speeling mistak...

well in the last year of our relationship, she did turn into a bit of a fiend...

I blame it on the traumatic experience of that folk club...!!!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 12:48 PM

pfr - I was very lucky to be introduced to folk through the Nursery Folk Club in Hartlepool which, as well as an eclectic booking policy, also had one of the best crowds of people you could hope to meet as the organisers and audience. I was really disappointed when I moved away that not all clubs were like that......

I attended the Topic off and on for many years once I moved to Bradford only finally becoming a weekly attendee when the club moved to a pub I had a direct bus connection to. Instead of only going to see people I had heard of I started going to see everyone and made some great discoveries. Later I got involved with the Committee and as mentioned above was the booking sec for just over a year - this was after I had spent a similar period booking artists for pub gigs and helping in the organisation of a few festivals. So it looks like there is no hope for me :-)

Since moving to York there are so many opportunities for listening to music of all genres I don't go to a club as often and a lot of time is spent promoting my own roots and Americana gigs.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 12:56 PM

How to get old folkies in a rage

and how to tip them over the edge

:-D

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 01:22 PM

Oddly I am not keen on BTP (but see absolutely nothing wrong in what they do just doesn't grab me)

But I did love Bellowhead ;-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 01:30 PM

I would recommend grannys attic or the young uns, as reasonably good bands

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 02:02 PM

Ahh memories... here's a band we used to like 25 years ago down here in Scrumpyshire...

https://www.shazam.com/track/5441358/bjorn-again-polka

Live - one of our favourites at 10min 40secs


This about as much as a quick google turns up..
the live sound is too weak and thin - that's a shame...

Yeah... I went to the first WOMAD Festival at Shepton Mallet in 1982..
which sums up the eclectic sound of Bristol in the early to mid 80s..

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 02:28 PM

Still doing occasional gigs as E2 pfr

I did mention Granny's Attic and the Young 'Uns - I'd suggest they are better than 'reasonably good', Dick. The Young 'Uns most recent album is full of superb songs written by Sean Cooney

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 02:52 PM

On a bit of a tangent, but sparked off by thoughts on this thread...

I like the idea of folk 'fusion' music in principle, but very often don't think much of the results...
Maybe, whatever genre is being fused with trad folk,
it usually tends to end up too smug and M.O.R...???

not enough grit and balls...

I got into 'Americana', particularly the 'Gothic' depressing variant 20 ish years ago..
and discovered some great bands that satisfied me at that time...

That actually challenged my prejudice towards Country and Western,
and I ended up learning to enjoy a lot of the music I hated when I was a kid,
and my uncle dominated family parties with his C&W LPs...

A similar process could potentially happen with kids who think they hate trad folk...???


hmmmm.. dunno...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 02:56 PM

Yep I alluded to that earlier but you'd probably lost the will to live by then ;-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 03:03 PM

Been trying to find the tracks by a guy with the stage name of Broadcaster who did some brilliant mixes of techno with samples of the Radio Ballads but can't track them down.

Of course Chumbawamba are a great example of a mix of more popular music and folk. Their Readymades CD that used samples of folk singers remains one of my favourites. Of course Biff Whalley of the band is also a superb song writer himself

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 03:23 PM

Ah found the Broadcaster album. Great to hear it again. Though I've switched to the Proms now for Sibelius 2 :-)

https://broadcasteruk.com/primary-transmission/

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 21 Aug 18 - 03:24 PM

As approved by Peggy Seeger :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 03:01 AM

This seems to have been turned into a fanzine thread
What a shame - it showed such promise
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 03:28 AM

The title is UK Folk Revival 2018 Jim and many of the links provided are to current bands so very relevant to the thread. Dredging up the past is more likely to detract from it.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 03:46 AM

Dredging up the past is more likely to detract from it. "No, I dredged up a 1971 clip of folk rock band steeleye which illuStrated that the balance of instruments to vocals compared to Calan was better,AND THAT THE CLIP OF CALAN WAS,showed that they were to put it politely a work in progress. I could provide clips from the past of the wilson family that shows how good they wereand still are. the young uns and grannys atic are un my opinion groups that are doing it well.
learning from the past is essential, particularly from tradtional performers singers and musicians helps to keep the roots of the music strong

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 03:47 AM

"The title is UK Folk Revival 2018 Jim and many of the links provided are to current bands so very relevant to the thread. "
If it's dealt with in these "I like" terms without putting forward why they like them it becomes fanzine, especially as some of those being put forward as as far from folk song as Maria Callas
We actually started to discuss what we expected from a folk-song club and why some of us had stopped going
We may not have got agreement on what we wanted but at least we got an opportunity to say why we thought things had gone wrong
Not discussing that guarantees than nothing will change
Pity
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 03:47 AM

Thanks Dave. Exactly - I have only shared suggestions of artists so that those interested can discover music that may be new to them and to demonstrate that folk is thriving, and being made relevant to new audiences, through the work of those artists.

Of course if one's position is that of not being interested in a vibrant future for folk then there will be nothing of interest

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 03:57 AM

I can think of no better way to put young people off folk for life than to play them Walter Pardon singing Cupid the Ploughboy.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:00 AM

however i have not heard any instrumental music in the uk that is as high in standard as music in county clare and kerry, Some of the young and old performers in the uk folk revival are very good as regards song but some seem to be tempted by commercialism which puts over arrangement and trying to create a new sound before clarity and meaning of lyrics, i do realise that the need to try new ideas is important but if should not be to the detriment of being able to hear words, to go in the direction of intersting soud to the detriment of words can be one of the products of commercilism, commercial music often has nothing challenging to say but goes for a wall of sound example phil spector.
GOOD TRADTIONAL SONGS AND GOOD MODERN SOCIAL COMMENT SONGS SUCH AS PALACES OF GOLD do not need over arrangement or the phil spector treatment

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:07 AM

I can think of no better way to put young people off folk for life than to play them Walter Pardon singing Cupid the Ploughboy."
Well i know at least three young people in the uk who were turned on by listening to old unaccompanied singers, and i have heard some very good young unacompanied singers here in ireland

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:14 AM

"I can think of no better way to put young people off folk for life than to play them Walter Pardon singing Cupid the Ploughboy.""
Which is a pretty good summation of what's gone wrong with folk song
Walter epitomise=ied what good folk singing was - if you can't sell him you may as well forget folk song
Hoew dare yo troll this thread by insulting our best performers
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:16 AM

If it's dealt with in these "I like" terms without putting forward why they like them it becomes fanzine

Fair comment, Jim. I like Blackbeard's Tea Party because they are vibrant and talented. I posted the links on here as a good example of what is driving the current folk revival. There are many others of course.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:17 AM

I agree they don't NEED it but there is absolutely no harm in them having it. As I stated earlier there will be people who have not heard folk music before who could be attracted in to the source material thanks to the efforts of artists who did different things with the music. Look how many people attended Bellowhead gigs across the country at the height of their career. I don't think all of those would have been follies before but I bet a decent number are now!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:18 AM

My comment above was really Dick's comment on Palaces of Gold

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:20 AM

Sorry 're' - predictive sex ;-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:21 AM

Jim, you have spent a good part of this thread disparaging the artists that people like yet when someone does the same to an artist you like you have a go at them. Is that not somewhat hypocritical?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:31 AM

Fair point Dave!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:39 AM

"Jim, you have spent a good part of this thread disparaging the artists that people like yet when someone"
I have said why I feel as I do about their performance that is not disparaging them
It would have been hypocritical for me not to have said what I though
I say they have nothing to do with folk song

Commenting on a band who plays publicly used to be known as fair criticism in my day

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:56 AM

Commenting on a band who plays publicly used to be known as fair criticism in my day

Then surely, by that same rule, commenting on anyone who has done anything publicly, including Walter Pardon, is fair criticism is it not?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 04:57 AM

Oh - and I claim 200 :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 05:08 AM

" Walter Pardon, is fair criticism is it not?"
No it most certainly is not
Since I came to this music it has been an unspoken convention that you do not attack our traditional singers (our benefactors), not in public and certainly not when they are dead
They gave us our songs - without them we wouldn't be talking to each other - but their world was not ours
Many of them were well past their prime when they were discovered, but somehow they managed to make the songs work far better than some of the latest manifestations
They are not "performers" in the same way those of us who perform choose to be
I have never if all my years here seen an openly critical attack on a traditional singer - never
This is part of the nastiness of the new folk scene
If you can't see that dave we occupy different parts of the folk planet
This individual will be digging Walter up next to give him a regular kicking just as so many folkies do with MacColl
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jag
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 05:14 AM

Jim. Is criticism of the song permitted?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 05:19 AM

I agree with the sentiment of your comment Jim but there is truth in the comment made. I don't think the poster's intention was to criticise Walter Pardon but simply to say that such singing would not be an attractive introduction to folk for a young person (though of course it would be good if the poster of the comment responded). As I mentioned earlier I was fortunate enough to be introduced to folk by a lively eclectic bunch of singers and guests at Hartlepool FC. If my introduction had been one of the source singers I may not have been bitten with the bug

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 05:30 AM

Well, I disagree, Jim. There is no performer, alive or dead, that deserves that god-like status. If someone does not like them they are entitled to say so in whatever manner they chose. I have not been on the folk scene as long as you but it has been over 40 years and I have never heard of such an 'unspoken convention'. Maybe Guest, pseudonymous has not heard of it either. The same, I suspect, as most people in or out of the folk scene. Maybe it was just amongst collectors?

If I did not like someone I would just say they are not my cup of tea. I would not have phrased it as Guest P did but neither would I say that anyone was a mish-mash of over-amplified sound, totally lacking in musical and narrative interpretation or were in it just for the money!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 05:31 AM

"but there is truth in the comment made"
THere - it's catching
The worst you can do with anything is to pretend it is something else leaving people to find out it wasn't what you told them it was
I wes lucky to find that out before I buggered off the scene fifty years ago
We came to the music because we liked it for what it was - any foundation we build for it has to be based on that

"Jim. Is criticism of the song permitted?"
Of course it is, but not in terms of criticising the singer, which is what you have done here
I've just made my point about this behavior and it's consequences on the 'Roud book' thread
I'm off for some fresh air
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 06:05 AM

I disagree with your first comment Jim. Introducing someone to folk music via a band like, for example, Bellowhead, doesn't mean that they will never get to enjoy more traditionally presented material. When I got into classical music I didn't start with the 'hard stuff' like chamber music I worked my way in via Johann Strauss and Tchaikovsky with their big tunes.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 06:10 AM

The start of my slippery slope to folk Music was Jethro Tull :-)

Nowadays the slide is even easier. If you listen to something on Spotify or any of the popular music streaming sites you get suggestions for what you may like. Someone listening to Bellowhead or Mumford and Sons is likely to be sent on a voyage of discovery that could well end at Walter Pardon!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 06:20 AM

Yes that is very true. A friend who thought he didn't like folk came across the band Talisk on Spotify and is now exploring the vast quantity of folk on the platform. Not sure if he will reach Walter but you never know!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 06:30 AM

You say you're not disparaging Jim. But you say that you know what the folk culture of our islands is, and all these other people (many of us having spent a lifetime in folk clubs) know nowt.

Its so dismissive. So negative.

If the music you love has such inherent strengths (and I believe it does). It really does not gain from shit slinging like this. In fact, it detracts - and sends out ALL the wrong messages.

History will decide what is our folksong. You are not the arbiter in this matter, Neither is some bloody silly 1954 committee of interested parties.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 06:30 AM

My lad came across a Mongolian Folk Rock band called Hanggai and put me on to them. Well worth a listen. Of course some would say it is not folk ;-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 06:52 AM

I went to a Chinese restaurant yesterday. Some people would say its not proper food...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 06:55 AM

In fact my Dad would have said, that's not proper food...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,JoeG
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 06:57 AM

Spot on Al

I'll check out Hanggai Dave - i quite like a bit of Mongolian folk rock - do you know Huun Huur Tu and Yat Kha? Well worth a listen if not

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 07:06 AM

I'll look them up. This is what a folk forum should be for :-) Maybe the expansion of awareness brought on by the internet globalising music has a bearing on the latest folk revival?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 07:57 AM

You might even take up reading fRoots!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 08:12 AM

I used to take it when it was Folk Roots, Vic. If I remember rightly I felt it had lost its way and stopped my subscription years back but I may give it another try.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 08:18 AM

Question asked by someone else earlier - "What latest folk revival".

Folk Clubs disappearing.

Folk Festivals disappearing.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 08:19 AM

My objection to modern "folk music" loosely based on the tradition is that it is so bloody boring, the emotion lost, the story lost, participation discouraged.
Modern "Folk Music" has become simply a gilded frame within which young and not so young wannabee's exhibit their just about average musical skills. To some this may be "clever" and designed to attract an audience who's knowledge has been honed on "Big Brother", "Love Island and Facebook; but oh how I long to hear a singer who really feels what the song or tune is all about and can transmit that feeling to an audience who are receptive and capable of absorption.
In my youth I was a fan of beat music and dancing, when purely by chance I dropped into a little hotel on my way to the Saturday dance.
In the lounge I sat with a pint to listen to a few campers who were singing and playing, when they had finished one of their songs, a young lassie came from a dim corner of the room and sat on the arm of my chair......She sang me a song of love and betrayal which touched me deeply and does so to this day. When she finished, no one cheered or whooped, there was complete silence .....we all knew that we had been honoured to have been present and it was not simply a song, but the girl's soul that we heard speak that night.
I later found out that the girl had just come back from Ewan MacColl's singers Club.....and she went on to become one of the most respected singers and teachers in Scotland.

That night taught me what Folk Music is, the power it has to make people rediscover lost emotions.
Absolutely nothing to do with marketing, celebrity, or mass appeal, Folk music is basically a personal thing, some of us unfortunately are unable to respond to anything musical without the armour of virtue signalling. Dilution is a sin.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guest
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 08:27 AM

"That night taught me what Folk Music is, the power it has to make people rediscover lost emotions."

Folk music? ALL music for God's sake!!!!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 08:31 AM

I accept that things called folk clubs are in decline but they are not disappearing. They are simply morphing into other things. Be that music sessions, open mic nights or folk music at other venues.

I am not sure about festivals. Does anyone have some hard facts about this? How many festivals were there in 2017 as opposed to 2007 for instance? Are you allowing for folk music being played at other festivals? I know that Glastonbury has some good folk music on because a friend of mine performs folk music there with his band. Just because a couple of festivals have made the news by folding does not mean there is a general decline.

I am sorry for those who feel that they have lost something. My folk cup is overflowing but unfortunately, try as I may, I cannot seem to share any of it.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 08:35 AM

Just out of interest and very unscientific I did a search on 'uk folk festivals 2017' and it returned 30 million results. The search for 'uk folk festivals 2007' returned 13 million. Not sure what that tells us :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Voices of the future
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:21 AM

All very interesting, but I refuse to put up with any high and mighty self-appointed critics dictating what music I should or shouldn't be listening to;
or insulting our generation's legitimacy and value as creative folk artists.
How dare they consider themselves to have such superior taste and judgement, that they can dismiss and disparage all performers who do not conform to their fusty puritanical spartan aesthetics.
Especially when they are so obviously clueless about the modern popular music genres they are so sneeringly handing down judgement on.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,For DtG
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:26 AM

UK Folkk festivals

I think this gives a reasonable picture for 2018 for the UK
not perfect but a reasonable approximation (too many variables in the "hits)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:32 AM

Thanks Guest. I had seen that and it looks very healthy. It would be nice if we could compare it to the picture 10 years ago.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:41 AM

yes its puzzling.

weymouth folk club will be on tonight , as it is every wednesdays at The Sailors Return down by the harbour at Weymouth. Get there after 8pm, you'll be lucky to get a seat -unless they recognise you as a singer - then a seat will be passed over the heads of those present for you.

All kinds of music is welcomed - beginners get a warm welcome.

The Weymouth Folk Festival is in June and the streets round the harbour are thronged with dancers and there two performance stages.

If you say there's a decline, I suppose there must be. What is it that's supposed to have declined. Things have changed - that I will grant you. Sidmouth used to be far more international than it is now. There less gigs in folk clubs for professional singers. On the other hand - there are far more live music/acoustic music gigs in pubs than ever before. So actually more professional folk/acoustic musicians.

Froots in a way is rather like Sidmouth thirty or forty years ago. Very international minded. Reliant on record company adverts and the like. So it promotes what it promotes - but it doesn't really reflect the clubs or the festivals. That's not to say it's wrong. Just that its a bit disassociated with the groundswell of folk music activity.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:45 AM

You could try this Dave. It only goes back as far as 2010. It's possible more festivals got added as the site got better known and, if it's anything like folk club listings, people tend to be better at getting new events added than closed ones removed but it might still give a reasonable picture...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:54 AM

That is very useful. Thanks Jon.

Earliest picture - 31 July 2010 - 132 Folk Festivals in England on the database.

Latest picture - 232 Folk Festivals in England on the database.

Even allowing for what Jon points out and the the picture being blurred by some not being removed etc., I think that pretty much puts that one to bed.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:55 AM

"I can think of no better way to put young people off folk for life than to play them Walter Pardon singing Cupid the Ploughboy."

Jim Carroll has been 'throwing his toys out of the pram' about this on another thread. Sometimes I worry about his blood pressure: all this high dudgeon and anger (as it appears to be from his posts) cannot be good for him. It isn't good for anyone. And it isn't going to persuade anybody to listen to or enjoy Pardon or to go to a traditional club. It seems to me more likely to put people off.

Cupid the Ploughboy was the first Pardon song I listened to, chosen at random from the selection available free on Spotify. I have to say that I didn't like it, and judging from what I know about the musical tastes of most young people, few of them would. So that is why I made the comment I did. And I think I should be permitted to make an honest comment to that effect without being harangued in an unpleasant manner.

If there are young people happy to sing such songs in such a style then fine, though I am suspecting that these youngsters may be a fairly middle class lot. Not that there is anything wrong with being middle class.

But it isn't for me. I find the lyrics peculiar. The idea of a ploughboy named after a classical god striking me as strange and unlikely. I don't like the tune, especially as the difficulty of singing it after what, for the sake of simplicity, I will call a 'key change' towards the end apparently results in Pardon starting the second verse on a different note from the one used in starting the first verse. It has no rhythm. There is no sense of natural speech patterns in the way the words are 'sung', in the sense that emphasis is put on unexpected words. You can tell that the singer is elderly, it seems to me. None of this, I feel, is likely to appeal to the young of today's ethnically diverse UK. Nor would being expected to treat either singer or song with some sort of quasi-religious reverence be much of an encouragment.


Hands off Jethro Tull! They were good fun:)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:56 AM

From Jim Carroll; "I buggered off the scene fifty years ago"

In which case what qualifies you to cast judgement on what is current?

I asked a similar question of you some years ago on another thread when you admitted that your knowledge of a particular happening in a club some six years or so before you were on the scene was not from being there but knowing someone who was. Is this a similar situation?

"Since I came to this music it has been an unspoken convention that you do not attack our traditional singers (our benefactors), not in public and certainly not when they are dead"

Sounds like it is yet more from your own fertile imagination.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:04 AM

What do you mean they WERE good fun, Pseudonymous? They still ARE :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:05 AM

UK folk festivals 2017 - on Google gives 5,420,000 results
UK folk festivals 2007 - on Google gives 46,900,000 results
UK folk festivals 1997 - on Google gives 43,700,000 results

IF the above are of any significance at all, then there is a marked and sharp decline from 2013 onward (2014 - 38,300,000: 2015 - 20,400,000 & 2016 - 7,820,000).

GUEST, Voices of the future:

No one is TELLING you to do anything, neither are they DICTATING anything to anyone.

No-one is insulting the current generation's legitimacy and value as creative artists. What is in dispute is whether or not there is any legitimacy in the claim, by others, that they are folk artists.

You ask, "How dare they consider themselves to have such superior taste and judgement". Possibly because THEY, and Jim Carroll in particular, have spent decades, researching, collecting and participating in the folk music of the British Isles and object quite rightly to just any modern popular music genres being "lumped into" folk music as a catch all.

Quite a number of bands have been mentioned in this thread as examples. It is worthwhile taking a look at how those bands describe themselves - FOLK is not the first thing that you see when they themselves describe what music they play. Folk does get a mention as a guiding influence and source of inspiration. THAT does not make them folk artists and who books them to play where is totally irrelevant.

Vic Smith, the magazine you recommend for our reading started off as The Southern Rag, then became Folk Roots and then became fRoots. There is a progression there for all to see, when does it just become Roots?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:14 AM

GUEST,For DtG, Date: 22 Aug 18 - 09:26 AM, I had a quick look at your link. Rather a misrepresentation as they list festivals NOT specifically Folk Festivals. A number of them in places I know have got no musical dimension to them at all.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:21 AM

Results of my Google searches.

UK folk festivals 2017 - About 31,000,000 results (0.67 seconds)
UK folk festivals 2007 - About 14,100,000 results (0.71 seconds)
UK folk festivals 1997 - About 7,200,000 results (0.75 seconds)

As I said earlier, unscientific.

But it matters not as we have already shown that on the database of http://ukfolkfestivals.co.uk there are 100 more festivals in England today than there was in 2010. A bit different to your bold statement that Folk Festivals are disappearing. If you can find something factual to back up that the general trend is a reduction in the number of Folk Festivals I am willing to listen.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:29 AM

Guest, 10.05 am.

I suspect that you might get on quite well with Jim Carroll as you appear to share a tendency to assert that people are making claims that nobody appears to be making as a way of (I suppose) trying to advance your own position. The rather 'emotional' use of italics and block capitals suggest a shared sensibility/temperament.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:33 AM

Al Whittle wrote -
Froots in a way is rather like Sidmouth thirty or forty years ago. Very international minded. Reliant on record company adverts and the like.

OK let's test this claim against the facts:-
Number of pages in current fRoots (No. 418) - 148 pages
Number of adverts taken by record companies - 1 page (inside cover for World Circuit Records) (There is one other that I happen to know is a freebie for a small company devoted to specialist British traditional releases)
Number of pages of current album reviews - 17 pages (Is the editor mad to devote so much space to an industry that gives him minimal support or is he just trying to keep his readers informed?)
Number of pages of adverts for folk music festivals/clubs/tours - 25 pages
Number of pages of adverts for world music events/festivals - 3 pages

If we don't have some relationship between claims and facts, I'll have to get my friend in the White House to make another FAKE NOOS tweet!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:35 AM

Sorry Pseudonymous. I used caps in my reply to you as well. I probably started a trend ;-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:49 AM

Hello Dave

The context and tone were different. :)

Don't suppose you liked 'Liege and Lief' as well?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:55 AM

And I am afraid I got to Bellowhead (mentioned above in this thread) via the theme music to the TV show Count Arthur Clark, which I liked because of its rhythms and quirkiness. I'm still annoyed I can't find it on iTunes.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:56 AM

Of course I did :-) Tull, Fairport, Steeleye, Mr Fox. You name 'em, I like 'em. Even been known to listen to Pentangle and Magna Carta occasionally :-D

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:58 AM

Count Arthur Strong: too much coffee to be articulate today.

I have an Oyster Band LP somewhere (bought at some folk do decades ago).

That's fun.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 10:59 AM

We saw Bellowhead in Grassington on their final tour. Amazing live performance. Support band were Louis Barabbas and the Bedlam Six. Well worth a listen as well.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 11:00 AM

a tendency to assert that people are making claims that nobody appears to be making

Interesting Psued but this is what GUEST, Voices of the people did write:

I refuse to put up with any high and mighty self-appointed critics dictating what music I should or shouldn't be listening to

Having read that, or better still GUEST, Voices of the people's entire post, are you honestly trying to tell us that he was not complaining about being DICTATED to? Good luck with that, but that dog won't hunt.

Use of Italics are a very good way of highlighting what words are not my own.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 11:03 AM

Thank you. This thread is providing some useful suggested listening/show going.

:)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 11:06 AM

I have vague memories of buying Bob Pegg & Nick Strutt LPs when I was 15 or 16..
and that'd be after mainstream chart band Lindisfarne hooked us teens into folk...

In fact Lindisfarne splinter group Jack The Lad were as important an influence as Wilko era Dr Feelgood...

..probably not 'folk' enough though.. eh...???


Sod the old miseries...
In 1975 Jack the Lad were in my estimation a crucial proto punk band,
and definitely one of the earliest 'punk folk' bands...
They were youngish folkies who were aggressive and exciting in concert...
an antidote to the usual run-of-the-mill insipid folkies we saw on the telly...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 11:07 AM

Vic Smith, the magazine you recommend for our reading started off as The Southern Rag, then became Folk Roots and then became fRoots. There is a progression there for all to see, when does it just become Roots?
I am aware of the sequence of names. I have every issue in sequence on a book shelf by my computer and find it a consistently useful research tool - especially as the magazine has a alphabetic list of features from all its 418 issues in its website.

May I politely suggest to the Observer that he does some observing? The current direction of the magazine has the British folk music as its core and always has done, Articles in the current issue include musings on the Folk Awards, on Katy Spicer CEO of the EFDSS. Articles on interesting folk newcomers Thom Ashcroft and Nick Hart, the folk dance band Banter, Rowan Rheingans, Jim Moray's new folk-rock band False Lights, Martin Hayes and The Gloaming, A look back at Dobells and other folk records shops from the 1960s, a retrospective on Buffy St, Marie, Cath & Phil Tyler, as well as a massive inclusive list of the UK's folk festivals with all the contact details. Name me a British magazine that has a wider coverage of folk music.

What the magazine does not believe - and I am fully agree with its policy - is that folk and traditional music stops at Dover. I often despair of the Brexity Little Englander views that I see expressed by this country's Mudcatters. Some years ago, I was depressed to read on this board that he didn't read fRoots any more because it was "full on Mongolian Nose Flute players." No, this was not Boris Johnson, but someone who has contributed to this thread.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 11:15 AM

Observer - can't speak for anyone else, but I get a distict whiff of you dictating your tastes
and opinions more loudly than others here...

You might not exactly be saying right now "I order you to comply with my views on folk"

.. but we certainly get a sense you would if you could...


We bow to you oh mighty opinion leader....

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 12:02 PM

Wot Punk Rocker said. :)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 12:15 PM

Idont know about monglian nose flute players ,but i have heard some wonderful bulgarian throat singing

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 12:20 PM

I've heard a fair bit of mudcatian arse singing...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,MATT MILTON
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 12:34 PM

Interesting that it's taken as read, as a given, as undisputed truth, by so many posts in this thread that folk clubs are dying.

In London I have plenty of folk clubs to attend. The Goose Is Out, Bermondsey Folk Club, Cellar Upstairs, Walthamstow, Musical Traditions, Croydon, among others... You will hear traditional folk songs at all of them. They are in general well attended.

Yes, most of the audience is 60+ but it's folk music, what do you expect... there is a smattering of younger people.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 01:03 PM

It isn't taken as read by all, Matt. I have reservations and, as I have highlighted, the number of festivals does not seem to be declining as stated at all. Near me (Airedale) there is plenty going on. Whether everyone would class it as folk is another question.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 01:32 PM

What a pity pfr that you cannot provide any examples of this. But let us look at what you've said:

I get a distict whiff of you dictating your tastes
and opinions more loudly than others here...

You might not exactly be saying right now "I order you to comply with my views on folk"

.. but we certainly get a sense you would if you could...

Have a quick count of relative number of posts to this thread and you will see very clearly who's pushing their opinions more loudly than others

This 252 post thread. You pfr have posted 36 times whereas I have only posted 21 times. As to the forum your 3535 posts to my 351.

By the way pfr who is the "we" you are referring to in what I suppose passes for that last sentence quoted above?

---

Chill on the combat, please, and stick to the topic of discussion - all of you. -Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jag
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 01:34 PM

How has the number of people, age profile and tradiotionalness of material at festival pub sessions and singarounds changed over the years?

What people do, rather than what they pay to listen to.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 01:52 PM

Observer - are you certain you are not Keith...???

So... sitting on the bog ruminating...
I now recall a band from my mid 1970s teens.. Hedgehog Pie
but I can't remember where I would have heard them...
John Peel..???

I'm fairly sure I never bought any of their LPs,
because the town record shop, and Woolworths carried very limited stock
.. the Library had an extensive shelf of Topic LPs,
but not much recent folk.

Brenda Wooton was popular, I think she was on our local telly a fair bit.
Saw her live in concert...

Really difficult finding her tracks online for a reminder...

I'm off to google any Hedgehog Pie...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 02:02 PM

Sorry, last guest was me. It was an accident but serves to prove the point about not knowing who guests are :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 02:41 PM

knObserver - whoever you are, or how many you are...

I am obviously not shy in voicing my opinions, but I do so in good humour;
and will never consider myself a voice of authority, or superior to anybody else...

[though obviously I might be where a few individuals are concerned...]

so go OCD yerself in a Keith stylee on that...

ps.. you neglected to count GUEST,punkfolkrocker...

that should keep you occupied while we all get on and enjoy life...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 07:14 PM

Good question GUEST,jag:

How has the number of people, age profile and tradiotionalness of material at festival pub sessions and singarounds changed over the years?

What people do, rather than what they pay to listen to.

There are five festivals that I have been attending regularly over the past fifteen years based in the UK and in Europe.

Taking the one in Europe first, it never really had a fringe but at least two out of the four concert venues were free. Over the years during the period of the festival various bars and eateries hired in bands playing rock and pop covers in an attempt to keep their premises full and busy. This has drawn the public away from the festival venues and the festival started losing funding and they were forced to drop one of their two big paying venues. What used to be a large international folk festival is now very much scaled down with mostly "local" artists playing with a slight scattering of foreign artists.

One of the UK festivals supports a great pub session scene which is mainly traditional tunes played to an amazingly high standard. Bands booked by the festival are assigned pubs to be in to get sessions going and should they start to flag keep them going.

The others, all UK based festivals, have changed markedly over the years. One used to run for seven days, now it has shortened in to three days. Bands and artists used to play at the sessions with locals and visitors joining in. It used to be a mix of trad tunes and songs, Spanish songs, and contemporary UK and American folk. The change has been that the artists booked for the concerts arrive do their concert and move on, rarely will they appear for any of the sessions, there now seems to be more of an audience at what are stated as being sessions with fewer locals participating and now very few tunes are played and the songs are mainly poor covers of 60s and 70s pop songs.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 22 Aug 18 - 08:30 PM

So essentially...

"Everything changes in time.
Nothing lasts forever.
All things will eventually perish..
Make the best of what you can while you can..

..I'm depressed now...".


There, I'll freely donate these words of simple folksy wisdom for a run of Tee shirts,
to be sold on behalf of a favourite festival benefit survival fund.....

My regular folk fest closed after 10 successful years.
The volunteers were getting older and exhausted,
and council and business subsidies had dwindled - a casualty of austerity...

It was the last annual event I could take my mum to, that she looked forward to.
But on the positive side, the festival announced it would be no more,
as my mum's dementia worsened to the degree
where she wouldn't have been able to attend it anymore anyway...
At least the festival closure relieved me of the unpleasant job
of telling her we couldn't take her to it any longer...

Nature's balance...

Nothing lasts forever...

not even traditions...



..or foam & rubber components in Hi Fi Equipment...
or tesco bags that we stored precious things in 10 to 20 years ago...
..that's bloody annoying when you open a box and get covered in all the flakes and tiny particles...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 02:25 AM

Yes, getting back to the topic. Good point made by Matt. Does anyone have any evidence that the folk scene is in decline? We have already disproved that festivals are dying. There are more open mic nights than ever and by their inherent inclusiveness there is plenty opportunity to perform folk music there. So, apart from the word of a handful of people on here, is there any evidence? The very title of this thread and the OP seems to indicate that there is plenty of folk about. Just not in the same format as it was 50 years ago.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 03:14 AM

DtG - yeah, observer seeems to be in an almighty sulk that the world won't stand still for him/her...

Whereas, Jim is doing a magnificent job of archiving, preserving, and advocating our tradition
while it still remains in a relatively healthy condition...

Insurance for if/when trad folk becomes extinct in the wild..
At least it won't be lost forever like the Dodo and T.Rex...

We might not always agree with Jim's opinions and conclusions,
but he deserves the highest esteem....

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 03:27 AM

Spot on PFR.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 03:38 AM

the change has been that the artists booked for the concerts arrive do their concert and move on, rarely will they appear for any of the sessions, there now seems to be more of an audience at what are stated as being sessions with fewer locals participating and now very few tunes are played and the songs are mainly poor covers of 60s and 70s pop songs."
I think there is some truth in the above statement, and i think it is a change for the worse, why is this hapeening ,is it because organsers of festivals do not want to pay for accomodation?
as regards the second statement there has been a small increase in people playing covers of pop music ,not sure about the decline in tune playing, if that is the case the fault lies with the organisation for not stipulating clearly what the session is about or not using the performers who will play trad tunes

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 04:05 AM

last post before I try and get a few hours sleep...

I wonder if some folks are too narrow focused on perceived problems,
by viewing folk clubs/festivals in a vacuum, isolated from wider cultural change
and economic austerity...

A lot of change for the worst is out of our control, but it impacts significantly upon us.
At a time when an excess of wannabe pro folk artists
are competing for arguably decreasing oportunities...
..and amateur folkies have far more diversions and distractions for their attention and spending cash...

Clubs are a quaint British pastime..

..are fancy hamster breeder clubs and model railway clubs, etc..
having similar introspective existential crisis discussions...?????

However, recorded folk music in all it's variants is available alll over the internet,
and 'live' performance abounds on youtube...

Amateur live streaming perfomances offer so much potential as the tech gets cheaper and more reliable...
We will relish sitting in our homes jammming in real time with friends all over the world.
That is becoming reality...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 04:27 AM

Dave the Gnome's last post:

Good point made by Matt. Does anyone have any evidence that the folk scene is in decline? We have already disproved that festivals are dying. There are more open mic nights than ever and by their inherent inclusiveness there is plenty opportunity to perform folk music there. So, apart from the word of a handful of people on here, is there any evidence? The very title of this thread and the OP seems to indicate that there is plenty of folk about. Just not in the same format as it was 50 years ago.

The good point made by GUEST, MATT MILTON that - In London I have plenty of folk clubs to attend. - hardly surprising, MATT is after all talking about the nation's capital city and the most populous part of the country where nearly 22% of the the population of the UK live. MATT also goes on to say - the audience is 60+ but it's folk music, what do you expect... there is a smattering of younger people. - and this is taken as evidence of a 2018 Folk Revival?

At what point Dave did the "we", you and pfr keeping mentioning, disprove that festivals are dying. Just a cursory examination of the link supplied by GUEST, For DtG shows that 16% of the festivals listed either aren't in the UK at all, or are specifically not folk festivals.

You state - There are more open mic nights than ever and by their inherent inclusiveness there is plenty opportunity to perform folk music there. - A number of points on that statement which render the point you are trying to make irrelevant and meaningless:

1. Just because the sign says "open mic" it does not mean that anyone can just wander in go up to the mic and launch into their party piece. Open Mic sessions tend to be organised, i.e. somebody is running it, and whether, or not, you get to do your stuff is entirely up to them, and if this is held in a pub then the person running it will generally tend to favour locals who he knows over strangers that he doesn't. So much for your assumption of inherent inclusiveness.

2. Just because there is opportunity to perform folk music does not mean that folk music is performed. So you mentioning the increase in the number of "open mic" nights signifies nothing.

3. The normal venues for these "open mic" nights are pubs, correct? Tell me Dave in your experience is the number of pubs increasing, or decreasing throughout the UK today? Don't know about where you live, but where I live they are going out of business at an alarming rate. In 2016, according to the Guardian, there were 52,750 pubs in the UK and at that time they were closing at the rate of 27 per week. So all those budding folk musicians had best get their skates on before all those "open mic" opportunities disappear. By the way Dave where were you when there was a thread on this forum about the increasing number of pubs who were adopting a policy of banning "live music" as they were reluctant to shell out for PRS Licences? One whole chain of pubs banned live music on their premises - Samuel Smith's wasn't it?

4. The OP from GUEST,Despondent of Slough asked the following question:

How much do is it now propelled by Commercial pressures and what are the advantages and disadvantages of Commercialisation

The title assumes that there is a 2018 Folk Revival in the UK, myself and others dispute that as we can see no evidence of it and pointed to the fact there have been numerous threads on this forum bemoaning the fact that folk clubs are closing and festivals are dying in both cases mainly because people cannot be found who are willing to take them on and run them. That would never be the case in the world of folk music that Jim Carroll knows and has described, but it is the reality over here in the UK because what is being played has excluded many who used to participate, so that now there are more listeners in a attendance than there are performers. The law of diminishing returns.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 05:11 AM

I partially agree with PFR that societal change plays a part in the very evident demise of folk music, but to equate the real thing, the atmosphere, the personal contact, the participation where appropriate, with youtube videos no matter how technically proficient, is a grave mistake......we are losing the heart and soul of the music by commercial dilution.
Traditional music is designed to make you happy enough to dance and to make you think hard enough to gain some understanding of life and what it brings.
Folk music could be a bridge back from what society is very rapidly becoming, a joining together of people regardless of age or circumstance, in the face of rampant commercialism and social insanity.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 05:43 AM

I disagree, Observer. You have not proven the point that folk is in decline in any way shape or form. Folk is easily accessible any night of the week where I live too. And Airedale is far from being a major population centre. Your point about 16% of the festivals in the link not being folk festivals is a red herring. There are still 100 more festivals on their list that there were in 2010 and even if 16% of them are not what you regard as folk, that is still 84 more.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pete
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 06:10 AM

I wasn't around during the folk club boom years stretching from the '50s to the '70s, I guess. I wish I could go back and experience what must have been really wonderful times.

That said, I feel very fortunate to be around now too. I live in a village in Cumbria but I could get to a session without too much of a drive most nights of the week. We also have little festivals that bring the full-time pros to 'town' and plenty of little gigs in village halls, arts centres and the like bringing in musicians at every level - including every price level.

I first got interested in folk music about 18 years ago and, in that time, I have seen considerable growth of what is available locally, both for players and for listeners.

In recent years I have met a number of well known performers who have come through the 'folk degree' route. I have booked a couple for events and shared a tune with one or two as well. These are the people who have really never had a full-time job other than 'folk musician'. The ones I have met have been polite, interesting and interested in what is going on locally and have shown great knowledge and deference in respect of what has gone before them. It does not seem that commercialisation has in any way diminished the attitude of those musicians and I have no doubt that they contribute to the scene as a whole enormously.

I am a bit old fashioned (and highly distrustful of 'the market' as a force for good). I like most things to be a bit rustic shall we say. I prefer semi-pro sport to the top flight stuff, a cask best bitter (or mild!) to a kegged craft ale and my music to be pretty small scale, intimate, wooden sounding and even a bit unpolished. But, I have found the new professionals I have met to embody that visceral, honest, grounded attitude very well and to show very little ego. I have had some incredibly selfless offers to come and perform at events we have put on for very modest fees from some pretty well known names.

All in all, I think it is a wonderful time to be a lover of folk and traditional music though, as stated, I have no personal experience of earlier times to make comparisons. I sort of let the really commercialised stuff just go by me a bit. There is so much rootsy stuff to enjoy and so many performers who, despite their own notoriety and commercial value, still play all manner of little gigs and sessions too.

I can't comment on what we may have lost over the decades but, over the course of my time, I feel like we have gained considerably.

i am not sure if that is the kind of response that the OP was looking for by the way! :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Captain Swing
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 06:29 AM

Well said Pete. I couldn't agree more!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 07:01 AM

Of course you disagree Dave, that is your automatic default position to anything certain posters contribute and I, for one, am not even going to attempt to try and get you to change your mind - pointless exercise. Folk is easily accessible any night of the week where I live too - Dare say it is, but of course, that all depends on what your definition of folk is. It is obviously far different to mine and a few others posting here. Personally I do not want to go to something that purports to be a "folk club" and listen to poorly played and poorly sung Beatles and Eagles covers, I do not go there to listen to jazz, rock or hits from the shows. It would appear to me that you equate what folk (people) sing or play to being folk music - basically it isn't and Jim Carroll has done his damnedest to explain the crucial difference, unfortunately his efforts seem to have fallen on deaf ears.

Your approach to festivals seems to be one of "Never mind the quality, feel the width". It seems obvious to me that if a festival does not take place in the UK it should not be named, or feature, in a list entitled UK Folk Festivals, I dare say that you will disagree with that also. I wonder how many trad folk bands or solo artists get booked to play at the festivals listed that are described as Cajun & Zydeco festivals, jazz festivals, bluegrass festivals, blues festivals, dance festivals? Yet all seem to feel free to appear at "folk" festivals, but there again to be honest although billed as "folk" festivals they should be more accurately described as "Music" festivals. As Jim Carroll has said on previous threads you attend a "folk" festival, or go into a "folk" club and what you get ain't what it says on the tin.

No retorts with regard to "open mic" nights, pub closures, or PRS concerns.

Over the last couple of decades those attending folk clubs have gone from being participants who contributed and joined in to now being merely an audience. Why? Because the over-riding impression given now is that you have play something, preferably self-penned, to contribute. Being self-penned of course means that nobody knows the material being sung which reduces audience participation to zilch. The same material gets trotted out week after week and the crowd gets bored and doesn't bother to turn up. The folk club I attend regularly has about six Guest Artist nights per year, on those nights the majority of the regular performers at the "session" nights don't turn up because they can't play. On the nights that they do play, with the material that they play, nobody joins in with them. They are only interested in doing their own thing - you cannot build anything of any substance and meaning upon that base and expect it to survive.

There is no evidence at all of there being a 2018 UK Folk Revival.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 07:16 AM

There is no evidence at all of there being a 2018 UK Folk Revival.

There is plenty of anecdotal evidence that folk is widely available even on this thread. That is no different to the anecdotal evidence you are supplying for evidence of decline apart from there is more to suggest that your analysis is incorrect. I have also provided data driven evidence that the number of festivals is now greater than it was 10 years ago. If you provide any actual data that things are different I may be swayed.

BTW - that is your automatic default position to anything certain posters contribute gives you away as one who was a member but cannot or will not log in under your own Mudcat name for some reason. I have a good idea who.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,kenny
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 07:33 AM

There has definitely been an increase in the availability of "folk" music [ a totally meaningless and discredited term these days IMHO ], in and around Aberdeen since the 1970s / 1980s, especially instrumental sessions. The question of quality, competence and musicianship is something else entirely.
At a "singaround-style" music event I went to on Tuesday night, I had to put up with "Bus Stop" [ "The Hollies" ] sung unaccompanied, badly, and the theme from "Born Free".
I'm fairly certain that there are more "Folk Festivals" in Scotland now than there were in the 1980s.
I'm also fairly certain that there are fewer "Folk Clubs" in Scotland now than in the 1980s.
Where you could go to hear an evening of traditional Scottish music in Aberdeen on any given night, I could not tell you.
"Folk revival" ? What exactly is it that is being "revived" ?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 07:43 AM

What irks me is when youngsters barely out of short trousers (and even this description, my children tell me, makes no sense nowadays) write songs about wishing they were young again. I've seen this several times recently! But I want people to be writing songs about today, about Trump, about climate change, about food banks, about spare bedroom charge and so on.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 07:49 AM

Unfortunately for you Dave the forum is free and open to be read by all, and flitting through the threads, both above and below the line, as interest takes my fancy the frequency and content of your posts is there for all to see - hence the conclusion drawn. As to your conclusions and suspicions, no need for me to have ever been a member. I am not interested at all in swaying your opinion on anything, as your opinions are of no interest or importance to me. However, pointing up the inaccuracies and faults in your "anecdotal evidence" does interest me. One reason for the apparent increase in the number of "folk festivals" over the last ten years Dave could be that ten years ago perhaps Folk Festivals that weren't in the UK were not included. Only actual Folk Festivals were included as opposed to myriad "music festivals" that now appear on that list. I could go through the links full list, my cursory examination to date has thrown up some festivals that I would like to go to. By the way would you call a festival that only lasts one night a festival or a concert? I ask as there are quite a number of those included in that link's list of "UK Folk Festivals", likewise competitions, not really festivals of the sort we are talking about, are they?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 07:59 AM

The figures given were for England only and your cursory examination seems to have missed that point.

I find it quite telling that you will address so much to someone who's opinions you are not interested in and you are not interested in swaying. I can only draw the conclusion that if your interests do not lie in those areas they can only be in just arguing for arguments sake.

Anyhow, Joe has already said we need to keep to the point. I am happy to do so. Will you reciprocate and provide us with any evidence, other than anecdotal, that the folk scene in England is in the mess you are suggesting or can we assume that this is purely your opinion?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 08:16 AM

By all means let us stick to the point.

Thread title - UK Folk Revival 2018

Question asked - How much is it now propelled by Commercial pressures and what are the advantages and disadvantages of Commercialisation

That there is a current Folk Revival in the UK is arguable - I see no evidence for it.

Commercial pressures have shut down some quite long running folk festivals and caused others to limit their scope in terms of times, venues and selection of artists invited to perform.

As far as "folk music" goes as I understand the term commercialisation has no obvious advantages for the genre in general, it does however have many obvious disadvantages, as commerce decides what is marketable and what is not, as previously stated the way things are going leads to an ever diminishing return.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 08:24 AM

"Folk revival" ? What exactly is it that is being "revived" ? A GOOD POINT,
as far as I am concerned it should be tradtional music and modern songs of social comment written in a particular style that has some sort of continuity from trad music, there are some modern songs,'born today ' for example as performed by richard grainger, i am also happy to iclude blues in this category, but bus stop and born free, no thanks

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 10:01 AM

twas me who brought in the mongolian nosefutes.

i think what inspired that . I can't help reading a copy without thinking of Adrian Mole who wanted to live on BBC Channel 4.was a singer of zulu satirical songs whose lyrics were - 'oh so telling'

I've never really warmed to Froots.
I can never read a copy without thinking of Adrian Mole who wanted to live on BBC Radio 4.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 11:03 AM

I believe it would be good if the EFDSS were to run one festival which promoted english folk dance and englsh tradtional song, so that these minority interests are encouraged, the problem for commercial folk festivals is that if english folk dance and songs do not draw large numbers the organisers will not feature them, i suspect that larger commercial festivals are already sidelining english tradtional dance and song, thus we need EFDSS TO STEP IN AND RUN SOMETHING LIKE THE FESTIVAL THAT USED TO HAPPEN AT SUTTON BONINGTON.
If there was an international folk dance and song society i hope it would promote international dance and song but that is not the remit of EFDSS.
FOR EXAMPLE SHREWSBURY FOLK FESTIVAL, only a small minority of revival performers performing trad english music,notably the wilsob family

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 12:23 PM

Hartlepoool look pretty well served with traditional acts. Just looking at their line up for the traditional ones I recognise I see -

Lankum
Kathryn Tickell
The Wilsons
Jim Moray
Sandra Kerr
Alistair Anderson
Johnny Handle
Brian Peters

There are many other acts but only those I recognise as performing traditional stuff. And they are a new festival! :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 12:36 PM

yes,Dave, one festival, likewise Whitby, but does one or evn two swallows make a summer?it would be better to look at the overall picture

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 12:58 PM

It does not, Dick, but apart from anecdotal evidence there is still nothing to indicate that folk music is in decline. In fact, based on anecdotal evidence on this thread, the reverse is true. I.e. More people are reporting an upswing than a downturn.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 01:01 PM

You could help though, Dick. You are a traditional artist. Are your opportunities to perform diminishing?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 01:17 PM

there has been a decline in guest booking clubs, so the majority of people are working less., but compared to forty years ago there has in my opinion been a shift gradually from trad music, part of the reason ,why i moved to ireland in 1990, so ican work in two places, fewer guest clubs[affects all performers]
I have just done saltburn festival plus three other clubs as part of a tour.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 01:44 PM

So the shift is not necessarily away from folk clubs but from clubs booking traditional acts? Which could confirm just what I am saying, that the folk scene is not in decline but just evolving.

It is very unfair to say, as some have on here, that non trad acts are talentless navel gazers when we have such splendid singer songwriters as Anthony John Clark, Phil Hare and Pete Morton to name but 3 doing the rounds.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 02:47 PM

I believe what Sandman said was - there has been a decline in guest booking club so the majority of people are working less. - I don't know quite how that gets interpreted by Dave the Gnome into - So the shift is not necessarily away from folk clubs but from clubs booking traditional acts?

Logic would seem to infer that the number of clubs booking guests have declined, therefore the opportunities for ALL genres of guest performers has been diminished, NOT just traditional acts.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 03:14 PM

Folks can moan as much as they like,
but British trad folk compares weakly to more enjoyable American and European equivalents...

Hence the popularity of more musically adventurous world 'folk' festivals...

To some Brit mudcatters, the music isn't even that essential,
they seem to regard trad folk as just a slightly more highly evolved form
of story telling and poetry...???

That's not good enough for most folks who like to enjoy folk music...

..and the Brit Trad songs that actually have good melodies
have been so sung to death over the last 65 years,
a lot of us of sick of hearing them yet again..
even if they have been spiced up with loud guitars or electro beats...


there I'm awake again, best sleep I've had all summer..
unfortunately at the wrong time of day... bugger.. never made it to the post office..

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 04:57 PM

You don't know because you are not aware of all the facts, observer. You could send a PM to Dick to be appraised of a conversation we have had but, once again, I suggest you stick to the topic in question. You still seem to be spending a lot of time responding to someone who's opinions you have already discounted.

Maybe you could give us some proof that folk music is in decline rather than glibly stating it is with no evidence to support that. Fewer guests being booked could well mean that there are more singers sessions, therefore less commercialism and a return to the music of the people.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 05:01 PM

Punkfolkrocker says: but British trad folk compares weakly to more enjoyable American and European equivalents...

And over here in the U.S., I hear complaints that folkies sing only British songs and ignore the American-born ones.

-Joe-

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 05:04 PM

The other man's grass and all that. Maybe that is what this fuss is all about? :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 06:01 PM

Please don't take over Shrewsbury. I've got an amazing weekend of music to get involved with. There may be even be some young people there!! Watch this space for 'Folk or nope'

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 06:03 PM

Actually I'll start now

John Tams - folk or nope

Obviously folk but some may disagree as he wrote songs in the last 50 years ;-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 06:42 PM

Iwas not suggesting taking over shrewsbury ,what i suggested was EFDSS put on a festival that promotes solely tradtional folk song and dance, do you have a problem with that joe g?, you may enjoy shrewsbury, and quoting one songwriter from a festival bears no relevance to the point i made about a minority of tradtional music at the festival.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 06:51 PM

over here in the U.S., I hear complaints that folkies sing only British songs and ignore the American-born ones.

Ah but Joe do they sing them in phony British accents? Over here in the UK when singing American songs phoney American accents seem de rigueur. The result is absolutely hilarious.

Dave the Gnome - You don't know because you are not aware of all the facts, observer. - Hate to point out the obvious Dave but neither are you aware of all the facts. My anecdotal evidence is to discredited but yours must be taken at face value as the gospel truth? Give over. You asked Sandman a direct question and he gave you an honest answer that you then attempted to spin to suit your argument.

Here is another of your twists:

Maybe you could give us some proof that folk music is in decline rather than glibly stating it is with no evidence to support that.

When did I say that folk music is in decline? I have said a number of times that traditional "folk music" as I know it does not need to chase an audience. I also said this:

The title assumes that there is a 2018 Folk Revival in the UK, myself and others dispute that as we can see no evidence of it and pointed to the fact there have been numerous threads on this forum bemoaning the fact that folk clubs are closing and festivals are dying in both cases mainly because people cannot be found who are willing to take them on and run them.

If you want evidence of festivals and folk clubs shutting up shop go to the threads on this forum where others, i.e. NOT ME, brought the subject up.

If you want to put questions then please address what has actually been said as opposed to what you think has been said, or what you would have liked to have seen said.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 23 Aug 18 - 07:18 PM

I wonder what the equivalent bitter arguments about falling standards and declining membership
at a fancy hamster breeders club sound like...???

There are bound to be the same personality archetypes as found here at mudcat...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 01:36 AM

Clubs are a quaint British pastime. Naw I think that if you looked you would find them all over the world.

As to your latest point that follows Joe's advice about sticking to the point:

I wonder what the equivalent bitter arguments about falling standards and declining membership at a fancy hamster breeders club sound like...???

What bitter arguments? I would doubt very much if there would be such with your fancy hamster breeders club mainly due to the fact that the club would consist of those interested in breeding fancy hamsters. In that club you would not have people dragging in reptiles, canines, llamas and fish telling other club members that they were fancy hamsters.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 01:51 AM

I am not discounting your anecdotal evidence, Observer. I have just said that there is more anecdotal evidence supporting my case than yours on this thread. I am however confused now. My case is and only ever had been that folk music is not in decline. You are now saying you do not say it is. If that is the case then we seem to be in agreement. So just what is it you are arguing about?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 02:15 AM

Sorry sticking to the point mentioned in the OP I forgot to mention in the first part of the last post regarding Clubs being a quaint British pastime. Had there been no Folk Clubs formed in the UK in the 1960s there would have been no "Folk Revival" in the UK as, due to commercialisation, there would have been nowhere where that music would have been played. The very first "folk club" I went to in the early to mid-60s was in the school I attended. The town itself did not have a folk club and as far as I am aware even until this day (In the height of this supposed 2018 UK Folk Revival) still does not have one.

The origins of the folk revival of the 60s came to the UK from the USA in the 50s in the form of Skiffle which had its roots in Jazz. Commercialisation killed off skiffle because they couldn't make any money out of it, there were something like 30,000 to 50,000 skiffle bands on the go in the UK at it's height. So skiffle died a death and evolved, the main thrust of that evolution became "pop" music, where things could be managed and manipulated and a great deal of money could be made. The same remains as the case today.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 02:18 AM

Pedantry and taking things literally is a quaint British pastime...

.. yes.. I know.. there are pedants all over the universe...

not just in British folk circles...

..and by circles.. I don't literally mean folk linking hands in a circle...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 02:35 AM

I am not arguing at all Dave.

The point under discussion is the assumption given in the title of this thread that we are, in 2018, in the middle of a folk revival in the UK, and although I agree with the questioning of it, I would like to point out to all, I was not responsible for the post that raised the matter - See the seventh post to this thread -

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Aug 18 - 03:14 PM

What "revival" ?

To which I responded four posts later with:

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 05:14 AM

GUEST, Date: 17 Aug 18 - 03:14 PM, good question, it is one I would have asked myself had you not beaten me to it. Don't expect an answer though. Mr Red above has got the measure of it, very few real Folk Festivals around these days they are all now "Music" Festivals where anything goes.

By the way what Mr Red said that I agreed with was:

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Mr Red
Date: 18 Aug 18 - 03:22 AM

What I object to is the kind of faded Punk performers who feel the best way to revive their career is to claim Folkdom. And charge more for one badly sung performance (and playing punk guitar regardless of skill) than the same weekend of top notch ceilidh bands all put together.

And then have the effrontery to harrangue and hector the audience on who to vote for - in one party!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 02:36 AM

yeah.. the Beatles sold out and betrayed skiffle...

Only later in the mid 70s did teenagers rediscover the simple joys of skiffle, renaiming it punk rock...

punk was the last true pure form of working class folk music...



[this post is at most only 5% sarcasm...]

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 03:10 AM

Great stuff, Observer. We are agreed that folk music is not in decline. What better end to a week could we ask for than peace and harmony :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 03:20 AM

Even when our "club" was getting hundreds of people attending weekly( we had to move to larger premises three times)....there were still those who saw no value in the music and who preferred "pop" and the culture it supported, I suppose it was a rebellion of sorts against parents, against the dull past and what they believed to be a future filled with flashing lights, stars, and fame.
"yeh yeh I can make you a star".
Much the same thing is happening today in "modern folk music"..... if it's different it must be better.
What I see are generations become further apart, technology and commercialism destroying things that were and should be innate to the human species. We are losing the ethos of the music, which at its best encouraged an understanding of the world, life, and love.

"Modern folk" is simply pop dressed up in the clothes of the tradition , a disturbing parody, in which the destruction of something precious and ethereal is applauded by those made emotionally numb to serve the cause of commercialism and a pseudo academic elite.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 03:36 AM

Dave as I noted above, what you are attempting to pass off as "Folk/traditional music" simply does not cut the mustard.
Genuine folk music is definitely on the decline.
If the current trend continues, the commercial aspect will remove any remaining vestiges of the tradition and replace them with the stars and baubles associated with the marketing industry.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 03:52 AM

I'd have no problems at all if EFDSS started a purely trade festival Dick. Whether enough people would attend to make it viable may be an issue though.

John Tams isn't at Shrewsbury this year - my folk or nope post was really to try to find out where people thought the boundary of folk lies. I consider JT to be very folkies but others here may disagree

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 04:02 AM

Genuine folk music is definitely on the decline.

What you define as 'genuine' folk music may well be on the decline. Which acts in particular do not 'cut the mustard? I would like to see you to argue the case that they do not perform 'genuine' folk music with any of them.

Its such a shame that you cannot move on and enjoy the wealth and diversity of folk music that is available today.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 04:09 AM

"Move on".......don't make me laugh. These words are meaningless in the context of traditional music.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 04:25 AM

Traditional music should not be encased in amber, never to be touched again. It should evolve and change and live. By its very essence it has to change as part of the folk process. From the very 1954 definition that traditionalists set such great store by.

The term can be applied to music that has been evolved from rudimentary beginnings by a community uninfluenced by popular and art music and it can likewise be applied to music which has originated with an individual composer and has subsequently been absorbed into the unwritten living tradition of a community.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 04:47 AM

that is why most poluar music will never be folk music, it is copyrighted and the words are very rarely alterd example [yesterday] arethe words altered.. no, so please no more pretending popsongs buddy holly songs,ysterday, are folk music, the only circumstances[imo] is if the tune is played as a tune and improvised or altered, then it might even be jazz

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 05:04 AM

Genuine question here as I do not know - Once the song is out of copyright and can be altered and absorbed into the "unwritten living tradition of a community", can it be said to be a folk song then?

As an example, the song 'Blue Moon' is sung in an altered form by a very large community - Manchester city fans! Can that be classed as a folk song? Our resident band at Swinton also incorporated the tune into their version of 'Nancy Whisky'. How does that work in terms of the folk tradition?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 07:30 AM

Yes under the definition it is, but does anyone want to pay to hear fotball chants, perhpas they are alright a t free singarounds where anything goes ,but not for me.
JOE, the purpose of EFDSS IS TO PRMOTE TRAD SONGS AND DANCES, it was viable in the past at sid mouth sutton bonington, imo it should be given a chance again

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 07:59 AM

Definitions, definitions. You feel you need to put a crash helmet on before you raise them on Mudcat. But if we take one that includes oral transmission over at least a couple of generations, just *maybe* football chants *might* come to count as folk one day. There might be books on them and it is interesting, just take the uses made and versions of Delilah for example.

Dave, I don't know either. But I wonder whether stuff is really passed on and remembered orally today: I tend to write more or less everything down, even if I have played it a thousand times. People video stuff on their phones to record it. Does that count as 'oral'? In principle on a transmission or 54 type defn maybe there is nothing to say a pop song could not come to be 'folk', but how likely this is?
The defn was devised to cover ages where there were no mobile phones or recording devises; maybe it isn't adequate to describe how people take pop songs copyright or not and make them their own, which definitely happens all the time all over the place.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 08:19 AM

It is indeed complex, Pseudonymous, and I have long since said that the '54 definition is no longer fit for purpose but there are some who insist that it is the best we have so we have to live with it.

The definition goes on to say

The term does not cover composed popular music that has been taken over ready-made by a community and remains unchanged, for it is the re-fashioning the re-creation of the music by the community that gives it its folk-character

So, a rendition of 'Yesterday', to use an earlier example, performed in the same way as McCartney does it, will not be folk. But a version performed at a folk club and "absorbed into the unwritten living tradition of a community" could well become one.

BTW - As I type this I am listening to "Aqualung 40th Anniversary edition". A fine album and should be absorbed by many :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 09:01 AM

Dave: My brother went to see Tull live a few years ago and said it was knock out. I've been listening to cello suites this morning … And yesterday it was Rainbow Bridge - on vinyl, Pali Gap doesn't seem to have been digitised yet. And in between, some Walter Pardon on Spotify.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 09:05 AM

And if I hear somebody doing something I like, I may well google to get the lyrics and chords online. Things have changed since the days when you had to work out the chords yourself if you could or see if any of your pals had managed it. We can't turn the clock back and 'revive' the past. Maybe 'renewal' is a better word?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 09:06 AM

I have seen them half a dozen times or so. One time, at the Apollo in Manchester, I was the designated driver so had not one drop to drink. However this was in the days when theatres permitted smoking and my passengers were partaking in 'certain substances'. I did not know until then that passive smoking could affect you so much. I was really in no fit state to drive!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 12:24 PM

Tidying out an obscure cupboard today I not only found two copies of the single I am the Walrus (how did that happen?) but also an EP cover,

"jethro tull, life is a long song/up the pool/dr. bogenbroom/from later/ nursie."


Sadly the cover turned out to contain an Alice Cooper single that I had no idea I owned!

Whoever Anthony was, sorry I never returned his copy of Jean Genie!

Aha, some folk …… Gaudete Steeleye Span from 1972

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Joe Offer
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 12:42 PM

Observer says: Ah but Joe do they sing them in phony British accents? Over here in the UK when singing American songs phoney American accents seem de rigueur. The result is absolutely hilarious.


Well, US folk musicians don't usually sing in fake British accents, although they'll try Scottish and Irish. For a while, it seemed that US pop/rock musicians were trying to sound British, while UK musicians were trying to sound American - my son went through a phase like that.

And don't ask me about Americans on the Internet who try to affect British spellings....

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 24 Aug 18 - 01:09 PM

What most of these old gits who snidely disparage 'punk' fail to understand,
is just how similar it was to their prescription for Trad British Folk...

F'rinstance.. circa 1975-76 many of us smartarse Brit teenagers were sick
of all the trite conventions of prevailing rock & pop orthodoxies...
Singing in an affected American or 'transatlantic' accent was a particular irritant and call to arms...

We made a point of proudly singing punk rock in our own British accents...

I still enjoy 1950s and 60s British rock n rollers who avoided putting on a yank accent...
[it might have been shite rock n roll compared to the real USA deal,
but it has a charm all of it's own..]

We were teens who were at comfort being British,
without the nationalism and xenophobia still to be found amongst too many Britsh Trad Folk chauvanists...

I like a lot of music - some of it is British trad folk,
and some of that trad folk is barely listenable by most popular standards...
I also have a soft spot for outsider music..
Different music pleasures as the mood takes me...

there.. I suppose that's the closest I get to a mission statement...!!!

Right now I'm listening to mid 60s Brit band The Action..
1/2 an hour ago I played The Southlanders "I am a Mole" about 5 times in a row... I'm still smiling...

I'm off down to the kitchen now to listen to some Louis Jordan...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 04:08 AM

you must have catholic ears,johnny rotten is playing in dublin thuis weekend ,are you goin, i believe the pope is going to dublin too

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 04:15 AM

Is that Johnny Rotten?

I hope not, I've only used it twice...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 04:38 AM

Sir* John Lydon is sharper witted and more hilarious than ever now that he is an angry old cumudgeonly git of 62...

[* come on yer majesty.. it's about time..
tap that sword on his shoulder.. at least give him the chance to tell you to eff off
and stick it where the sun no longer shines on the empire..

..though, he did do that butter ad, and dresses like a country gentleman,
so these days he'd might shock the nation and welcome the honour...???]

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 04:40 AM

very good Dave, i hadn't heard that.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 04:48 AM

I saw the Sex Pistols over the top of Burtons (was it called Wood's then? It changed its name so often) in Plymouth at the end of '76 and I don't recall anyone say they were "sick of all the trite conventions of prevailing rock & pop orthodoxies".

Of course, I can't speak for the intelligentsia of Devon, but I think most of us were there just to jump up and down (you could hardly call it dancing) and have some fun. Nothing more thoughtful than that.

I'm wondering if Greg Dyke had anything to do with bringing the Pistols to Plymouth? He did introduce me to The Ramones at his "Implosion" on Union Street.

Nowadays I'll listen to anyone who can actually play their instrument, which does rule out a lot of Punk, and I can do that here in Glossop almost any night of any week.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 05:06 AM

good for you... so what.. next..

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 05:23 AM

SO basically you are admitting that 40 odd years ago you might not have been as well read,
bright, or actively involved in discussions about creative arts and music
as other teenagers...

fair enough... some of us started bands and fanzines,
while others copied prefab punk uniform fashions and attitudes off the telly
and sat on their arses sniffing crisp bags of glue...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 05:59 AM

And back to this Folk Revival . . .

Although I've only been here in north Derbyshire a short time, and so I can't comment on any "revival" in these parts, the folk scene seems in very rude health to me.

There are plenty of both amateur sessions/singarounds and professional concerts.

I'll be sad to leave the place.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,other
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 06:00 AM

actually, no

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 11:28 AM

mod - fair enough.. but the post Date: 25 Aug 18 - 07:06 AM was a valid thread relevant contribution..
So I'm resubmittting it...

"So a smug antagonistic anonymous GUEST tries to establish punkier than thou street cred
by claiming to have seen the Pistols...

They'd be by far the most mainstream corporate commercialised sell out punk rock band of all time...

Now consider how that might relate to this thread, and the OPs quetion...

"How much do is it now propelled by Commercial pressures and what are the advantages and disadvantages of Commercialisation"

The Sex Pistols and their duller witted plastic punk 13 year old fanboys
were as far removed from the grassroots amateur punk/indie culture
as The Mumfords are from real trad folk...


Me and my mates were 18 year old small town provincial college kids,
who actively established bands, fanzines, youth theatre and arts projects,
and a long lasting network of musicians gig sharing collectives and co-ops..

all for eff all remuneration or glory... just like trad folkies used to do,
and is what is at debate in this thread...

1970s punk and folk scenes were parallell and often interlinked...

If that makes me an intellectual... I've been called much worse by far better people..."

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 11:34 AM

Mod - if this is not acceptable, I can see a tweak, a sentence that can be cut,
that might make it comply with your deletions,
which go further back than I first noticed...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 03:34 PM

And let me elucidate:

I wasn't trying to "establish punkier than thou street cred by claiming to have seen the Pistols" . . . I was merely pointing out that rather than a rebellion against "trite conventions of prevailing rock & pop orthodoxies", the audience were just a bunch of kids having a good time.

Anonymous? Yes. But smug and antagonistic? I think I must have hit a nerve.

And, I never accused you of being an intellectual . . . that would just be ridiculous.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 03:47 PM

Back from Dublin in one piece despite the efforts of the Poe aand his entourage

"From the very 1954 definition that traditionalists set such great store by.
It's always been my experience that the only people ws set enough store by it out those like yourself who mention it to disparage it - most of the people I know treat is as a definition in need of repair - nothing more
As nobody else has ever come up with another, it does as a astandby
It would be appreciated that those with an obsession with '54 would get over it and not try and infect the rest us us with it.

I've just been accused of misrepresenting what people say (by the poster who gets his rocks off by deninrating elderly dead singers)
"Jim. But you say that you know what the folk culture of our islands is, and all these other people (many of us having spent a lifetime in folk clubs) know nowt."
Where have I said this Al I don't say you don't know - I say you have never come up with an alternative definition - your music is not that with I have known (probably for a lot longer than most people here and is represented in literature that goes back at least a century and recordings that go back nearly as long and chan be clearly found registered under the title (established in the 1830s as "folk"
The term is internationally applied to songs made and sung by the people to represent their lives, thoughts and aspirations
If you want to tag a pop song to that title, tell us why and where it has merited the title
The club scene sank because people began using the term as a meaningless catchphrase so you never knew what you were going to hear when you turned up   
That's a world world away from "knowing nowt" - it's cynical misrepresentation because some people cant bother their arse to think up a term for the music they want to sing - a hostile takeover
If you are going to quiote me, do so accurately
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 03:55 PM

The club scene sank because people began using the term as a meaningless catchphrase so you never knew what you were going to hear when you turned up."
the club scene has changed for a number of different reasons.
lack of venues ,
more festivals through out the year.
People getting older and passing on
Less volunteers prepared to run a club every week for non commercial reasons.
Commercialism

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 04:43 PM

Just back from a festival in Argyllshire, the music comprised of four groups of young people.....guitar accordion fiddle bagpipes keyboard and a massive drum kit, all played at breakneck speed so loudly the tunes could not be deciphered and the words a mystery.
The audience of mainly young people jumped up and down in time to the overpowering beat.
I am getting a bit deaf, but the noise level was so high that I was finally forced outside.
This is modern folk?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 06:08 PM

Well definitions are just restrictions that we impose on the chaos of life.

I think the perspective has simply changed since 1954.

I think there has been an identifiable artistic movement we call 'folk'. And that folk music is the music connected with that movement.

The trouble with saying that its just something that happened a long time ago in small communities, is that involves turning your back on humanity and what it is up to

I understand and sympathise with your point of view - you did important work for the movement with one idea of what folk music amounted to.

Jazz and classical music went through the same ructions with the trad lads calling the modernists dirty boppers. And if you read EF Benson' Lucia novels, you will read of the short shrift Debussy received from folks brought up listening to 19th century classical music in 1920's.

That things move on does not invalidate or lessen the importance of what you set out to record and preserve.

The point is that its an unfolding story - full of charismatic people, creativity, one that takes a twist with each technological breakthrough - a story that connects us all, cos we're all living threough these days of history.
The English folk club scene might surprise you yet - don't give up on it completely.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 06:34 PM

"I was merely pointing out that rather than a rebellion against "trite conventions of prevailing rock & pop orthodoxies", the audience were just a bunch of kids having a good time."

The ability of web discussion groups to make enemies out of complete strangers who share the same enthusiasm is always a thing of wonder to me.

Isn't the above exactly what PFR was trying to to say? The prevailing orthodoxy in 'alternative ' music circles in the mid-70s was Prog-Rock. Kids jumping up and down to punk was - precisely - a rebellion against all that.

I remember thinking back in the 1980s that, as PFR said, there was a crossover between folk and punk, particularly the concept of 'doing music for yourself'. Incidentally, anonymous Guest, I've lived in Glossop for 36 years, and will be looking out for you at the next Buzzcocks reunion gig in town.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 09:06 PM

GUEST seems obsessed with me.. flattering to some extent.. but not reciprocated...

I almost posted an exended missive addressing GUESTS utterly petty incorrect presumptions
and accusations regarding myself,
until I realised that the entire string of posts had been deleted..

But what would have been any real point posting it, even if GUEST had read it before it also got the chop..

Our anonymous antagonist aint gonna respect anything I say, no matter how valid or justified.

No big deal.. GUEST's identity, intentions, objectives for pursuing me across threads are totally inconsequential
while he/she/they hides and snipes from the netherworld of spineless non-consistent identity...

..and sorry to disapoint you.. no nerves struck..
at worst you are just a diverting amusement between household chores..
but at best you serve a purpose stimulating my long distant memories of ideas
from a more hopeful pre thatcher era,
when punk and folk offered a positive alternative counter to mainstream commercial music culture...

..and guess what, I haven't listened to much punk music at all in the last 25 years...

So it's odd to me that other mudcatters make such a song and dance of it,
somehow elevating me as defender of the safety pin and mohican media stereotypes...????

I was actually listening to Bill Nelson and Be Bop Deluxe this afternoon...
Rubbish self indulgent lyrics and song structures imho.. but great guitar playing and tone...

[mod - please can you let this post survive,
and I will try my best to ignore GUEST's need for further reaction from me.. thanks...]

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 25 Aug 18 - 09:47 PM

errrmm.. except for...

GUEST - I appreciate the sarcasm of your calling me an intellectual...
[in a now deleted post...]

35 years ago an uptight middle-class marxist lecturer suddenly cracked,
lost her temper,
and accused me of being an anti-intellectual,
when I innocently asked if she could please clarify a point
during one of her densly incomprehensible
poorly communicated seminars...

She was so up her own rear end with big fish in a small academic pond vain self importance..

got to laugh...

[mod - you can delete this one if you like... cheers...]

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 01:27 AM

Brian Peters,

I doubt very much you'll see me at a Buzzcocks gig, even in Glossop.

I'm hoping to get to the Hayes Sisters at the Globe on 6th September, though. If you're around, I'll seek you out.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 02:51 AM

It seems to me that, despite the complaints of being insulted by some, there is a fair amount of it coming from both sides here and those complaining the loudest are quite capable of doing their share
I suggest that rather than pointing fingers we ALL agree to stop it or we all learn to live with it
I find this "nuffin to do with me guv" attitude as insulting as it gets

"The club scene sank because"
I go along with much of what Dick lists, but I think the essential reason people stopped going was the choice of what they could listen to in a folk club was taken away from them
Before the takeover, even in the 'Mickey Mouse' clubs, you knew you would go home having heard a night of songs you had set out to listen to a few hours earlier - folk songs - if you chose not to go back, you did so on the basis of how well those songs were interpreted.
Then the "anything goes" crowd moved in and the people stopped coming
It didn't help that the standard fell because the tolerance of bad singing from 'singers' who hadn't bothered to learn their songs became the norm Those of us who expected a standard below which public performances didn't fall were called 'elitists' - we just expected singers to have put in enough work beforehand to put over their songs - little enough to ask as far as I'm concerned.
The more responsible of the clubs devised ways of helping inexperienced singers, be it established singers offering to help to full-blown workshops
Bad singing from 'Magical Mystery Tour' folk clubs killed off a healthy and still very promising scene.

The club scene was established on a definite form of music - originally introduced by Sharp and co and later revived by th BBC's 1950s extended field trip
We didn't need a definition - '54 or any other kind - the type of songs we wanted to listen to could be found in Lloyd's and Vaughan Williams' Penguin Book of English Folk Songs' or MacColl's and Seegers' 'The Singing Island, or that issued on the 10 volume 'Folk Songs of Britain' series of albums or Norman Buchan's 'Scotland Sings.
They were the basis of the folk sohg scene
Singers like MacColl and Leon Rosselson and many others were making new songs using old forms so our clubs never strayed far from their roots
We knew that we were there to promote a certain type of music - not ourselves
That seems to be the basic difference between then and now

I still have a couple of dozen live recordings of clubs I attended around forty of fifty years ago - they are still highly enjoyable and they buzz with atmosphere
We made a two radio programme tribute to MacColl a couple of years ago and the young producer commented on just that and said she envied our being there - they certainly seem not to make 'em like that any more

For me, MacColl made the best and most enjoyable analysis of British Folk Song in 1965 - a series of 10 half hour programmes of exquisite singing from the best of our performers, with a loving and very perceptive analysis - those programmes have never been surpassed in all this time to my knowledge.
If you want to know what British and Irish folk song is, listen to them - if you haven't got ac copy - just ask
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 03:16 AM

Jim, Dick says "the club scene changed", not sank. I think that is right. His points are good, as is yours, and a combination of these factors has resulted in the folk clubs you describe being few and far between. But there is a different folk scene now that incorporates the old and the new and while we may lament the good old days, there is still a vibrant and lively network of venues where people can perform, get involved or just listen to folk music. It is not all introspective songwriters and pop covers either, although there is an element of that. There is also plenty of traditional folk and good new music amongst the dross.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 04:15 AM

"Jim, Dick says "the club scene changed", not sank."
No it did not "change" - it was taken over my a music that had nothing to do with folk
The clubs that had been set up to present one type of music were taken over by people who wanted to listen to another - thye no longer were putting on folk songs
That is not change - it is the usurping of a name and venue
You could have got your own clubs and called them something else - you chose to take over our description
That is what makes what happened a hostile takeover
It's not as if you were successul at what you did - your clubs bombed just as ours did
Ours had a good reason - people couldn't find folk music in folk clubs - your's bombed because you couldn't make up your mind what you were trying to sell - you tried to please all of the people all of the time and ended up pleasing nobody
That's what ****** up the folk scene
The fact that you allowed standards to drop as you did meant that what you put on was a badly performed unidentifiable mish-mash
Your music has no future because it has no definable identity
Ours will at least survive in the collections collections and the archived
Can your point out one single publication containing your 'folk song' - no you can't
Can you provide a track record - a genealogy - a history... of your folk song - of course you can't - it would be like trying to bottle fog

THe predatory behaviour of peole who neither liked nor understood folk song has succeeded in killing off the real thing
Here in Ireland, it took only the effort to understand what folk songs means and build a foundation for it
Now thousands of kids are pouring in and taking our folk music up - it has a guaranteed at least two generation future

Hand on heart - can you say thay?
Of course you can't - you can't even describe what you represent as folk music
You're like these big Multinationals (except you're not big) who moved into the East Anglian farms, tore down all the hedgerows, farmed the land bith their monster machines, until, after a few years the East Wind blew off all the topsoil and made the land a desert
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 05:18 AM

I will try and explain why i think commercialism has contributed to the decline of folk clubs. AND uk FOLK REVIVAL
1.Lack of available club premises as manager of pub thinks more money can be made puttin on discos etc.
2. Performers altering direction because more money can be made from song writer composotions [prs imro etc]and doing less trad, temptation for performers to try cross over folk sounding love songs with folky sound to make more money and get composotion royalties,moving away from trad music and political social comment, because the two are less likely to get mainstream extablishment airplay[ with a few exceptions jez lowe springs to mind]

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 05:38 AM

Yes Sandman, I attended a JL concert lately and was pleasantly surprised by the emotion conveyed and his connection to the audience.
I spoke to him briefly during the interval and he asked me if I would like him to sing anything and he sang my request with a lovely explanation of my choice......a REAL folk character on a par with Alex Campbell.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 05:48 AM

I meant JEZ was one of a few exceptions who make social comment songs popular.
3. Increase in festival run by entrepreneurs who are trying to make money, being more commercial then alters the direction of choice of music, result less trad material and less politcal social comment songs, more material that will not challenge the establishment, or acceptable to those used to pop music diet, so a directional change towards more pop sounding music or more commercial mainstream, taking the music further from its roots, in an attempt to make money for the entrepreneur under the guise of bringing more people to hear folk music, so the direction of the folk revival gets changed to some extent by commercialism.
perhaps it does bring more people?
but if commercilism is taken too far are the roots still there in sufficient quantity for people to hear.
That is why i think EFDSS should be running a tradtional festival of song and dance, whose aim should be protection and promotion of tradtional dance and song, any profits made go back to either running the next years festival or the EFDSS to be used for other folk projects

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 05:51 AM

Re Jim Carroll'a statement

"The club scene was established on a definite form of music - originally introduced by Sharp and co and later revived by the BBC's 1950s extended field trip"

The club that I attended from around 1956 until 1965 was not. It appeared to grow out of the skiffle scene encouraged by Alan Lomax.

In 1961 two of the club's regular singers/songwriters went off to form their own club. From Jim's own admission he did not get into the music until 1966 and I get the impression that that club may have been established in the way he describes.

Can Jim name any other clubs prior to 1961 that were established that way and if so how does he know?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 06:05 AM

Swindon folk club,Founded by Ted & Ivy Poole and friends in 1960, Swindon Folksingers’ Club has a long history of keeping traditional music alive in this busy town in north-west Wiltshire. From its beginnings in the folk revival, the club has seen Swindon’s character change from railway town to a modern centre of new technology and financial services; but through it all, Swindon Folksingers’ Club has remained as a friendly, relaxed and welcoming place where anyone can come and sing or listen.         

The Topic was founded in 1956 by Alex Eaton - once he had left the local Young Communist League choir - and some friends. It was the height of the Cold War, with Suez and the Hungarian Uprising dominating the headlines. From its very beginnings as a fairly informal opportunity for like-minded youths - many of them teenagers still at school - to get together and talk politics and sing folk songs or play skiffle, up to its current policy of around two-thirds guest acts, The Topic was always and remains now a weekly club (sometimes, in the earliest days, twice-weekly).
just to show different perspectives,
however Swindon did not exclude people playing skiffle or singing blues as floor spots[ as far as i remember],although guest booking policy was more in the direction of tradtional music

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 06:21 AM

"It appeared to grow out of the skiffle scene encouraged by Alan Lomax. "
Lomax did not "inspire" the skiffle scene, which, it was reckoned was largely based on the recordings brought back to England by Ken Colyer when he was a merchant seaman
Lomax first helped inspire the BBC mopping up campaign which gave us a basis for our British and Irish repertoires and later, betrayed people like Ewan and Bert for singing American songs
The Short Lived 'Ramblers' group was an aberration and had nothing to do with the skiffle movement
It was because of Lomax's strong views that it became possible to establish policy clubs
These were early days and everybody was learning
Ewan Peggy and Bert were part of the Ballads and Blues Club (I have a recording of the live radio broadcast) and they broke with it to form a principled and decdicated folk club, e Ewan wrote an article, 'Why I am Forming a New Club' in one of Dallas's magazines
The first public performances dedicated to folk music were probably the morning concerts hed at The Theatre Royal, Stratford
Shortly afterwards similar clubs sprang up all over Britain - Manchester and Birmingham were two of them
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 06:23 AM

I'd add to Dick's comments about the Topic that as long as I have been attending, since the early 80's when I moved to Bradford it has had an eclectic booking policy featuring both traditional and contemporary singers. I believe that is why it has survived and remains healthy though I am sure others will disagree :-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 07:01 AM

East Anglia.... a desert?

What have they been telling you over there in Ireland?

I know Ian Paisley's son was living somewhere near Yarmouth for a while. But that family have a way of exaggerating ...they always did.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 07:03 AM

hard case by alan lomax ramblers with maccoll singing sounds skiffle to me and features a lovely clarinet solo

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 07:27 AM

Jim,

The first line of your reply misquotes me. Check your fourth word in.

It's true that Colyer was in at the beginning of the skiffle craze. He and a couple of members of his band would do a few numbers as a trio/quartet doing American blues and folk songs. When Colyer was ejected from the co-operative band Chris Barber resumed leadership they carried on the tradition. Anthony "Lonnie" Donegan continued with Chris as banjo and guitar player. A "throwaway" unplanned recording became a pop hit in 1956 and things took off from there.

Re your statement:
"The Short Lived 'Ramblers' group was an aberration and had nothing to do with the skiffle movement"

Can I refer you to the Skiffle Album by Alan Lomax and the Ramblers.The group included Lomax, McColl, Peggy Seeger and Shirley Collins. You state it had nothing to do with the skiffle movement ???
This group recorded in 1957. As I suggested in a post above this might just be an example of jumping on the band wagon.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 08:21 AM

Compare the album to the Donegan Skiffle group, the Vipers, and all the other washboard and teachest bases that proliferated the skiffle scene
On the EP it was largely american folk with Dirty Old Town and Hard Case (2 MaColl songs) thrown in for good measure Chalk and cheese
The EP was released in 1957 - Donegan had established his name in skiffle at least three years earlier
You count it as 'skiffle' - I do not
Ballads and Blues appeare to be a colpromise to please all the eclectic interests - MacColl walked away from because of Malcolm Nixon'e attempts to commercialise it further *(all rather savegly described in MacColl's

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 08:28 AM

Sorry - finger slipped
No AGENTS NEED APPLY

MacColl's tastes and intentions were already established by this description of his first being 'found' by a man from the BBC

"Ewan MacColl was himself a victim of the Depression. The son of an unemployed Glasgow steelworker, who had moved to Salford in search of work during the twenties, he had suffered every privation and humiliation that poverty could contrive for him from the age of ten. His memories of his early years are still bitter—like his recollection of how to kill aimless time in a world where there was nothing else to do: "You go in the Public Library. And the old men are there standing against the pipes to get warm, all the newspaper parts are occupied, and you pick a book up. I can remember then that you got the smell of the unemployed, a kind of sour or bitter-sweet smell, mixed in with the smell of old books, dust, leather and the rest of it. So now if I pick up, say, a Dostoievsky—immediately with the first page, there's that smell of poverty in 1931."
MacColl had been out busking for pennies by the Manchester theatres and cinemas. The songs he sang were unusual, Scots songs, Gaelic songs he had learnt from his mother, border ballads and folk-songs. One night while queueing up for the three-and-sixpennies, Kenneth Adam had heard him singing outside the Manchester Paramount. He was suitably impressed. Not only did he give MacColl a handout; he also advised him to go and audition for Archie Harding at the BBC studios in Manchester's Piccadilly.
PROSPERO AND ARIEL (The rise and fall of radio, a personal recollection – D G Bridson 1971)

Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 09:41 AM

Three and Six for a cinema ticket!
My Mums wages were eleven bob a week in 1938. Leaving school to work for the borough treasurer's office at 17 with 8 school certificates.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 10:46 AM

Jim.

You will find that Donegan in 1953 was known as banjo and guitar player in the Chris Barber / Ken Colyer bands among the followers of what was known as "Traditional Jazz". That's how I knew him and where I first saw and heard him. It was 1956 when he became a household name.

Can I refer you again to "The Skiffle Album" the printed copy of the material sung by The Ramblers.It must have been Lomax & MacColl I guess that gave it that title. Why?

I would never have called what they did Skiffle. I thought it was as bad as all the other stuff that came along under that banner and I did hear many of them. There were some excellent musicians there but I preferred hearing Bruce Turner and Jim Bray in their normal jazz setting which I did many times live.

May I remind you Jim that you don't like "grave dancing" but you attack Malcolm Nixon never having met the man.

The remainder of your post re MacColl is irrelevant to this thread, we have heard it all before.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 10:54 AM

just a little contextual material...

I was sat on the bog listening to a band I hadn't bothered with for nearly 30 yeras..

nostalgia.. eh...

So I did a wiki search...

"..the *********** **** began rehearsing in his family's front room, but were soon banished because of the noise.
They became prominent in England's emerging punk scene in 1977,
where they auditioned for ***** *******'s record label.
******* signed the band, hoping to cash in on the punk scene that was sweeping the UK
and believing that a more produced studio sound would appeal to a larger market...

ONE MASSIVE HIT LATER

..the success ...caused the band to be pressured into entering the recording studio with producer **** ******
to record a follow-up release before they were ready.
The result was ******** ** ********, their biggest Top 40 success to date,
but an album ..later characterized as "hollow, vapid and weak".
A more overtly commercial effort than their prior recordings, "

This band had a massive USA hit leading to world wide success,
and eventual/inevitable creative dissatisfaction and disillusionment...

No need to name this individual band, as it was and continues to be a high price
for artistic integrity for so many bright young bands and singers of all genres...

Though obviously, many also revel in the fame and money...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 11:25 AM

You appear to be wanting to make a meal of this
I don't know who named it The Skiffle Album or even when they are supposed to have done so - it certainly wasn't Lomax, MacColl, seeger or even the producers of the album, Decca
I've just dug out my original DEcca recording and "Skiffle" doesn't appear on the sleeve as you can see below

As for my comments about Malcolm Nixon - no - I didn't know or meet him, bus his reputation goes before him
I first read about him in detail in an article by Long John Baldry and was later told by people who did know him of his attempted commercialisation of The Ballads and Blues (as in the song)
Baldry took it a stage further when he related how Nixon left the B&B with the club takings
You among others have no qualms in relating denigrating stories about MacColl so you can hardly be offended when the tables are turned
Jim


Alan Lomax and The Ramblers
DFE 6367 DFE 6367
ALAN LOMAX and the RAMBLERS
Side No. 1        Side No. 2
Oh! Lula (Hurston, Lomax)        Dirty        old town (MacColl)
Railroad man (Lomax)        Hard        case (MacColl)
Alan Lomax (vocal and guitar); Ewan MacColl (vocal)', Peggy Seeger (banjo and vocal); Shirley Collins (vocal); Sandy Brown (clarinet); John Cole (harmonica); Bryan Daley (guitar); Jim Bray (bass); Alan Sutton (washboard).        Recorded London, August 2, 1956.
Ewan MacColl and I were both raised with folk songs like Gypsy Davy and Careless love right in the house with us. Ewan’s father, a Scots iron puddler, used to spend the whole of Hogmanay with his pals singing Scots ballads and drinking songs. Since then. MacColl has wandered over the British Isles as a poet and an actor, picking up songs along the road. When there was no traditional song to fit a scene in one of his-.many plays or radio pro¬grammes. he composed one. like a true Scots bard, drawing upon a heritage of tunes and verse forms he acquired before he could read or write. Dirty old town, which catches the nostalgic mood of love in bigtown, and Hard case, which is couched in absolutely accurate convict lingo, are examples of this kind.
As for me, my father, John Lomax, who was America’s first ballad hunter, the collector of The Boll Weevil. The Dogie, Home on the Range, and thousands more, brought me up to take over where he left off. Out of our recording trips all over the South grew the Archive of Folk Songs in Washington, and came the songs like Rock Island Line (recorded in Arkansas in 1936), Take this hammer (recorded in Virginia in 1934), Stewball (recorded in Mississippi in 1933), and hundreds more that are now beginning to be popular in Great Britain.
On this record the Ramblers belt into their Scots, Irish and English songs with the same lack of in¬hibitions that characterise a Memphis jug-band or a Kentucky mountain square dance orchestra play¬ing boogie-woogie. Sandy Brown, a ballad-loving Scotsman, sings through his clarinet. Johnny Cole, an aircraft parts worker with a real genius for the harmonica, sings his part on his small reeds. The rhythm section is composed at times of washboard and bongo drums, but it always rests upon the firm beat of Jim Bray on bass and Bryan Daley on guitar. Shirley Collins, from Hastings, sings the high parts and the soft love songs. Peggy Seeger has an uncanny instinct for accompanying every¬body. Occasionally I am permitted to sing some American songs the way I heard them in the South and West when I was very young—and out of this came the new songs Oh! Lula and Railroad man. But we are all united in our hope that some day, and that not faraway, the British people will again be singing their own folk-songs, which are the most beautiful and varied of Western Europe, and that the Ramblers will have helped.
ALAN LOMAX

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 12:08 PM

Not offended Jim, just reminding you of your usual complaint when somebody mentions your hero.

As I mentioned above I was referring to the printed copy called The Skiffle Album. published by B Feldman & Co. Ltd. I have a copy here and if you wish to see a copy there is one on page 252 of Billy Bragg's recent book "Roots Radicals and Rockers". The photograph of the group shows Bruce Turner to be the clarinet player which I believe is correct but Lomax's notes confuse things by calling him Sandy Brown.

Re Long John Baldry, I knew him very well. Did he really make that accusation in print? Malcolm never left The Ballads Blues. It was Ewan and Peggy that left in 1961. Malcolm continued until 1965

The thought that anyone would run off with the takings from a folk club is laughable. Even you can't really seriously believe that.

On the closing night of the Ballads and Blues Club 1965 the main guest was Long John Baldry. John was represented by the Malcolm Nixon Agency. When we closed the agency John continued with the same man who had been his manager at the Agency one George Webb. George put John together with Rod Stewart and Julie Driscoll and the Brian Auger Trinity to form The Steam Packet. All three vocalists went on to have big hits in the pop market. Pretty irrelevant here but just to make the point that Long John Stayed with Malcolm Nixon until the agency no longer existed.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 12:15 PM

Well, Jim. Having never heard me perform my primarily traditional material or never having attended the primarily tradition folk club and festival I ran for almost 30 years you have decided that I am to blame for the destruction of traditional folk. How does that work then? And, for the record once again, Swinton Folk Club has not 'bombed'. It is still going strong as I said earlier.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 12:42 PM

"you have decided that I am to blame for the destruction of traditional folk"
Why on earth do you do this Dave - I really thought you better than this?
I have never suggested any individual or their singing ruined folk (if I have, have the decency to point out where)
I said that what destroyed folk (among other things) was the fact that people were robbed of their choice of what they wished to listen to when they went to a "folk club"
You appear to be suffering with a persecution complex

Hoot
I don't give a toss who called the group "skiffle" (a 'Hoot' even)
Lomax laid out perfectly in the sleeve notes I put up what the intention of the performers was
Bertrand Feldman was a music publisher - not known for their insight into the music they produce nor for consulting the artists

As for Nixon's running away with the cash box - I never heard this from either Ewan or Peggy
It was part of an overview of the scene back in the day - shortly before the club finally closed
I have no heroes, but if I had they wouldn't be those who tried to commercialise folk song (oe ran off with the takings!)
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 01:18 PM

Jim. I refer you back to your post of 26 Aug 18 - 04:15 AM. You start quoting something I had said so you were plainly addressing me. You then go on to say

You could have got your own clubs and called them something else - you chose to take over our description

...

It's not as if you were successul at what you did - your clubs bombed just as ours did. Ours had a good reason - people couldn't find folk music in folk clubs - your's bombed because you couldn't make up your mind what you were trying to sell - you tried to please all of the people all of the time and ended up pleasing nobody

...

The fact that you allowed standards to drop as you did meant that what you put on was a badly performed unidentifiable mish-mash
Your music has no future because it has no definable identity

...

Can your point out one single publication containing your 'folk song' - no you can't
Can you provide a track record - a genealogy - a history... of your folk song - of course you can't - it would be like trying to bottle fog

...

Hand on heart - can you say thay?
Of course you can't - you can't even describe what you represent as folk music
You're like these big Multinationals (except you're not big) who moved into the East Anglian farms, tore down all the hedgerows, farmed the land bith their monster machines, until, after a few years the East Wind blew off all the topsoil and made the land a desert

Now, if you can explain how this is not blaming me for something (although I am not sure what exactly) I am willing to listen to reason. As to a persecution complex. Nah, not really but when someone I consider a friend makes an unprovoked personal attack on me I do worry.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 01:26 PM

"You could have got your own clubs and called them something else - you chose to take over our description"
The Royal "you" Dave - you have alligned yourself with those who justify not presenting folk songs in folk clubs - you claimed to have moved on

The same with the rest really - you say there's nothing wrong with the scene, yoiu seem comfortable that they have driven away thousands because of their policies

Is this notwhat you (not you personally) have done/
"There is always room for traditional music but the fact remains that unless you move with the times, you stand still and get overtaken by something better. "
Something better ?
So it's our fault for expecting to har folk song
You seem to be taking evasive action to divert from your previous statements
Some of us don't believe that there is "anything better" but I'll be fascinated to learn what you believe is

Isn't 'hoist on your own petard' appropriate here?
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 01:50 PM

Jim - a lot of us out here believe there is loads of 'better' music [personal tastes vary],
but we still value and enjoy trad folk...

That is an undisputable fact in the 21st Century...

Our concern is that trad folk continues to be valued and enjoyed by generations to come,
alongside all their newer future music yet to be written/produced...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 02:09 PM

No evasive action here, Jim. I always understood it someone says 'you' they mean it personally. I have heard of the royal we. Never the royal you. But I accept you explanation. I do however need to point out the error in your logic. Your being personal in this case. I have pointed out time and time again that the club I ran was, and still is, sucessful. It is primarily traditional but we are acceptant of other types of folk music. It has never sold out to commercialism. It has never been anything other than a folk club. It is the only club I have ever had any way in running. If you chose to allocate blame to anyone for the destruction of your idea of folk music, make sure you are aiming at the right targets.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Ebor Fiddler
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 02:44 PM

I'm still not very sure what this thread is all about, apart from continuing a slanging match between two gentlemen old enough to know better. Please gentlemen, cease this unseemly behaviour, find yourselves a settle in a good pub, and make friends again. DON'T argue about who's going to buy the first round either! (Stamps foot.)

Chris B.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 02:46 PM

:D But what do you mean by 'yourselves'

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Cj
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 02:51 PM

So often and here again it comes down to what one considers "folk". As soon as anyone with an acoustic guitar singing anything was accepted into that definition, a new one should have been made for traditional music. Though I suppose again the belly fluff singers would want to encroach on this new name, to enhance their credibility and perhaps give them an audience.
Traditional folk will never be able to compete against the Ed Sheeran / Bob Dylan / Paul Simon wannabes, but so long as it stays living and breathing, that's good enough for me.
I hate going to folk clubs and hearing earnest new songs about broken hearts tho', I find it torturous. Why couldn't these wallopers have considered themselves jazz, instead?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 03:09 PM

"Never the royal you."
That's what I meant Dave - creative langage)
t should have been self explanatory in what I said
You have castigated us from the beginning - "nothing wrong" - "change with the times or something better will take over"
I don't think I have misunderstood you - not deliberately anyway

"Jim - a lot of us out here believe there is loads of 'better' music [personal tastes vary],"
No problem with that - À chacun son goût
The problem arises when you start calling it folk music

This is about the Clubs - in my opinion the dustbin philosophy is what ruined them

Why should anybody wish to compere with Dylan/Zimmermann - he's a pop singer and doesn't pretend to be anything else?
Paul Simon the same
Ed Sheeran - a failed C and W singer
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 03:12 PM

I only wish I could fail as well as Ed Sheeran :-)

Subject: RogerRE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 03:24 PM

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.
What a load of cobblers.
Roger.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 03:39 PM

'But we are all united in our hope that some day, and that not faraway, the British people will again be singing their own folk-songs, which are the most beautiful and varied of Western Europe, and that the Ramblers will have helped.'

sort of early Brexiteers, before we even joined up with those foreign johnnies...

Quite right though! We are by far the best. I'm backing Britain!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 03:52 PM

Quite right Mr Whittle.
Them there foreign johnnies don’t like the cold steel up ‘em.
Rober

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 04:02 PM

I think you may find the old school Bullingdon boys do like it up 'em...

:-D

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 04:11 PM

You do remember that was Bruce Forsyth, don't you Big Al?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 04:27 PM

This thread is about the effect of commercialisation on the uk folk revival.
I have given some examples.
Traditional song and dance are suffering because of commercialisation,venues are disappearing because of commercialisation,because pubs decide they can make more money, they get ridof folk clubs.
EFDSS could start a festival and perhaps one club, they have a data base of members, the festival and club would be promoting tradtional song and dance[ONLY] and would have the support of its members any profits ploughed back into the festival and club or the society.TRADTIONAL DANCE AND SONG IS IN DANGER

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 07:24 PM

what was Bruce Forsyth?

How come Sandman and Jim - both living in Ireland, have come to such diametrically opinions?

One of them says that kids are flocking into seminars to gain access to the ancient culture and
One of them says TRADITIONAL SONG AND DANCE IS IN DANGER

Its confusing, I'm confused.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 26 Aug 18 - 08:29 PM

This software sample set is a deal of the day 85 quid down to 25 quid...

"NEO FOLK

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This collection of 24 NEO-FOLK construction kits include all the Bluegrass and Folk instruments that embody the ever-popular genre: banjo, mandolin, dobro, fiddle, and guitar, each played with a rhythmic style based in Alternative Rock and Folk. The instruments are performed by an all star line up..

These construction kits are 100% royalty free and ready to use in songs, music libraries, film, TV, commercials, or any form of audio production. Inject some Neo Folk roots flavor into your music with this fastidious collection of instrument loops and samples. Use as full construction kits to build a track around, or individually cut up and process the loops for a more experimental use."

Also available: ACOUSTIC SONGWRITER
CONTEMPORARY SINGER SONGWRITER STYLES...

There you go, making commercial sounding folk music is as easy as letraset and fuzzy felt...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 03:09 AM

I was referring to england not ireland

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 04:02 AM

"I only wish I could fail as well as Ed Sheeran"
Depends on what you want to be good at
Ed Sheeran fills massive arenas here - - with people more interested in Frank Sinatra than they would be Frank Harte
IF THAT IS HOW YOU SEE THE ENGLISH CLUB SCENE , I think you have made my point
Festivals city stopping concerts for screaming fans, - my, my - now that's going to fill our clubs !!
I think I get your picture for the future of folk song
Sorry lads, not mine
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 04:06 AM

'But we are all united in our hope that some day, and that not faraway, the British people will again be singing their own folk-songs, which are the most beautiful and varied of Western Europe, and that the Ramblers will have *helped*'

But not, perhaps, by releasing an EP with two songs written by MacColl and two written by Alan Lomax, with music sounding mainly like Acker Bilk mixed with Hank Williams on Speed!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 04:25 AM

Hmmm.... the Iberian Peninsula is in Western Europe I seem to remember.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 05:01 AM

Pseud,

I notice too that in the printed album of eleven titles the traditional songs are sometimes labelled "music arranged by" and "words and music arranged by".

It also contains the music, guitar chords and fingering. All done in the good old British tradition of course.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 05:04 AM

Good grief, Jim. If you see an aside about Ed Sheeran as my views on Folk Clubs there really is no hope.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 05:08 AM

Well last night at Shrewsbury FF Jon Boden and the Remnant Kings gripped two of my non folkie friends by their rendition of traditional folk songs along with Jon's original songs. Exciting, vibrant and passionate. That's what folk song should be and it is the younger generations of performers that are making it so. By contrast the Irish 'supergroup' of the older guard were technically brilliant but comparitively passionless

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 06:06 AM

well I'd give Ed a floorspot.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 06:20 AM

" If you see an aside about Ed Sheeran as my views on Folk Clubs there really is no hope."
I don't Dave - you weren't the fanzine who raised him as a comparison to traditional singers

"I notice too that in the printed album of eleven titles the traditional songs are sometimes labelled "music arranged by" and "words and music arranged by".
THat is commonplace with folk song nowadays
John Reilly's ' Well below the Valley is now copyrighted by musician, Phil Coulter
Ironically, John, an impoverished Traveller was taken from a derelict house in Boyle and taken to hospital, where he died of malnutrition

"But not, perhaps, by releasing an EP with two songs written by MacColl and two written by Alan Lomax,"
You can't resist taking a poke at those dead devotees who set this music on the road, can you?
Seeger, MacColl and Lloyd were instrumental in creating a revival that lasted for decades - MacColl alone breathed life int 175 of the Child ballads, hundreds of Scots and English folk songs and made at least 300 songs using folk forms
He and others helped build up the edifice that your friends are now attempting to tear down
Lomax if renowned throughout the world for his contribution to world traditional music
However they sang six decades ago, it was vastly superior to the pretty-pretty breathy little-girl singing that Steve Roud seems to regard as good singing - go and look them up
HERE'S ONE
AND ANOTHER

I'd stick to knocking dead singers and your "foot-tapping ballads" if I were you

Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 06:27 AM

>>>>>>pretty-pretty breathy little-girl singing that Steve Roud seems to regard as good singing<<<<<<<

Evidence please!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 06:46 AM

Brenda Wooton was big in the West Country 40 years ago, she was on our local telly a fair bit.
Me and a mate went to see her live at an arts centre.

These days it's difficult finding CDs of her singing, at a sensible price.
But by chance found 2 collections on Amazon Prime Music...

So last night I persuaded the wife to have a listen.
She was curious to hear how Cornish sounded compared to Welsh.

My mrs is a big fan of more recent female singers - particularly Kate Rusby...

After a few songs, she told me to stop playing her tracks
as Brenda Wooton sounded "too scary"...

From my point of view, now that I've heard her again afer 40 years,
these 2 collections seem a random collection of some really good recordings in a style I like [the scarier ones..],
but too many are delivered in a trite comic style that was popular decades ago..
[perhaps still is in folk clubs...???]

So it seems Brenda is not a singer to be easily recommeded to ears atuned to 'modern' folk singers...???

Shame her back catalogue is not more widely available at a fair price.
I'd like to hear the 1970s LPs that were well regarded back then,
not these hotch potch compilations..

But maybe they also sounded variable like this...???

..one good track followed by a couple of excrutiating duds...?????

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 07:26 AM

The Library and Archives Director of the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library is one of the most knowledgeable, impressive and enthusiastic young people that I have had the pleasure of talking about traditional song to. She has a deep understanding and wide knowledge at her fingertips. She is proving to be a worthy successor to her very impressive predecessor, Malcolm Taylor. She is also one of the finest of the rising generation of young singers. Her singing shows that she knows what traditional song is all about.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 07:26 AM

"Evidence please!"
Bit cheeky from somebody who refuses to supply any
Go look it up Steve - they both get honourable mentions in one of his interviews
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 07:46 AM

Jim, you said to me, 27 Aug 18 - 04:02 AM IF THAT IS HOW YOU SEE THE ENGLISH CLUB SCENE , I think you have made my point (In caps but was a link to an article about Ed Sheeran)

Me: If you see an aside about Ed Sheeran as my views on Folk Clubs there really is no hope.


Jim: I don't Dave - you weren't the fanzine who raised him as a comparison to traditional singers

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 07:49 AM

Sorry, didn't finish. I am a real loss as to just what it is you actually are saying and to who, Jim. As my post above demonstrates you seem to address a comment to me and then when I respond you deny it.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 08:41 AM

Dave
This argument appears to have divided neatly into two sides - I'm afraid as far as I am concerned, if you aint for us, you are agin us - sorry if you've got caught in the cross fire
It might have helped that, instead of pointing out how successful Ed Sheeran is, you'd have shared my outrage at his being identified as a better singer than our traditional ones (along with Robert Zimmerman) - but there you go.

All this is a bit of a diversion anyway - we were discussing the state of the clubs and whether they were in need of repair, not our own personal tastes
I have no doubt of your own commitment to traditional song - I don't need your assurances on that one
What you are prepared to tolerate in a 'folk club' is a different matter
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 08:56 AM

jim.
Despondent of slough seems to be refrring to festivals as well as clubs, he she refers to the uk folk revival, which seems to be as many festivals as clubs, festivals such as shrewsbury and cambridge which have little or few trad performers.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 08:56 AM

If people want to follow up the Brenda Wooton ref, there are a couple of albums on Spotify, which you don't have to pay for. Some of it a tad screechy, perhaps, some more listenable.

As it happens I quite liked the MacColl Lomax hybrid. I am happy with my description of it. Again, people can listen using Spotify if interested and check it out for themselves.

It really is surprising how much material is available from Spotify free of charge at the click of a button.

There was an interesting programme on the radio which had a section about how MacColl and Seeger trained female singers to select particular types of 'tone' (for lack of a better word) for particular songs. It is discussed on thread 142157 here and is still available on the BBC radio iplayer. Enlightening, and including some examples of MacColl himself speaking. That was a real eye-opener for me.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 09:28 AM

Perhaps somebody could suggest a MacColl song or two done without accompaniment and without regular rhythm?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 09:31 AM

"There was an interesting programme on the radio which had a section about how MacColl and Seeger trained female singers to select particular types of 'tone' (for lack of a better word) for particular songs. "
Your display of ignorance is n=breathtaking as is your capacity to persist with it
MacColl (not Pegg) was approached by a group of singers in the early sixties to "take classes"
He refused and instead, set up a self-help" group (which eventually became the Critics Group, which met weekly in their home for nearly ten years
They/we ( I was a member for a couple of years, my wife was part of it for most of its existence) on the one hand,experimented with various voice and relaxation techniques in order to improve their performances.
They also examined the history and social significance of the songs in detail
By the time the Group finally disbanded in the early 1970s, some members had become voice trainers and teachers themselves, others major songwriters and others still prominent singers in the Revival - Pat and I went on to research the music we have been inspired to examine closely
One of the earliest members, Like Kelly, became a leading figure on the Irish scene, Sandra Kerr was part of a music course in Newcastle University, Frankie Armstrong, apart from being a respected singer in her own right, taught voice
John Falkner and his then partner, Dolorous Keane became household names on the Irish scene
The Group left behind a couple of dozen of the best examples of folk singing ever produced in the revival - London songs, Sea songs, Songs of the 19th century Industrial Revolution, Women's songs - all solo or group researched and sung gems
On top of that, the Group participated in the making of two sets of combined poems and songs for schoolchildren along with some of Britain's most prominent actors/readers - a folio of around 30 albums in all

Can I suggest that, if you are gong to make this yet another MacColl hate-fest, you avoid making a fool of yourself by showing you know something of what you are talking about
No wonder you are a Steve Roud fan
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 09:31 AM

"There was an interesting programme on the radio which had a section about how MacColl and Seeger trained female singers to select particular types of 'tone' (for lack of a better word) for particular songs. "
Your display of ignorance is n=breathtaking as is your capacity to persist with it
MacColl (not Pegg) was approached by a group of singers in the early sixties to "take classes"
He refused and instead, set up a self-help" group (which eventually became the Critics Group, which met weekly in their home for nearly ten years
They/we ( I was a member for a couple of years, my wife was part of it for most of its existence) on the one hand,experimented with various voice and relaxation techniques in order to improve their performances.
They also examined the history and social significance of the songs in detail
By the time the Group finally disbanded in the early 1970s, some members had become voice trainers and teachers themselves, others major songwriters and others still prominent singers in the Revival - Pat and I went on to research the music we have been inspired to examine closely
One of the earliest members, Like Kelly, became a leading figure on the Irish scene, Sandra Kerr was part of a music course in Newcastle University, Frankie Armstrong, apart from being a respected singer in her own right, taught voice
John Falkner and his then partner, Dolorous Keane became household names on the Irish scene
The Group left behind a couple of dozen of the best examples of folk singing ever produced in the revival - London songs, Sea songs, Songs of the 19th century Industrial Revolution, Women's songs - all solo or group researched and sung gems
On top of that, the Group participated in the making of two sets of combined poems and songs for schoolchildren along with some of Britain's most prominent actors/readers - a folio of around 30 albums in all

Can I suggest that, if you are gong to make this yet another MacColl hate-fest, you avoid making a fool of yourself by showing you know something of what you are talking about
No wonder you are a Steve Roud fan
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 09:35 AM

Sorry, I should have added and not one he wrote himself.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 09:41 AM

Jim, I think Pseudonymous is genuinely curious about MacColl, and I see no sign here of a hate-fest.

"Perhaps somebody could suggest a MacColl song or two done without accompaniment and without regular rhythm?"

How about The Baron of Brackley?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 09:49 AM

There was a programme and it did have such a section in it, a point relevant to the discussion on this thread of female singing styles and also to the discussion of 'revivals'. For me, stating this fact is not 'showing one's ignorance'.

My understanding is that we are being told that MacColl was a significant figure in preserving English/Scottish (possibly Irish, not sure about this but he does sing in an Irish accent on one song on Spotify) traditions. I am merely asking for an example.

I am perfectly happy that nobody should regard me as an expert: it is precisely because I am not that I have delved into the works of Roud and others and engaged with the ideas that they present.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 09:51 AM

Thank you, Brian. I'll listen to that in a moment. Thanks again.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 09:59 AM

Now that this is another MacColl thread...

"The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face

Perhaps the most unusual reconfiguration has come from Seeger herself, who in 2012, aged 77,
recorded it alongside the electronic producer Broadcaster. MacColl’s melody was all but dispensed with,
Seeger’s voice was fed through a vocoder and the song was set against a Gary Numan-esque synth groove.
Asked what her late ex-husband would have thought of it, Seeger replied,
“Well, the Ewan of the Seventies would have thrown it in the fire.
But the Ewan of the Eighties was coming to terms with a lot of things?.?.?.
I think he would have been very interested in it.”"

hmmm.. my kind of modern folkies.. wonder if any older mudcatters would like them...???

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 10:07 AM

"and I see no sign here of a hate-fest."
Hank williams soundalike and the rest - we have to disagree Brian
None so blind

"I am perfectly happy that nobody should regard me as an expert:"
No fear of that, I can assure you especially as your total understanding of folk song period seems to be based on thee few songs you have dredged up from Spotify
The overwhelming number of MacColl's 175 ballads are unaccompanied
Peggy is a superb instrumentalist and in one of her lectures on accompaniment, her opening statement was - The first thing you ask about accompaniment is "is it necessary"
Very much in contrast with the wannabe Carthys who suffocate their songs in unnecessary. overelabourate accompaniment
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 10:15 AM

'Breathtaking'. It's been a long time since anybody called me that! :)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 10:58 AM

One of the earliest members, Like Kelly, became a leading figure on the Irish scene,"
yes and he left very early.
although his repertoire was influenced by contact with Ewan, and he had respect for him, he wanted to develop his own style, to give the impression he was a long time member is wrong.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 11:10 AM

"yes and he left very early."
Nothing to do with the Group Dick - he moved out of London
He remained a strong supporter of MacColl and his ideas all his life
Read what I said - I said he was one of the earliest members - nothing more
Don't you start
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 11:15 AM

Bloody hell Jim. Do you have anything nice to say about anybody who's alive?

Martin Carthy is one of the unavoidable stopping off points for every English guitarist-singer.

For Brian and me his version, and maybe Tony Rose's version of Thorneymoor Woods was inspirational. Okay guitars aren't your thing. You've made that plain. But for some of us they are all we think of all day, having gone to sleep thinking about them in our dreams all night.

In Brian's case, he thinks about concertinas too. But with me - its just the guitars.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Pseudonymous
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 11:25 AM

I'm not sticking around. Thanks.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 12:50 PM

"Martin Carthy is one of the unavoidable stopping off points for every English guitarist-singer."
Doesn't make him a good accompanist Al -
I like Martin but that doesn't mean I like what he does

My long dead mate (30 years now) threw his home open once a week to young singers like me and ran classes where he devised ways of helping inexperienced newcomers improve their singing

He did more work on singing techniques for folk songs than any other single individual on the scene
He wrote around 300 songs and was recognised as the leading singer of his day for many decades
If you mention his name on this forum you will be inundated with open hate mail which almost immediately closes down thread after thread - making it virtually impossible to discuss all the ideas and techniques that he left behind in recorded form
I have 250 tapes of his workshops that I have no idea what I am going to do with and nearly as many interviews, lectures and radio programmes all containing examples of has pioneering work
And you complain about my crticisnf somebody's style of accomaniment in passing
Give us a ***** break Al!
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 01:32 PM

Jim - fair enough.. MacColl was a great bloke...

Now, trying to relate the admiration for him to this thread...

If he could have experienced the last 30 years of music in all it's diversity,
how adaptable or intolerant would he be...???

Might MacColl think things you don't like in modern folk, are actually quite inspiring and cool...???

How would he have accepted computer/internet music technology and the way it has opened up,
democratised and facilitated,
affordable high quality music recording, production, and distribution for the ordiany folks...???
Way beyond the horizons of any folk clubs...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 01:49 PM

Well I'm really sorry you feel like that Jim.

I've never sent you any hate mail.

I think people possibly home in on your vulnerability.

The thing you always forget about Ewan. He was a pro! He had the bravery common to every showbiz footsoldier. In fact he had it in spades. If you put your head above the parapet - particularly as fearlessly, and innovatively as Ewan did - people are going to take shots at it. Every artist knows this.

Knowing his humble origins - do you really think the assurance with which he performed and expressed himself cost him nothing? He was a toughie! And I think the slings and arrows of the Lilliputians 30 years on would have made him laugh.

Regarding your problem with library-fing or whatever the word is, all this research work. Have you approached the big museums, and universties? What of this Newcastle place that's doing a folksingers degree course - surely they'd love a resource like that. It would keep PH.D students out of mischief for years.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 02:25 PM

"Martin Carthy is one of the unavoidable stopping off points for every English guitarist-singer. For Brian and me his version, and maybe Tony Rose's version of Thorneymoor Woods was inspirational."

Yes, Al, in fact (as I may have told you) the very first song I performed in public was a Carthy-esque version of 'Thorneymoor Woods'. Jim, you're not obliged to like his guitar playing, but I can tell you he's put a lot of thought and work over many years into devising accompaniments to work with the grain of songs learned from unaccompanied source singers, rather than imposing foursquare rhythms on them.

His adaptations of Child ballads have also been very inspirational to me and many others.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 02:58 PM

"how adaptable or intolerant would he be...???"
He would probably have shoved his head in the gas oven as I feel like doing sometimes - though I do take issue with your "diversity"
Abandonment is the word which springs to mind
Might MacColl think things you don't like in modern folk,"
What's modern folk - define it for me?
MacColl would have loved the internet as it exists at present - he talked about it with anticipation when he was alive -
The first thing he and Peggy did when they suddenly became relatively wealthy when one of Ewan's love songs for Peggy hit the charts big-time was to instal a recording studio in their hoe
They produced a series of ballad albums that were the best ever produced as far as I'm concerned and a load of other masterpieces
As far as technology in general, I hope he would have treated it circumspectly as I do
We are involved in an art form that doesn't need amplification (unless you want to put it in a concert hall - I certainly don't
Instrumentation the same - used with taste, it's fine used indiscriminately it's destructive
Our tradition is based around the most intricate, versatile, democratic and the most readily available musical instrument there is - the voice
Accompaniment can enhance it sometimes but most of the time it is totally unnecessary and can be a diabolic hindrance to good singing - even (and sometimes especially) in the hands of a good musician.
I used to sing some of my 300 songs with an accompanist - when I came to leve here I thought I'd have to abandon them
Not the case - I can sow sing them all unaccompanied and make as equal a job with them as i could twenty years ago
Nowadays, too many singers accompany their instruments rather than the other way around - they ruin perfectly good singing of perfectly good songs by catering for unnecessary accompaniment
If you think anty of this technology is way above anything in a folk club we exist on different planes
The most important, and sometimes the only thing a singer needs with him/her is an attentive listening audience
If you don't understand that you don't understand folk singing
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 03:04 PM

" Jim, you're not obliged to like his guitar playing, but I can tell you he's put a lot of thought and work over many years into devising accompaniments"
I'm sure he did Brian - too much maybe
His long, intrusive instrument breaks and gis hiccoughy idiosyncratic phrasing spoil most of what he does for me
I found myself listening to his skilful guitar playing rather than the song
One of the features of instrumental accompaniment for me is that you should only notice it when it stops or it goes wrong
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 03:17 PM

Well ornamentation isn't limited to guitarists. Some unaccompanied trad singers style is very ornate.

Are we to approach folk singing like Oliver Cromwell did Lincoln Cathedral and knock the knobs off everything and the noses off the gargoyles?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 03:38 PM

" Some unaccompanied trad singers style is very ornate."
Seldom in the English tradition Al and not often in English-language Irish ones (I'm talking about the old styles of singing of course)
Storytelling doesn't need ornametation - that's what our singing tradition is about
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 03:50 PM

Pfr - I mentioned Broadcaster's work which sampled the Radio Ballads earlier in this discussion. I wonder what those in this discussion would think of what he did. I found it thrilling

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 04:23 PM

Jim, i was only stating a fact luke kelly left early, put whatever interpretation you like on that, , i also said he had respect for Ewan

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 04:36 PM

joseph taylor was hghly ornamented listen to brigg fair and from percy grainger who said thisGrainger wrote:[4]

    Mr. Joseph Taylor is in most respects the most exceptional folksinger I have yet heard. Although he is 75 years of age, his lovely tenor voice is as fresh as a young man's, while the ease and ring of the high notes, the freshness of his rhythmic attack, his clear intonation of modal intervals, and his finished execution of ornamental turns and twiddles (in which so many folk-singers abound) are typical of all that is best in the vocal art of the peasant traditional-singers of these islands.

    Though his memory for the texts of songs was not uncommonly good, his mind was a seemingly unlimited store-house of melodies, which he swiftly recalled at the merest mention of their titles. His versions were generally distinguished by the beauty of their melodic curves and by the symmetry of their construction. He relied more upon purely vocal effects than almost any folk-singer I ever heard. His dialect and his treatment of narrative points were not so exceptional, but his effortless high notes, sturdy rhythms, clean unmistakable intervals and his twiddles and ‘bleating’ ornaments (invariably executed with unfailing grace and neatness) were irresistible.
phil tanner used ornamentation listen to gower wassail or dark eyed sailor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GS-OLMXqV6Awww.youtube.com/watch?v=GS-OLMXqV6A"> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GS-OLMXqV6A

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 04:40 PM

Jim, rufford park poachers is also high;y ornamented

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 06:14 PM

Baring-Gould recalled:

'tunes have to be repeated several times to be noted with accuracy, as peasant singers are disposed to embroider them with twirls and flourishes of their own device'

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 07:03 PM

I'm still sorry you feel hurt on Ewan's behalf.
I feel sure he wouldn't have wanted that.
He probably got a bit of a buzz out of pissing people off, and he would smile to think of all those people still walking round with the arrows of discord that he fired, stuck firmly in their bum after all these years.

Have you asked Peggy how she sees the situation?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 07:14 PM

"Jim, i was only stating a fact luke kelly left early, put whatever interpretation you like on that,"
And I was only stating that he was an early member - you suggested I was being misleading
Put whatever interpretation you like on that Dick
It is a moot point whether or not Taylor ornamented - other's claimed that he had natural vibrato
Joseph Taylor sang the the traditional version of Rufford Park Poachers, so the doubt about his using decoration still applies Be
side the point anyway - the Lincolnshire singers were recorded in 1908 and ornamentation has hardly appeared since
There was a possibility that Ned Adams was using decoration on the end of the first line of Bold Princess Royal but it is hardly discernable
Harry Cox talked about 'putting in the twiddly bits', but he never managed to do so.
I did say "seldom" - I never suggested it never put in an appearance - I certainly never intended to make a definitieve point about it.
Our singers considered themselves storytellers - their texts were secondary to the tunes - that was my point
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 27 Aug 18 - 08:22 PM

Jim - you seeem to be over-reacting and getting a bit evangelically hostile [again]
defending prophets and 'rules of folk' that most music lovers
know nothing about,
and wouldn't give a toss if they did...

You are doing a brilliant job of curating and preservation,
and know you need to make practical arrangements
so that custodianship of your collection and recorded personal memories
is donated to an archive that will value and conserve it all properly.

That will be your legacy to folk music academia and specialist musicologistss / journalists...

If in the future a minority still cares enough,
your collection might help inspire and influence new Folk Revivals,
.. perhaps in ways you do not like or approve of...
But you are at least doing your best to offer that option of informed choice to future folkies..
That is one main reason you have earned our admiration.

But it gives you no special rights now to lay down the law
to young [and not so young] creative singers and musicians
who have even the vaguest interest in trad folk...

..and certainly no excuse for frightening any away...


One of the vilest people I ever encounteed was a fundementalist evalgelical preacher [wedding in Liverpool],
even large a part of his congregation of the converted
looked uncomfortable like they thought he was too out or order...
but still he continued banging on and on about the evils of feminism and it's abomination in the eyes of god..

When you are in one of these fire and brimstone preaching moods you could even put him in the shade...

I say this frankly and honestly as someone who has much respect for you
both above and below the BS line...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 02:39 AM

And I was only stating that he was an early member - you suggested I was being misleading"
isuggested nothing of the sort, i stated a fact.
joseph taylor sang in an ornamented style, go and listen

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 02:49 AM

There is a difference between 'vibrato' in singing and 'ornamentation', though some vibrato can be so pronounced that it sounds as if the pitch of the note varies.

In Rufford Park Poachers as sung by Joseph Taylor, both vibrato and ornamentation can be heard. The vibrato occurs when he holds the same pitch of note. At other times he uses flourishes or glissando.

Ewan MacColl uses a great deal of ornamentation.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 03:49 AM

i agree about story telling. however some irish singers also used ornamentation, i heard a young irish traveller singer recently who used a lot there was a discussiin about ornamrntation on this forum, i think his name was mcCarthy, i got the impression from listening to him that ornamentation was used a lot by irish travellers, please correct me if that is wrong

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 04:33 AM

thomas macCarthy at the magpies nest, tell me jim is he siningnin in an authentic tradtional style, he is using ornamentation "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyRuPE9Hzms">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyRuPE9Hzms

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 05:45 AM

I don't think Jim ever denied Irish trad singers use ornamentation.

In fact the first time I ever heard the term ornate applied to singing was from Peggy Seeger.

Her and Ewan were following Sean Cannon who had just sung a version of Blackwaterside unaccompanied This was pre Dubs, about the time of the curry wagon.

Anyway Peggy describes Sean's singing style as very ornate.
I know I'been thinking I liked Tommy Dempsey's more straightforward version better. And Bert Jansch's (complete with folk baroque guitar) better than both of the Irish versions.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 06:22 AM

"I don't think Jim ever denied Irish trad singers use ornamentation."
Thanks Al, I'm most certainly not, nor am I denying it was ever used in England
We are more or less restricted by the fact that our knowledge of traditional singing dates back largely to the beginning of the 20th century - apart from Grainger's 1908 recordings, a working view of singing dates back to the 1950s when the BBC embarked on their mopping-up campaign to record what they regarded was the last of the traditional singers in these islands

Listening to the Grainger singers suggests that there might have been an ornamented tradition and some later recordings confirms that there might have been, but the actual evidence is thin on the ground
I know the BBC recordings inside out and I would be pushed to identify many singers singing in English who ornament extensively among the recordings we have - some in Ireland (not many in the Northern counties), and hardly any in England or Scotland (I'm referring to structural ornamentation rather than the less obvious ones ).
THat doesn't mean it was never used - when collectors reached the tradition it was all but dead and singers were remembering songs rather than performing them.

If it did exist, and I see no reasong to believe it didn't, we have to try to work how it was used.
There is a tendency of some Irish singers to 'decorate the tunes' rather than to use ornamentation to emphasise important parts of the narrative
In The Critics Group, those were the terms in which ornamentation was discussed
Both Peggy Seeger and Sandra Kerr did some excellent work on researching ornamentation and folk song styles
I constantly get thoroughly pissed off by the fact that the closed mindedness towards MacColl and everything surrounding him prevents any open discussion on the masses of detailed work put in on every aspect of folk singing and folk songs - totally unique, in my experience.

I know Thomas McCarthy and consider him a friend - I don't think he is typical of how Irish Travellers sang, not in our experience anyway
Beyond that, I'm not prepared to discuss his singing publicly - I don't do that with traditional singers, as I've said before
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 10:17 AM

ok jim ,fair enough

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 10:56 AM

It seems to me that it is perfectly possible to admire some aspects of the life and work of MacColl without necessarily admiring others. I for one accept that some people may like or dislike things about famous (and talented) people that I think and feel differently about. What does not help is when people go OTT about MacColl on either side, pro or agin. And both types happen. And some of the people on MacColl's side make him sound like an arse.

I personally do not regard any tutorials organised by MacColl and Seeger as the last word on anything, though obviously advice from accomplished professionals, which they both were, can be useful.

Among the items in Jim Carroll's legacy will be the posts he has made on Mudcat. Interesting to ponder what people may make of them.

'The Princess Royal' by Ned Adams is full or ornamentation.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 11:28 AM

"I personally do not regard any tutorials organised by MacColl and Seeger as the last word on anything,"
If anybody saifd the last word on anything, we may as well all fold up our tents and **** off home
"Interesting to ponder what people may make of them."
Interesting to ponder if anybody will bother to read them
Reagrding some of them - I hope not
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 12:49 PM

Anyway trad song is in dnger in England[imo] because of coomercial pressure, lack of venues where people can listen, where it is not treated as background music, commercialisaton of folk festivals so trad songs get sidelined to fringe events or smaller eventsor get performed and altered with over arrangement or changes so that the music gets further from its roots

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 12:55 PM

Surely the altering and changing of a song is part of the folk process is it not? I know what you mean about over arranging though.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 01:06 PM

Interestingly.. trad heavy rock/metal is experiencing a similar existential crisis..
and coming to similar conclusions on the cause of problems...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9jNrPTTbSo

If any of you can be bothered having a watch,
maybe getting a wider perspective on factors which are affecting music
well beyond our little world of folk...


btw.. his dad was in Badfinger...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 03:53 PM

i did listen, thanks

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 05:49 PM

"There was a possibility that Ned Adams was using decoration on the end of the first line of Bold Princess Royal but it is hardly discernible"

I've been using that recording of Ned Adams in workshops for many years, to show that English singers were well capable of ornamentation. Apart from the turns at the end of the first line of every verse, the performance is full of the most extravagant slides.

A much better known singer, Bob Copper himself (the very man who made the recording of Adams) slipped subtle ornaments into his singing all the time. Neither example is comparable with the ornamental complexity of sean nós singing in Ireland, but they are interesting nonetheless.

Jim's point, though, is that ornamentation and storytelling don't go together, since one is likely to distract attention from the other. That's an interesting question I've thought about a lot. If, say, a guitar accompaniment detracts from the story (I don't accept it myself but people who enjoy traditional singers sometimes say this), then by the same token so should ornamentation.

But here I'm going to call in evidence one of Jim's own recordings, the magnificent 1970s performance by the traveller Bill Cassidy of 'Pretty Polly' (aka Outlandish Knight). Cassidy used all kinds of ornaments, often to my ears unconventional ones, but still succeeded in telling the tale very effectively. What think you Jim?

And how about Paddy Tunney, whose 'Lowlands of Holland' I once tried to imitate vocally for a another workshop. The first phrase alone contains at least four beautifully executed turns (it took me ages to get hold of it), but how does it bear on the storytelling? I'm not sure how I feel myself about that one.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 28 Aug 18 - 06:51 PM

"Jim's point, though, is that ornamentation and storytelling don't go together, since one is likely to distract attention from the other."
That's not what I said Brian - ornamentation for ornamentation's sake can do just that, but used subtly to underline important words, it can be an invaluable addition to the song
Joe Heaney was interviewed over quite a long period by Ewan and Peggy and he spoke at length about the uses of ornamentation
The same with accompaniment, though I have never been convinced that the Guitar is the best instrument
In both cases it's the "look how clever I am" approach to the song that spoils the song for me - neither songing nor instrumental playing

I have always though 'Little' Bill's singing to be superb, but I find, for various reasons, it doesn't have the emotional mileage for my taste - once you've heard it a few times, you've heard it
Sam Larner's unornamented singing, particularly 'Butter and Cheese and All' always leaves me feeling it's the first time I'm hearing it - and it's the first time Sam had sung it
I don't know if that makes sense!

"Surely the altering and changing of a song is part of the folk process is it not? "
Nope - every song that had ever been changed wulfd be a folk song using that logic
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 01:46 AM

"..."Surely the altering and changing of a song is part of the folk process is it not? "
Nope - every song that had ever been changed wulfd be a folk song using that logic."

And that is false equivalence - like saying "A donkey has four legs, therefore every animal with four legs is a donkey".

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 02:46 AM

Quite, BWM. I may have phrased it badly though so I will try again.

Surely the altering and changing of a song is part of the folk process (along with various other things that preclude it from becoming a folk song) is it not?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 02:48 AM

Sorry that do not preclude it from becoming a folk song etc.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 02:48 AM

I am saying the opposite All
Changing a song has no part in defining it a folk songs, though it is something that can happen naturally during the process but it is not a defining feature
I may be nit-picking, but people have argued that the fact that changes that have taken place in a song automatically prove it to be 'folk'
It's not as simple as that
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 03:10 AM

Some people may have argued that changes prove it is a folk song, Jim, but not me. I simply said that altering or changing a song is part of the folk process.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 03:59 AM

"part of the folk process."
It can happen during the folk process - but what if no changes occur - is it still a folk song ?
There aren't too many different versions of Dark Eyed Sailor
What do you do if there is only one documented version on record?
Roud contains a number of ours that have never been found elsewhere
Maybe I have nit-picked Dave
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 04:13 AM

OK, Jim.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guessed
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 07:27 AM

'Roud contains a number of ours that have never been found elsewhere'

The wife and I collect fossils. We may refer to our collection as 'ours'. It belongs to us. But I am not quite comfortable with the use of 'ours' by collectors to refer to songs that they have 'collected'.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 08:15 AM

That's not what I said Brian - ornamentation for ornamentation's sake can do just that, but used subtly to underline important words, it can be an invaluable addition to the song... it's the "look how clever I am" approach to the song that spoils the song for me - neither singing nor instrumental playing"

Sorry for the misquote, Jim. I quite concur with your last statement and have certainly heard examples, though we might disagree over where to draw the line. For instance, Nic Jones' setting of 'Canadee-I-O' begins with a lengthy and beautifully played guitar intro and includes a similar break part-way through, but to my ears that doesn't detract from the narrative. It's simply a very fine piece of music that includes a well-told story.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 08:18 AM

guessed wrote
I am not quite comfortable with the use of 'ours' by collectors to refer to songs that they have 'collected'.

Major embarrassing moment!
Tina and I were singing in a concert at the Newton Abbott folk festival some time in the mid 1970s and as part of our set we sang Billy Taylor learned directly from Cameron & Jane Turriff who sang it together in unison which was what we do.
Peter Kennedy had a stall in the hall and was selling a selection of his Folktrax cassettes - (yes, I know all about their provenance). At the end of the concert as I walked past his stall, he attracted my attention to speak to me:-
> Who did you learn that version of Billy Taylor from?
> We learned it from Cameron & Jane Turriff when we were staying with them in Fetterangus.
> Oh! That's all right then.... that's not one of mine!

I can lose my temper but only do so rarely and generally there is a slow and gradual build up. On this occasion I went from 0% to 100% in one second. I bawled at him at the top of my voice -
>What f***ing difference would it have made if it had been one of yours?
Peter ran out of the hall. The people going out of the concert fell silent and all eyes turned on me.
I was mortified.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 08:28 AM

"But I am not quite comfortable with the use of 'ours'"
Shorthand - do you think I should put up a list ?
We have made enough of our recordings available, given them away on request and put them up on line for free access to indicate that we have no proprietarial attitude towards any of the singers we recorded
We have never sold any of their songs in any shape or form (not strictly true actually - we were rewarded with six free copies of the double CDs we issued through a well-known folk magazine, which we were expected to share with the 20 - plus singers included) and since then, if we want more we have to buy them.
None of the songs on the dozen albums we have been involved in bears a little (c) and the notes clearly say that the rights rest with the appropriate singer
Sorry 'bout that - I felt some of it needed saying

Where were you when the threads on Peter Kennedy and his behaviour were up and running ?
If you care to discuss the appalling way our traditional singers have been treated down the years, I'll be more than happy to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with you
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 09:27 AM

Where were you when the threads on Peter Kennedy and his behaviour were up and running ?
If you care to discuss the appalling way our traditional singers have been treated down the years, I'll be more than happy to stand shoulder-to-shoulder.

Let's examine the evidence from two 'Peter Kennedy' threads:-
Thread title - "Peter Kennedy & Folktrax". Posts by Vic - 8
Thread title - "Refleections on Peter Kennedy". Posts by Vic - 5

An apology, perhaps?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 09:32 AM

I don't know what you are talking about Vic
I posted in response to "GUEST,guessed"
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 10:02 AM

Then you need to make yourself clear, I had mentioned PK in the post previous to yours. Guessed has not mentioned PK.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 10:05 AM

"Then you need to make yourself clear, "
I did Vic - I actually put the quote I was responding to at the top of my posting
Perhaps you should read what is posted with more care
I won't bother asking for an apology - mistakes happen
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Some bloke
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 10:08 AM

Folk goes from strength to strength. It is an exciting time to hear wonderful interpretation of traditional words and tunes.

At one time, young people shared their passion in smokey upstairs rooms of pubs. Now, its Youtube.

The art however remains as ever; every generation adds to the evolving tradition with its own styles. As I keep saying, Cecil Sharpe would have been as bemused by hearing melodeons accompanying Morris as some grumpy old men on here react to electric guitars and looper pedals.

There are many interpretations of the word folk, from modern songwriters putting their lives, hopes and aspirations to paper, all the way back to Child ballads and far beyond, er.. putting their lives, hopes and aspirations to either paper (broadsides) or oral tradition (changes every month, never mind generation.)

Oh, and somewhere along the way, there's even a pigeon hole for Jim Carroll's narrow sub genre.

Forty years ago, if I pick on a song, say, Handweaver and factory maid, I got an appreciative round of applause for singing it unaccompanied. Now, most people prefer to hear it with guitar. That's the beauty of folk. It didn't grind to a halt in 1954. It evolves. That's what it is all about for crying out loud.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 10:40 AM

I agree, 'Some bloke', there is a lot of terrific music being made right now by young artists, especially on the instrumental side (I still tend to prefer singers of the older generation though).

However, though I use Youtube both for discovery and self-promotion, but it's no substitute for live music. Young people may not want to sit in folk clubs these days, but they do still want to get out there and share music and song in the flesh.

I'd have said that, since Cecil Sharp collected a pile of tunes and became well-acquainted with the anglo concertina for Headington Morris, I doubt if he'd have been at all surprised or discomforted to hear a melodeon accompanying morris dancing.

Lastly, I loved Steeleye Span's electric arrangement of 'The Handweaver and the Factory Maid' when it came out 45 years ago, but nowadays folk-rock itself is pretty old hat and I'd rather hear something different done with the song. Maybe even an unaccompanied version.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 10:50 AM

"there's even a pigeon hole for Jim Carroll's narrow sub genre."
I think you'll fing you'd need an awfully big pigeon hole to fit in over a century's "sub-genre"
It becomes increasingly dishonest to describe the definition I am happy to be guided by as "Jim Carroll's" or a "sub-genre"
It is actually an internationally accepted way of describing 'The Songs of the People' which has prevailed since folk-song put in a general appearance and will remain the only one until somebody wins support for another one - no takers so far
'Horse Music' has always been a term of abuse so it doesn't count as a definition
By 1954 the tradition was dead in the water, so I suggest that those who keep mentioning "54" stop using it as a crutch
The only people who seem to find it in anyway useful are those who wish to use it for target practice
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 11:00 AM

Actually, the remarkable thing to me is that the UK folk revival that Lloyd and MacColl started in the 1950s is still going strong - if not as strongly as it was - 60 years later, where so many other musical movements - skiffle, prog-rock, punk, New Romantics, etc, have waxed and waned and fallen off the radar. So much so that a 17-year-old came up to me in Glossop Labour Club on election night this year and started talking about Cecil Sharp (he also turned out to be a really good singer, unaccompanied or otherwise!).

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 11:01 AM

Steeleye [and others] were fresh sounding at the start...
but later became too slick and MOR...

Sounding more like a bunch of souless jobbing pro session players...

The youtube vid I posted last night demonstrates that all genres of live music
are under attack,
with opportunities for young musicians to gain experience and pay there dues rapidly diminishing...

Too many young wannabes bands and singers competing for fewer remaining grass roots local live venues,
that have not yet been closed down...

Main culprits...???, property developers and inner city/town gentrification, noise complaints, prohibitive insurance costs, etc....

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 11:03 AM

Brian, I searched Youtube for 'The Handweaver and the Factory Maid' and came up with some interesting information about the song which I don't think that you did not know about the song. I certainly didn't and I don't think anyone else who contributes here will know that it is:-

A traditional song collected by Roud (Roud 17771) and performed by many greats- including by A. L. Lloyd, Steeleye Span, Martin Carthy, Mike Harding, and others.

This was the note on the song by a quintet called 'Stray Hens'. Clearly they do not perform in folk clubs or many of the old fogeys who contribute here (including self) would have put them right.

The performance didn't appeal to me but they are trying to perform that song in a way that relates to their own musical lives and no-one should be criticising for them.
However, if they are going to get anywhere they will need, on this evidence, to get a new lead singer.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Vic Smith
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 11:08 AM

Penultimate line should read:-
criticising for them for that.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 11:23 AM

"At one time, young people shared their passion in smokey upstairs rooms of pubs. Now, its Youtube".
Possibly the saddest statement ever on Mudcat. Thankfully, I don't believe it.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 11:33 AM

Well, Vic, I have to thank you for mentioning the Stray Hens, for more reasons than you may realise. I could certainly have given them a bit of advice about those liner notes (oops!) but I do actually think they are trying to do something different with the song rather than merely a tepid cover of Steeleye, and I should point out that the bass player doesn't seem to be the regular lead singer.

Of even more interest to me is their version of 'Lay the Bent to the Bonny Broom', which they seem to have got from me, directly or most likely indirectly. How do I know? Well, I tweaked the text quite a bit when I arranged it, and all the tweaks are still there. I can also begin to imagine ways in which it might have reached a band in Australia...

Am I happy they used my version? Yes. Will I get royalties? Perish the thought! Do I like their treatment? Yes (though others may disagree). Ha! Us Old Fogeys aren't done yet!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 11:47 AM

""At one time, young people shared their passion in smokey upstairs rooms of pubs. Now, its Youtube".
Possibly the saddest statement ever on Mudcat. Thankfully, I don't believe it."

better believe it... old folks...

Increasing broadband speeds and decreasing lag...
Only a few more years and we could be jamming in a real time
with groups of musical folks all over the world...

..though obviously in the UK our broadband is too slow and expensive,
and we are probably dragging a decade behind the rest of the 'developed' world....

How come some folks can skype relatives in Australia,
yet we can't get sufficient mobile signal/boadband speed to skype my mum's house less than 15 miles away...
because the UK has gone to shite...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 12:29 PM

It's great that so much material is available on youtube- just hope that there's some way young folk can steer through the vast amount of dross to find some of the gems which ARE certainly there.
Still no substitute for the real thing of course, which we old fogies were lucky enough to experience mainly through the 'revival'

On the subject of the nature of tradition, I have my own views but don't want to provoke any acrimony from the usual suspects.

However I've just read a lovely travel/history book called 'Love of Country- A Hebridean Journey' by Madeleine Bunting.

In it, she writes of the time 20 years ago when a superquarry was to be inflicted on the lovely Isle of Harris. This was to be used for roadstone in the Leicester area!! A quarry on such a huge scale would never be allowed in England- the company's argument was that it was a very remote area & even quoted Sir Walter Scott's journal as evidence of its meagre cultural value, with high, sterile hills...
I have never seen anything more unpropitious' Scott wrote from a boat offshore - he never landed!

   The company's case provoked a discussion about the nature of culture and tradition and the objectors' campaign relied heavily on two Gaelic concepts to explain the islanders' understanding of the value of PLACE.   'Duthchas' expresses the collective right to the land of those who use it, and 'corachean' being the belief that people BELONG to the land.
In other words, the future for Harris should be based on the use (but not destruction) of the land- fishing, crofting & tourism, and the plans were defeated, and a later plan for 234 wind turbines for the Isle of Lewis failed for similar reasons.
Anyway, one resident summed it up WITH NO REFERENCE to music..

'Another reality prevails in Harris- language, culture, history- the whole of everyday life- are embedded in tradition, not consumption. Tradition should not be confused with the past; it could better be described as the meaning of the past, distilled into the present and cared for, with a view to handing it on to future'.

   I've never heard it better expressed and as part of a wider culture, I could find little fault with that definition & just wonder if the 'folk revival' lives up to those standards?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 12:40 PM

"I could find little fault with that definition & just wonder if the 'folk revival' lives up to those standards?"

I think that is partly what the OP's original question might have been about, Jim, and it is a good quote. But from the outset the folk revival didn't exactly grow from within the community in the way that the culture of Harris presumably did. Though of course Harris is not urban Britain.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 29 Aug 18 - 12:55 PM

"usual suspects."
The problem with that phrase Jom is it can be equally applied to the people who use it regularly
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 03:55 AM

Brian, no but some of the [imo] best clubs [swindon for example], were community orientated and needed the dedication of people like Ted Poole a communist who believed and tried to make it the peoples music by including and welcoming the community.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 04:01 AM

Ted, tried to widen his audience by inviting peopLE from the local community who had not heard folk before, so not relying commercialism to get people into the club, he also attracted people from the irish community who had had to move to england and who would have an empathy with trad music.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 05:02 AM

Agree absolutely about Ted Poole's approach, Dick.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 05:12 AM

Yes Brian, but isn't that what we've lost, except in places like Harris?
All the older singers I've heard & learnt from, like Fred Jordan, Davie Stewart, Willy Scott & Jack Elliott had their roots DEEP in their community, and I agree that Ted Poole was one who tried very hard to make the music part of the community- the man was a hero to me, and a feature of the earlier days of Swindon club was that it was a cross-section of the community, especially age-wise.
It's hard to see the music or the other aspects of Ms Bunting's comments as relevant to the communities we live in today, very likely in Harris as well, but I think she hit the spot!
Some of us try to re-create community and I'm full of admiration for those who go out, like Ted, into the non-folk world & make the music relevant & not some kind of preservation society- that way lies oblivion.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 07:19 AM

no, jim, there should be room for both, bring people in through community approach,rather than commercialising the music and at the same time have at least one festival run by EFDSS WHICH PROMOTES TRAD SONG AND DANCE, it does not have to be either or, or one or the other, what is wrong with having a festival that is solely about the roots of the music?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guessed
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 07:52 AM

Regarding the use of 'ours' as in 'our songs' (meaning 'the songs we collected' and, worse 'our travellers' (meaning 'the travellers we collected songs from').

Nobody's accusing Jim of behaving a la Kennedy.

'our recordings' seems tickety boo to me.

Decent shorthand sums up what you want to say or notes it down in a quicker form. Poor shorthand says something that you might not wish to say.

Given that people are arguing that words are so important in songs, lets use them with respect and thought when we can.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 08:00 AM

By the way I fundamentally disagree with this:

"By the way - regarding 'music making' - this tends to ignore the fact that as far as songs are concerned, we are being invited to share ideas and experiences, not watch musical performances"

I cannot believe that 'the folk' could not or did not distinguish poor singing from virtuosic singing, be that singing ornamented or relatively plain. Singing *is* making music.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 02:50 PM

Phillips Barry, quoted in A L Lloyd's 'Folk Song in England':

'The fieldworker knows that the ballad is a living organism, tune and text together, the spirit and the body. When the spirit is gone, what is left is a dead thing.'

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 03:17 PM

Ask any traditional singer what the most important - te=he story or the tune he will tell you - the story
Nobodt is suggesting that neither is important - just that the words take precedence
The tune is there to carry the words - too often nowadays that is not the case
That is the
only point being made
Simples
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 06:19 PM

Have to agree with Jim here.

However GG I don't very often agree with Phillips Barry so I will indulge in a bit of coffin kicking. 'living organism, tune and text together' okay, but a poor analogy 'spirit and body'; which is the spirit and which is the body? If the tune is lost you're left with a poem, which isn't dead, it can be read or recited with pleasure. Also the tunes are frequently very beautiful things in their own right. Listened on the Radio today and caught 2 lots of classically arranged folksongs quite by chance, beautiful stuff!(IMO) I can and do frequently appreciate the tune of a folk song without knowing any of the words

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guest
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 06:37 PM

Hmm.

A poem may not be 'dead' in itself, but the song minus the tune is dead as a song, surely? And a tune is not a song, just a tune.

And surely a performance of a song is a musical performance, however much Jim may disagree with the idea (as in the quotation from him above).

I get as frustrated as the next person when you can't make out the words, of course.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 08:30 PM

"A poem may not be 'dead' in itself, but the song minus the tune is dead as a song, surely?"
Agaain nobody is talking in the extremes - dead or not dead - it becomes a matter of emphasis
You can present a songs as a beautiful (or beautifully sung) music that happens to have words, as most opera has to be to those who don't understand the languages they are sung in
It is fairly common for a song to be 'over-accompanied or over-ornamented
Once that happens it becomes a piece of music with words, rather than a narrative
That was not what the old crowd did (not in Briain and Ireland anyway - Americam traditions developed differently
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 30 Aug 18 - 09:27 PM

There must be lots of examples of well worn tunes being used for ballads.

You're listening - and you find yourself thinking = I know this tune, and last time I heard it , it was another song.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 01:46 AM

Peter Bellamy gave Kiplings poems an extra dimension when he set them to music. In my opinion. I may be a philistine but I must admit that poems do not do much for me on their own. Music let's me follow both story and rhythm much better. I do know other people appreciate the poet's skill just for what it is.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: r.padgett
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 02:26 AM

The tune does of course help to remember the words ~ it provides a hook into them!

Many songs will have had a tune in mind no doubt on creation ~ "to the tune of" whatever was well know before ~ new tunes and words will have a PRS implication nowadays

Ray

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 03:21 AM

Traditional music in much of Europe, maybe excepting Scandinavia, is very much focused on the tuned. And in many aspects of British and Irish traditional music too. I do here think Jim's genre is very narrow.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 03:48 AM

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome - PM
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 01:46 AM

Peter Bellamy gave Kiplings poems an extra dimension when he set them to music. In my opinion. I may be a philistine but I must admit that poems do not do much for me on their own. Music let's me follow both story and rhythm much better. I do know other people appreciate the poet's skill just for what it is."
That was because Kipling wrote with rhythm in his head, but many good poems are not written like this and do not require music to enhance them,
I think many story tellers can hold an audience for longer not just because they are skilled but because music can sometimes distract from the story,keepin accompaniment simple or singing ballads unaccompanied can be more efective that over accompaniment or musical distraction. if you do not appreciate poetry you would" to some extent" answer the dictionary definition of a philistinea"person who is hostile or indifferent to culture and the arts."

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 04:09 AM

"Jim's genre is very narrow."
Blame it on all those traditional singers David - they told us what they felt about their songs - we recorded wite a few of them saying exactly that
Comparing them to other traditions proves nothing, it really doesn't
Our oral tradition is overwhelmingly unaccompanied - why?
Were our singers unable to walk and chew gum at the same time like thir American, Spanish, Eastern European, Asisia counterparts were?
What with their being the composers of their folk songs, they really must have been a dim lot!!

The proof of the pudding is really in the eating - just examine the songs themselves - Lomax's Cantometrics team described them as "word intensive" - the emphasis of their construction being in the text of the song
This doesn't mean that the tune is unimportant - of course it is - it is the vehicle on which the song is carried

Our songs fall into two major categories - lyrical and narrative - the former tends to concentrate on description and emotion, while the latter tells the story
Ireland has a great deal for lyrical songs than Britian - the British tradition is largely a narrative one - the ballads intensively so
An over-concentraion on the tune is very much a revival thing - not even Irish singers, for all the reputation Ireland has for highly skilled instrumentation, has a history of accompanied singing, though the very lyrical Irish language singers did fo in for ornamentation (though not as much as today's singers do)

This attitude was rammed home to us way back when we spent an afternoon with two elderly brothers with a large repertoir of traditional songs between them

Theyd sung about a dozen for us, when one, after he'd sung a broken token song, siad, "Isn't that a great air?"
It was - the problem was that he'd used the same one for five other of his songs
THis was a family steeped in the local musical, song and storytelling traditions so it wasn't as if they were mindlessly repeating their songs
Walter ardon was noted for the rareness of his tunes, but at no time did they dominate his songs
He played the melodeon and the fiddle but at no time did he ever attempt to accompany them
It's all in the pudding
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 04:11 AM

I appreciate most art, Dick, including storytelling. I don't understand the preoccupation some people have with the use of words. To me, the story is the important thing, not the language. Sometimes the use of 'clever' linguistic tricks can detract from the story as much as over arrangement can from a song.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: David Carter (UK)
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 05:13 AM

Jim I think that you are being very parochial. Other countries have other traditions, even the UK has other traditions, and your use of the term "our singers" is very narrow. They may be your singers, but others of us have wider interests.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 05:29 AM

that is true and i think dylans farewell angelina is in this category, though god knows what dylan was trying to say, wheras in the same pop but folky sounding genre donovans colours has some of the essnce of folk" simplicity"
Farewell Angelina[what is he trying to say, seems like he is throwing cliches together, imo]
T

[
compare it to colours
Farewell Angelina
The bells of the crown
Are being stolen by bandits
I must follow the sound
The triangle tingles
The music play slow
But farewell Angelina
The night is on fire
And I must go

[Verse 2]
There is no use in talking
And there's no need for blame
There is nothing to prove
Ev’rything still is the same
A table stands empty
By the edge of the stream
But farewell Angelina
The sky's changing colours
And I must leave

[Verse 3]
The jacks and the queens
They forsake the courtyard
Fifty-two gypsies
Now file past the guards
In the space where the deuce
And the ace once ran wild
Farewell Angelina
The sky is folding
I'll see you after a while

[Verse 4]
See the cross-eyed pirates sitting
Perched in the sun
Shooting tin cans
With a sawed-off shotgun
And the corporals and neighbors
Clap and cheer with each blast
Farewell Angelina
The sky it is trembling
And I must leave fast

[Verse 5]
King Kong, little elves
In the rooftoops they dance
Valentino-type tangos
While the hero's clean hands
Shut the eyes of the dead
Not to embarrass anyone
Farewell Angelina
The sky is flooding over
And I must be gone

[Verse 6]
The camouflaged parrot
He flutters from fear
When something he doesn't know about
Suddenly appears
What cannot be imitated
Perfect must die
Farewell Angelina
The sky's flooding over
And I must go where it is dry


[Verse 7]
Machine guns are roaring
Puppets heave rocks
At misunderstood visions
And at the faces of clocks
Call me any name you like
I will never deny it
But farewell Angelina
The sky is erupting
And I must go where it's quiet
Colours
Yellow is the color of my true love's hair
In the mornin', when we rise
In the mornin', when we rise
That's the time, that's the time
I love the best

Blue's the color of the sky
In the mornin', when we rise
In the mornin', when we rise
That's the time, that's the time
I love the best

Green's the color of the sparklin' corn
In the mornin', when we rise
In the mornin', when we rise
That's the time, that's the time
I love the best

Mellow is the feelin' that I get
When I see her, mm hmm
When I see her, uh huh
That's the time, that's the time
I love the best

Freedom is a word I rarely use
Without thinkin', mm hmm
Without thinkin', uh huh
Of the time, of the time
When I've been loved ,
now i agree its just a love song and maybe a bit light weight, but it is clear

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 06:56 AM

"Jim I think that you are being very parochial."
How - aren't we talking about British and Irish songs
I know perfectly well what happens in other countries - we have hundreds of hours of the stuff - but it ain't what we did
When I talk about "our singers" I'm taking about us British and Irish
I know the repertoires inside out, I've been listening to the stuff since I was in my early twenties

I have extremely wide interests - in all traditional musics
I was even lucky enough to be introduced to and record one of Zoltan Kodaly's singers in Hungary - she sang us a Hungarian version of 'The Cruel Mother' (unaccompanied, as it happens)

There is nothing wrong with accompaniment any more than there is decoration, but it has to serve the narrative, and not the other way around as it has become on the folk scene
The plage of 'Electric Folk turned or songs and ballads into impenetrable soup - you could go down for a pee and a pint during some of the over-indulgent guitar breaks

Dick
In an unguarded moment Dylan admitted that his poetry was meaningless gibberish - doesn't stop some of his Zimmermanite follows from worhiping at his feet
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 07:50 AM

Dylan has never had an unguarded moment in his life.
If he said that, you can bet your life it was to deflect some idiot asking, what does this mean...?

AS Ezra Pound put it. A poem is an equation for an emotion. If you can explain what it means - there would have been no reason to write it. That's how poetry works.

I'm sorry you haven't noticed that a lot of people living in England relate to Dylan's songs and views about folk music. Almost certainly more than relate to Ewan's.

As Tony Hancock said, if this had been an election - you'd have lost your deposit mate...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 08:15 AM

"If he said that, you can bet your life it was to deflect some idiot asking, what does this mean..."
Nope - he said it at a prize giving - and he was right to do so
Much of it is impenetrable
In fairness, he describes himself a musician rather than a poet - which makes sense, if you like that sort of thing
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Knockroe
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 08:44 AM

Bob famously describes himself as a Song and Dance Man, whether you like that sort of thing or not.
I'm enjoying the feisty discussion, particularly re traditional singing.
Particularly like Jim's point above:
"It is fairly common for a song to be over-accompanied or over-ornamented
Once that happens it becomes a piece of music with words, rather than a narrative"

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 08:51 AM

I should make it clear that I have nothing personal against Bob Dylan, but I wouldn't like him to marry may sister!
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 08:54 AM

""It is fairly common for a song to be over-accompanied or over-ornamented
Once that happens it becomes a piece of music with words, rather than a narrative""

I can live with that...

But I don't dismiss or disparage folks who prefer words over music...

Each to their own, coexisting as happily as possible as far as I'm concerned...

Having said that, I don't like show off musical virtuosity, and endless soloing...

Keep it minimalist, short, and to the point - is my personal preference...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 09:18 AM

"I can live with that..."
If it's a pievce of music i can't be a folk song
I don't disparage anything - certainly not anybody's tastes
For me, the most exquiste pies of orchestral music ever written was Gouge Butterworth 'Banks of Green billow, based on the ballad, Bonnie Annie
Rejecting the words of a folk song for the tune is like throwing away the Bounty Bar and eating the wrapper
Not for my pallette
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Despondent of Slough
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 09:25 AM

Thanks everybody much intellectual stimulation here.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 09:27 AM

Dick, we obviously agree about the 'community' being important if the music is to thrive, and you practice what you preach with your own events in your own village.

Now I'm not one for festivals, as you know, and I can't really see the point of them apart from a chance to meet old pals but as for the EFDSS running festivals- thanks but no thanks...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 09:39 AM

well theres quite a lot of sessions where singers aren't really welcome. they just like playing tunes. as a singer - you're just about tolerated.

that's just another aspect of the folk revival. like the singer/songwriters. and the folk dance.

its a big picture - not just confined to one lot of activity.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,EFDSS admirer
Date: 31 Aug 18 - 11:19 AM

We can all meet old pals in the geriatric dog home.
EFDSS running festivals, hardly new didnt they start Sidmouth.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 02 Sep 18 - 07:16 AM

Where's this geriatric dog home- Sidmouth??- have never been

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 02 Sep 18 - 08:27 AM

Barking hosts a festival, i suppose thats an appropriate name, no dogs booked as far as i know,
i am joking

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guessed
Date: 02 Sep 18 - 09:06 PM

I was even lucky enough to be introduced to and record one of Zoltan Kodaly's singers in Hungary


Here we go again with the collectors 'owning' the people whose singing they recorded!


But this is interesting, and I doubt there was much 'luck' involved.

The story behing this meeting would be interesting: how did it come about that Jim was in Hungary with recording equipment? Was this 'luck' or was it planned as a folk recording trip? How come he was introduced to this singer? Who was the singer? When and where did this happen? Who made the introduction and why? Was it planned before or after Jim arrived with his equipment, and by whom? How was Jim's Hungarian itinerary planned? Because this doesn't sound like a series of lucky co-incidences and the full story would be interesting? How did Jim know what the song was? Who chose the song? How did Jim know that this was in fact one of 'Kodaly's singers'?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Sep 18 - 03:26 AM

"Here we go again with the collectors 'owning' the people whose singing they recorded!"
You appear to be making an issue of this for some reason - what a pity you appear to have no other point to make
Far from being an attempt at "ownership", as you seem to in#fer, it is to show that the singer was established in her art
It iis common to talk about Sharp's singers (researchers like Roud do it all the time) or Grainger's, or Carpenters or Mike Yates's... it iw a way of establishing time and place
   
How did we meet her?
I have explained this elsewhere.
Four od us went on a motoring holiday in 1968 - John Faulkner, Sandra Kerr, Sandra's brother and me
We were giben the address of a broadcaster friend of MaCColl's, Charlie Couts, (hope that didn't give the impression that Ewan owned him) who was working for Budapest Radio, Charlie introduced us to people at the Folk Music Department - they took us to meet one of Kodaly's singers (please don't be silly) and brought their (yes - I think they did own it!)
While we were there, one of the team suggested we ask the singer dor ballads on themes that occurred in the British repertoire - Sandra ased here about "the one where the woman who murdered her illegitimate babies - and the lady obliged
Sandra asked the team to send her a copy of the recording - my own interests in field recording hadn't developed at that time

We had no itinerary - -it was a holiday which started with a stop in Vienna to meet another friend of MacColl's (he didn't own him, of course), went on to Budapest, where we were interviewed for English language radio, and then on to Yugoslavia and finally to the Island of Krk, where we swapped songs witn Bosnian fishermen
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Sep 18 - 04:01 AM

Sould read
" (please don't be silly) and brought their (yes - I think they did own it!) recording equipment

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guessed
Date: 03 Sep 18 - 04:15 AM

Thanks for the account. As for 'making a thing', come on, Jim, you 'make a thing' out of err, things, yourself. Frequently. Love the witty sarcasm on the topic, and so early in the day, too!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guessed
Date: 03 Sep 18 - 04:52 AM

'I was even lucky enough to be introduced to and record one of Zoltan Kodaly's singers in Hungary - she sang us a Hungarian version of 'The Cruel Mother' (unaccompanied, as it happens)'

So in fact you didn't actually 'record' her yourself then? See, sometimes it is worth asking a question or two.

1968, so a couple of years after you got interested in folk and probably while you were still in the Critics Group run by MacColl. One of the few of that generation who can remember the 60s, and no doubt much the better for it!

We guessed either MacColl or Lloyd might come into the story as both are famous for not leaving the CP after the Russian invasion of Hungary. Assuming Budapest Radio would have been state run.


Wiki says this about Hungarian music at the time:

For the first half of the 20th century, Bartók and Kodály were potent symbols for a generation of composers, especially Kodály. Starting in about 1947, a revival in folk choir music began, ended as an honest force by 1950, when state-run art became dominant with the rise of Communism. Under Communism, "commitment and ideological affiliation (were) measured by the musical style of a composer; the ignominious adjectives 'formalistic' and 'cosmopolitan' gain currency ... (and the proper Hungarian style was) identified with the major mode, the classical aria, rondo or sonata form, the chord sequences distilled" from Kodály's works.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Sep 18 - 05:00 AM

"So in fact you didn't actually 'record' her yourself then?"
For crying out loud - what are you on?

You want to make this a right wing rant - I suggest you open a thread on the other secr#tion
Corpse kicking has become the major sport of folkies who have very little else to offer - especially when their knowledge#dge seldom rises above 'Wiki' level
Over and out (with you at least)
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 03 Sep 18 - 06:07 AM

For the information of anybody interested in digging up corpses
"both are famous for not leaving the CP after the Russian invasion of Hungary."
According to their biographers, MacColl left the Communist Party during the War and never rejoined; The last reference to Lloy'd's being a member was 1948 when he was turned down for a job in Picture Post by Hulton Press
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 04 Sep 18 - 06:11 AM

Out of interest I was at the Fleetwood Folk and Blues festival over the weekend. Blues seems suffers from the same phenomenon that people have mentioned about folk on here - IE, some bands are playing covers of pop songs which can be loosely described as blues. I don't really know enough about that genre to know if the aficionados see it as a problem.

I did see some wonderful folk music from both paid artists at concerts and others in both singarounds and music sessions.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guessed
Date: 04 Sep 18 - 06:32 AM

"What are you on?"

PG Tips, as it happens.

A person who claimed to have recorded somebody that it turns out they did not record and who claims that ornamented singing lacks ornamentation doesn't seem to be on strong ground when it comes to the credibility stakes, however long they were involved in the scene.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Brian Peters
Date: 04 Sep 18 - 08:12 AM

When I'm talking about people from whom Cecil Sharp notated songs, I probably have sometimes referred to them as 'Sharp's singers'. It's just shorthand - no implication of 'ownership'.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 07:55 AM

how can blues include pop songs ,ridiculous , generally they have a 12 bar sructure some jazz groups do interesting imporovisation over 12 bars , but if it is called folk and blues that is what it should be

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 08:51 AM

Because over much more than half a century many thousands of pop hits have foundations in blues...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 08:58 AM

Dunno, Dick. As I said I am not a blues aficionado but as an example McGuinness Flint's 'When I'm dead and gone' was covered. Tom McGuinness still plays with the Blues Band so there is a tentative connection.

Status Quo play predominatley 12 bar and most (all?) rock and roll is 12 bar so I don't think 12 bar is the main measure of blues.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 09:22 AM

..and because good enjoyable music does not always / often fit precisely
within the narrow confines of nice tidy conservative 'definitions'...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 09:29 AM

All music needs defining if we are going to discuss it PFK
The fact that any form of definition was abandoned destroyed an extremely robust folk scene
How about a list of types of music you would expect to hear oat a folk club
If you can make such a list, you are guilty of defining music - bit of a Catch 22 really
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Cj
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 09:41 AM

Jim,

Been meaning to ask this for a while, please don't view it as trolling.

As you're well aware, a of people, myself included, have issues with EM's Scottish accent.

And, a lot of people, and I'm not one of these, have an issue with the Critics Group, which as far as I can gather, was partially in existence for people to comment and criticise other member's singing.

So the question is ~ at such meetings, do you recall anyone ever mentioning EM's Scottish accent, and if so, how did he respond?

I imagine this may open the usual tin of worms, but it's asked in good faith.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Disgusted
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 09:47 AM

Rock and Roll is a derivative of blues.
There is nothing conservative about definitions according to the dictionary, definition can mean the degree of distinctness in outline of an object, image, or sound.
Good enjoyable music frequently falls into a definition, for example Mozart concertos are classified as Classical, Beethoven concertos are classified as Classical, Rock around the Clock is classified as Rock and Roll,Robert Johnson is defined as a Delta Blues singer.
If i want to hear Blues and see it advertised as blues,I do not want to hear a Cliff Richard impersonator, neither do I want to hear a heavy metal band or a rock band like Status Quo.
If I open a can of Tomatoes I do not want to find it contains Corned Beef
If I see punk rock advertised, I do not expect to hear a Country and Irish band or a band doing covers of The Spice Girls.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 10:07 AM

Disgusted - What an orderly life you must lead...

Shhh.. careful everybody... try not to challenge Disgusted's expectations...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Disgusted
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 10:23 AM

punkfolkrocker   you decide to go to a Jazz Club? Chris Barber is the advertised guest, Cliff Richard walks on stage would you stay and say, jolly good its not Jazz, but I do not care about definitions or trade descriptions, I am going to have an orgasm watching Cliff sing Summer holiday.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Wiki information about Blues
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 10:36 AM

Blues
Stylistic origins        
Work songs spirituals folk music[1]
Cultural origins        Late 19th century, Deep South, United States
Typical instruments        
Guitar piano harmonica bass drums blues harp slide guitar xylophone
Derivative forms        
Bluegrass jazz jug band ragtime rock and roll country
Subgenres
Boogie-woogie classic female blues country blues electric blues jump blues piano blues
(complete list)
Fusion genres
Blues rock gospel blues punk blues rhythm and blues soul blues
Regional scenes
British blues Canadian blues Chicago blues Delta blues Detroit blues hill country blues Kansas City blues Louisiana blues Memphis blues New Orleans blues Piedmont blues St. Louis blues swamp blues Texas blues West Coast blues
Other topics
List of genres list of musicians list of standards origins

Blues is a music genre and musical form originated by African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the end of the 19th century. The genre developed from roots in African musical traditions, African-American work songs, and spirituals Blues incorporated spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts, chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads. The blues form, ubiquitous in jazz, rhythm and blues and rock and roll, is characterized by the call-and-response pattern, the blues scale and specific chord progressions, of which the twelve-bar blues is the most common. Blue notes (or "worried notes"), usually thirds or fifths flattened in pitch, are also an essential part of the sound. Blues shuffles or walking bass reinforce the trance-like rhythm and form a repetitive effect known as the groove.

Blues as a genre is also characterized by its lyrics, bass lines, and instrumentation. Early traditional blues verses consisted of a single line repeated four times. It was only in the first decades of the 20th century that the most common current structure became standard: the AAB pattern, consisting of a line sung over the four first bars, its repetition over the next four, and then a longer concluding line over the last bars. Early blues frequently took the form of a loose narrative, often relating the racial discrimination and other challenges experienced by African-Americans.

Many elements, such as the call-and-response format and the use of blue notes, can be traced back to the music of Africa. The origins of the blues are also closely related to the religious music of the Afro-American community, the spirituals. The first appearance of the blues is often dated to after the ending of slavery and, later, the development of juke joints. It is associated with the newly acquired freedom of the former slaves. Chroniclers began to report about blues music at the dawn of the 20th century. The first publication of blues sheet music was in 1908. Blues has since evolved from unaccompanied vocal music and oral traditions of slaves into a wide variety of styles and subgenres. Blues subgenres include country blues, such as Delta blues and Piedmont blues, as well as urban blues styles such as Chicago blues and West Coast blues. World War II marked the transition from acoustic to electric blues and the progressive opening of blues music to a wider audience, especially white listeners. In the 1960s and 1970s, a hybrid form called blues rock developed, which blended blues styles with rock music.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 10:43 AM

I'll have some of that...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 10:53 AM

errr... on closer scrutiny that wiki has neglected to mention 'boring blues' and 'crap blues'..

..very popular sub genres jammed by smug tedious wannabes of all ages
at pubs and social gatherings wherever duller musicians gather...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,funkyolkpicker
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 11:15 AM

PFR,
Cliff Richard is not jazz, Cliff is not blues.
Neither would I expect a Cliff fan to sit through Blues. there has to be definitions because it is impossible to please everybody, so people have to have some idea of what music is on offer and expect to get what is advertised.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 11:33 AM

Errrmm... I never mentioned Cliff...???

Btw.. I got a biology O level - I know definitions can come in handy sometimes...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 11:37 AM

funkyolkpicker - allow me to help you with your new name...

"The Funkyeggpicklers" sounds more like a shite festival blues jam band...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 12:39 PM

Actually Disgusted Mozart may well be considered as classical but most Beethoven would be more accurately named as Romantic. Sibelius & Mahler late romantic, Stavinsky neo classical, Schoenberg serial, John Adams Minimalist but most people call this classical ( the only genre of those I have listed that I don't enjoy). I have the sense to be able to choose between the sub genres so why can't died in the wool folkies do the same with folk?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 12:52 PM

"As you're well aware, a of people, myself included, have issues with EM's Scottish accent."
No problem
I've never heard to many people mention Ewan's Scottish accent within the Critics'Singers Club circle
At that time many people were inging in a whole variety of accents - American, Mummerset - 'Oirish' Mock-Scots'...
Let's face it, most of us were townies singing country songs
There's a myth that Ewan insisted you only sang in your own accent - he lived in London and sang Scots songs - Peggy sang songs from every corner of the U.S. ... they would be daft to have insisted on something they didn't do
The idea of singing songs from your own national cultures came from Alan Lomax, who visted Britain and found everybody (including Ewan and Bert) trying to soun#d like Guthrie or Leadbelly
He accused them of neglecting their own national cultures and they fell into line

Ewan was born of Scottish parents who lived among other Scots families in Salford and took in Scottish lodgers - he would would guess have has a Salford/Scottish accent as a child
When I moved to London he and Peggy gave me a bed for a month and I spent a great deal of time taking to Ewan's mother, Betsy, who lived with them - I quite often had problems understanding the conversation when we gathered together for meals - Ewan lapsed into the accent he grew up with
I come from Liverpool and have been away for over half a century, yet when I talk to family members I slip back into a broad Liverpool accent (to the great amusement of Pat)
Ewaan learned a number of his songs from his parents, so when he decided to sing publicly, he adopted a deliberately neutral accent in order to put them across to an English audience, pretty much as actors do - as a ballad lover, I'm grateful he did
I'm not a Scot, but I've never had any trouble understanding his songs

The Critics Group was set up at the request of a number of singers who weren't happy with what was happy with the club scene
They asked Ewan to hold classes - he refused and instead, evolved a method whereby the members worked on each others singing
Someone would give a performance of say 3 - 4- 5... however many songs, the group would comment on the performance, what worked, what didn't.. and how they singing could be improved
A decision would be reached mutually which particular aspect of the singing might be worked on by members throwing in suggestions, suggestions would be tried and the singer would go off and decide what worked for him/her
Usually, they were asked to bring the song back several weeks later to see whether further work was needed
The system ascertained that everybody in attendance benefited by being required to take part - it worked, often brilliantly

One of the things I took away from the group is that, despite any other problems I may have had, I have never - ever - felt nervous singing in from#nt of an audience.

Ewan also developed a series of singing, voice, relaxation and breathing exercises to develop and expand the voice still work for me nearly half a century later
Most of the meetings were recorded - I have copies here
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 02:22 PM

So Alan Lomax was responsible for the direction of the UK FOLK REVIVAL in the late 1960s?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 03:22 PM

From Vic - still in Corsica
To be fair, Dick, that is not what he said. People jump on him when he twists others' words. Let's not stoop to using the same techniques.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 03:29 PM

"Let's not stoop to using the same techniques."
Squalid as ever Vic
I've come to expect nothing else sadly
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Joe G
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 04:14 PM

What is wrong with you lot? Can't you just have a civil discussion? It's no wonder so many people have abandoned Mudcat

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Cj
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 07:52 PM

Thanks Jim,I appreciate the detailed response.

I've never had a problem with folk singing in their own accent. The opposite for me, I cannot stand Americanisms or Oirish etc. I find they're faintly ridiculous and detract from the song. Hence my take on EM's Scots vocal. But I can see where you're coming from re his parents and the rest.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 07 Sep 18 - 08:15 PM

"What is wrong with you lot? "
Apologies - on my part
A knee-jerk response to what I consider uncalled-far bad manners
I'm quite enjoying this discussion
"for the direction of the UK FOLK REVIVAL in the late 1960s?"
Not completely Dick, but he did help instigate the BBC collecting campaign and suggested that British singers used it as a source for their material
I was at the symposium for MacColl's 70th and sat in on the public dise#cussiion between Ewan and Lomax
It was obvious that they had anormous respect for each other - quite rightly IMO
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Will Fly
Date: 08 Sep 18 - 03:49 AM

The question of singing accents has arisen many times here before, and poses some interesting questions.

If you sing in a foreign language - simply because those songs appeal to you musically - it would be surely be very silly not to sing them without attempting the appropriate accent and pronunciation. I happen to love singing some French songs from the 1930s so, when I sing them, I try to do it correctly. French listeners will undoubtedly recognise that my French is occasionally oddly accented (though I have been complimented on my performances). As I recall, Petula Clark had a French song repertoire - married to a Frenchman - and was extremely popular in France, perhaps because of, not in spite of, the "Englishness" in her promunciation.

Now, if you as a singer, are drawn to a songs from a particular culture or country, then in my view that should be the aim - to make those songs sound as naturally from that culture as possible. The problem obviously arises with the UK/US song axis because most people don't assume that UK English and US English can be considered as different languages. To me, singing an American song without inflections that don't nod to its American-ness is foolish. The alternative, to some of the Pronunciation Police, is not to sing these songs at all. But why not? If a song grabs you, sing it.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 08 Sep 18 - 04:06 AM

thanks for the info, jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jm bainbridge
Date: 08 Sep 18 - 01:15 PM

Re singing in different accents, I've lived in Ireland and sung songs here for 20 years, on & off. Often Irish or American songs, but have never disguised my Geordie accent.

The only time I do that is when I occasionally sing a Geordie one & soften it a little rather than not be understood at all, or worse still have to explain it in advance- not appropriate in a pub setting, IMHO.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 09 Sep 18 - 07:49 AM

The downside of the Lomax idea was that young english singers to some extent no longer performed american songs of people like woody guthrie

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guessed
Date: 09 Sep 18 - 08:10 AM

I am sure I have heard MacColl singing in an Irish accent.

My problem is with MacColl's speaking voice, as exemplified on the tapes of the critics group and on the 'Song Carriers'. He sounds like somebody who took elocution lessons from a member of the upper class mid 20th century, a sort of almost but not quite 'BBC English', the sort in which a 'creche' is a car accident in Knightsbridge. He certainly did not learn to speak like that on the streets of Salford. 'Seeoot' not suit etc.

Yet this was an era in which people were beginning to object to the marginalisation of Northern accents and voices. But MacColl chose to go with the tones of the establishment.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,guessed
Date: 09 Sep 18 - 08:16 AM

And if you listen to the first episode of the Song Carriers, to just the start, you may find yourself thinking, "The Spanish came up with that magnificent sound, and we have Walter Pardon."

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Sep 18 - 08:19 AM

"I am sure I have heard MacColl singing in an Irish accent"
He did - sixty-odd years ago he recorded Rocky Road to Dublin
Hope nobody ever remembers what I was doing that far back

I found Ewan's BBC voice on The Song Carriers a little excruciating at times - he was previously an actor and found it necessary to be adept in many accents - Theatre Workshop provided training for that sort of thing
Harry H Corbett (Steptoe) could speak with a plum in his mouth with the best of them, as could the landlady of The Vic, Barbara Windsor, when she put her mind to it
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Sep 18 - 11:13 AM

It was an easy process to rob a provincial kid of his/her regional identity...

As a boy I had the same west country accent as my dad, and everyone else on the estate...

But my mum, an outsider war evacuee from the midlands, had higher aspirations
and kept nagging me to stop saying words like "gurt" and to talk 'properly'...

Then Grammar school gradually turned me, without realising it,
into a correct little gentleman talking like a BBC news reader..

I now sound rubbish if I try to imitate the accent I was born with - just unable to do it..

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 09 Sep 18 - 11:30 AM

Dick re your post above

"The downside of the Lomax idea was that young english singers to some extent no longer performed american songs of people like woody guthrie"

They certainly did perform the songs of Woody and others at THE BALLADS & BLUES CLUB both pre and post MacColl's departure. Some even sang English, Irish and Scottish material. I am sure it was so in many other clubs, probably still is. I still sing songs that I learnt from Alan Lomax.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 09 Sep 18 - 11:31 AM

... and more relevant to the current strand of this thread...

Me and the mrs have been listening all afternoon to vintage Blue Beat and Ska...

One song we enjoyed enough to repeat a few times was Derrick Morgan - Don't Call Me Daddy [lyrics]

Now as much as I enjoy it and would love to sing it..

There's no way I could put on a phoney Jamaican accent,
or even singing in my own English accent, go anywhere near the risque race related lyrics in 2018..

Though daresay a minority of ornery anti PC brigade mudcatters probably still would
just out of lefty snowflake baiting devilment...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Ake
Date: 09 Sep 18 - 01:25 PM

Jim's mention of Harry H Corbett, reminds me that he was a folkie long before Steptoe, I had(probably still have)an LP on which he was singing shanties!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,padgett
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 03:01 AM

I still have said 45 vinyl Blow the Man Down ~ Bert Lloyd, Ewan MacColl and Harry H Corbett on Topic recorded by Bill Leader ~ first published 1956

Ray

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Cj
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 06:50 AM

Interesting point Dick made about less Woody Guthrie songs being sang when people began reverting to their own accents. I guess those people picked up on their own local songs, but a shame to miss the Guthrie anyhow.

My view on accents is they're one step away from wearing a C.U. Jimmy or cowboy hat. At best they're unnecessary, at worst, comical, distracting and even offensive...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 07:10 AM

"but a shame to miss the Guthrie anyhow."
It is, but it doesn't have to be
There are far more Guthrie recordings unavailable now than there ever where
We used to sing them on the Aldermaston Marches or on the chara trips to Blackpool to see the lights
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Derrick
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 07:30 AM

Guest Cj, What is the correct accent and pronouncement of the English language?
Most people would say received or Kings/Queens English.
That is a regional English from the Midlands and parts of Southern England which was adopted by the upper classes and academics.
Because those people had a such a high opinion of themselves they considered their speech to be superior to the accents and dialects of the ordinary folk,and therefore correct.
See here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Received_Pronunciation
The only need for a standard English is to ensure you can be understood in all parts of the country.
If everyone in the conversation is familiar with the accent or dialect being spoken be it Geordie or received Englishit doesn't matter,and often adds richness and colour to the conversation.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Derrick
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 07:32 AM

OOPs separate English and it.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 08:36 AM

GUEST,Derrick - My mrs is Welsh... she'd applaud you for your mistyping...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 09:44 AM

Stet

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Cj
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 10:37 AM

"Guest Cj, What is the correct accent and pronouncement of the English language?"

Well, in this context, the answer for me personally is one's own...

I know some folk love mid-Atlantic accents, I just never have.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 10:48 AM

I think the 'Freedom Come-All-Ye' is one of the finest songs in existence today.

I love the sentiments expressed & would love to sing it BUT there is no way it could be sung by anyone other than a Scot.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Sep 18 - 10:55 AM

"there is no way it could be sung by anyone other than a Scot."
I think many Scots have problems with it too Jim, but they're far more likely to make a better job of it than a Sassenach
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 11 Sep 18 - 06:11 AM

https://uk.video.search.yahoo.com/search/video?fr=mcafee&p=The+Freedom+Come+All+Ye+youtube#id=4&vid=2d05ecbd150d0a5bb95baa8075a9

attempted translation:



Freedom Come All Ye
Original Scots Lyrics by Hamish Henderson, this version by Gordon Hudson


Rough's the wind in the clear day's dawning
Blows the clouds head-oer-heel across the bay
But there's more than a rough wind blowing
Through the Great Glen of the world today
It's a thought that would make our vermin
All those rogues who strut and swagger without care
Take the road and seek other lodgings
With their vile schemes to sport and play

No more will our fine lads be commanded
to march to war at a braggarts call
Nor wee weans from pitheads and clachans
Mourn the ships sailing down the Broomielaw
Broken families in lands we've vanquished
Will curse "Scotland the Brave", nae mair, nae mair
Black and white to one another married
Will make the slums of their masters bare

So come all ye at home with freedom
Never heed those prophets of doom
In your house all the bairns of Adam
Will find bread, drink and painted rooms
When Maclean meets with friends in Springburn
All the rose and cherry trees will turn to bloom
And the black lad from Nyanga
Will break the powers of his masters doon.




Roch the wind in the clear day's dawin
Blaws the cloods heilster-gowdie owre the bay
But there's mair nor a roch wind blawin
Thro the Great Glen o the warld the day
It's a thocht that wad gar oor rottans
Aa thae rogues that gang gallus fresh an gay
Tak the road an seek ither loanins
Wi thair ill-ploys tae sport an play

Nae mair will our bonnie callants
Merch tae war when oor braggarts crousely craw
Nor wee weans frae pitheid an clachan
Mourn the ships sailin doun the Broomielaw
Broken faimlies in lands we've hairriet
Will curse 'Scotlan the Brave' nae mair, nae mair
Black an white ane-til-ither mairriet
Mak the vile barracks o thair maisters bare

Sae come aa ye at hame wi freedom
Never heed whit the houdies croak for Doom
In yer hoos aa the bairns o Adam
Will find breid, barley-bree an paintit rooms
When Maclean meets wi's friens in Springburn
Aa thae roses an geans will turn tae blume
An the black lad frae yont Nyanga
Dings the fell gallows o the burghers doun.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 11 Sep 18 - 06:15 AM

Interesting info about The Freedom Come All Ye


http://www.dickgaughan.co.uk/songs/texts/freecaye.html

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Ake
Date: 11 Sep 18 - 06:40 AM

Yes, that's the one Ray, I also have it on a "Topic Sampler" Harry makes quite a good job of it.

Sorry for the aside here but I rarely get to converse with Big Al these days.....just to say thanks for your kind words at the time of my removal from BS.....noted and to be remembered :0).

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Guessed
Date: 11 Sep 18 - 07:07 AM

Following the early 18th century Act of Union, Scottish merchants got access to British colonies and some of them got wealthy from the tobacco trade, with its links to slavery. Some Scots were also involved with the slave trade. I'm guessing this might be where the reference to black and white co-operation in the song comes from. Jamaica, for example, has many Scottish names for people and places.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 11 Sep 18 - 07:09 AM

Ake - you're not missing much..
I've gone days without even bothering to read any of it..
Even BS thread titles that usually catch my interest and spur me on to get involved...

Too few folks writing too many posts within too short a time,
that render a thread unreadable for anyone trying to catch up from the start
and join in...

...and you must remember what it was like, the pointless distracting arguments,
when folks jump in half cocked and clueless
without having read and understood previous posts...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: John MacKenzie
Date: 11 Sep 18 - 12:37 PM

Ever wish you hadn't bothered to open a thread?.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 11 Sep 18 - 01:53 PM

Yes it can be 'translated' but I'm no judge of the accuracy of the result- haven't heard Luke Kelly's version of it, although sounds like he did it the right way, in his own accent & without changing any words, I presume?
Hamish wrote it in about 1960 and then went on a song collecting your of Scotland soon afterwards. He was amazed to meet a young lady near Newton Stewart who sang it back to him as an 'auld Scots ballad'.
That lady was Mona Stewart, whose ceilidh band we (the Marsden Rattlers) met in Blairgowrie in 1967.
When I moved to Glentrool near Newton Stewart in 2003, I was playing at the Riverside day centre and asked if Mona still lived in the town. I was told yes & she'd be singing with her own piano accompaniment the following week!
It was great to meet her again & hear her stories of the old days in Galloway & you'll find my article about this lovely lady in an old issue of Living Tradition.
I hope she's still around as we plan to move back to Galloway in the next few weeks.....

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 11 Sep 18 - 07:43 PM

Strange story in a strange book.
The biography of Mike Heron.
Anyone read it?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 02:36 AM

"Ever wish you hadn't bothered to open a thread?."
I'm really sorry you feel like this John
The state of British folk music really needs to be discussed critically and as things stand at present with all the self-imposed confusion surrounding the term 'folk', I think this is as good as you're going to get
Jim

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 03:04 AM

I agree, Jim, and i have pointed out earlier how commercialism has contributed to its difficulties , undoubtedly despondent of slough , is despondently sucking mars bars. rather like jack horner in a corner

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 05:20 AM

Has anyone given any thought to the possibility that the Folk Revival or Folk Scare may have been brought about by the commercialisation of the music, A sort of dumbing down or tarting up process which made folk derived material appeal to a wider audience?

Think back to The Weavers, The Kingston Trio, Lonnie Donegan for instance.

Some of that wider audience were interested enough to find out more about the origins of the material, liked what they found and stayed with it.
The interest in blues in the UK and probably elsewhere was boosted in a similar way by pop groups like Rolling Stones.

Even Jim Carrol I believe came in via an English folk group popular enough to have their own radio or tv (I can't remember which) series

I don't believe folk music will die but just continue to be a minority sport just like it was before pop charts came along.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 05:37 AM

No maybe what Jim regards as folk music will continue to be minority stuff, but ordinary folk will strive for self expression through informal modes of music as long as there is breath in their bodies.

Folk music will not be contained in definitions, restrictions, and middle class cerebration.

Folk music will, like John Barleycorn, prove the strongest man of all.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,akenaton
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 05:46 AM

"Modern" folk music, as portrayed on the media and influenced by the academies is not an inclusive genre. It bears no relation to the stuff being produced by the "pop folkies" of the sixties, at least their output could be related to traditional music and did steer listeners towards it.
The cacophony produced by the folk/orchestral ensembles speaks only to the producers themselves and a tiny group of mindless followers.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 05:49 AM

Not really sure what you're talking about Ake. Modern folk music....what be that?

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 06:02 AM

Sorry Al, I cross posted. I was referring to the stuff which is being produced by the "folk orchestras" and enjoyed by the pretentious middle class elite who control the direction of this new genre......which is related to folk music in only the loosest of ways.
I agree with most of what you have written ...5:37 am.....Ake

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,jim bainbridge
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 08:01 AM

Dunno what happened there- maybe I've nothing to say?

No, but the commercial scene does seem unable to accept the solo singer or musician.
It seems within weeks of hearing a grand young singer (predominantly female, I think?) called Aggie Sprotworthy we see the same lass promoted as the Aggie Sprotworthy Band, with a few hangers-on as the compulsory BAND..

Likewise with many CDs- it takes a non-commercial and brave person to stand up to them & not have a full band backing- some do resist & good luck to them....

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 08:23 AM

Heard the Ward Thomas Twins on Radio on the way home last night. 24 year old twins from Hampshire with a great talent. Point being, it is Country music as I understand it but is it Country music as the Country 'purists' would have it? They did say they always say it is Country music, just a different Country :-)

Set me thinking. Do they have the same discussions as this on Country music forums? Is Country music American folk music? Just interested!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 08:43 AM

yes they do...in jazz forums, in country music forums, blues forums.

there are no end of the people who want to pooh pooh original creative effort.

god knows why...the more people they exclude, the less chance people will have in hearing their own style of music, either alluded to as a source, or performed.

when folk, blues, jazz etc., as we know it,   is safely stuffed into ghetto like classrooms , museums and college courses. i suppose ordinary folk will have to beat on dustbins or yell in canyons. but at least it will be folk music.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 09:06 AM

Thanks Al. I thought as much.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 03:21 PM

Last year, I used to go to Bournemouth Jazz Club a lot. I was the youngest person there. All these octogenarians jiving away to the trad jazz revival of sixty years ago. Most of the band members not much younger.

"That's not what i call trad," said this old chap who had given me a lift there.

Two oldish guys used to to do the Country Hour on Radio Nottingham - Fred Lynch and Reg Cooper.

Not what I call country! opined Fred about Bluegrass. And he said the same about Dick Something , a songwriter who'd written the music for Smokey and the Bandit, he'd been booked that year for Nottingham Country Music festival - Smokey and the Bandit was the highest selling film album of the year after Star Wars. Listen to the film soundtrack - see if you can spot the non country music as Burt goes Eastbound and Down.

So the answer is yes. Its a very popular misconception that you know everything about everything. With getting old, its a bit like hardening of the arteries - you can feel it coming on!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 03:37 PM

Very good Big Al, but I still know that when sat in what purports to be a folk club listening to absolutely dire acoustic, solo effort Dire Straights covers or equally poor renditions of "Blackbird" or "Norwegian Wood" I KNOW I am NOT listening to folk music.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 03:44 PM

No of course not. But who knows, when they've learnt their chops on the Beatles and Mark K - perhaps they will produce something of value.

Perhaps that's as far as they'll ever get. We don't know. People surprise you sometimes.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 03:54 PM

If I go to a concert and pay £30 for a ticket I expect it to do what it says on the tin. I have never been to one that failed to do that. When I go to a folk club and pay a fiver to go in or, sometimes, get in free, I expect to take the rough with the smooth. Set your expectations low and more often than not you will be pleasently surprised.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 04:19 PM

Irrespective of what you pay to get in you should always expect to get "what it says on the tin" - applies even if you get in for nowt.

Anyone wishing to perform shite covers of pop songs should form their own clubs and then they would at least only torture one another.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 04:42 PM

When I go to a folk club and pay a fiver to go in or, sometimes, get in free, I expect to take the rough with the smooth. I have always found that the smooth always exceeds the rough and I always enjoy it. If you do not, that is not my problem. Sorry.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 05:04 PM

shite is shite.
whether its traditional English shite or pop shite.

You're happy with one load of shite but the other bothers you.
If you run a folk club you get to be tolerant of most kinds of musical shite. not too many virtuosi turn up on singers nights.

however you do get very grateful to the musicians who make genuine efforts, whatever their inclinations. you get to understand their preoccupations and concerns. you're happy for them when they defeat their demons, improve their technical skills, gain the respect of the audience and join the company of musicians.

the underscript to your posting is that you are tolerant of lazy, unmusical bores as long as they like the same music as you do.

Shite stinks, whoever shits it.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 05:59 PM

You're happy with one load of shite but the other bothers you.

Now where did you get that from? Certainly not from me.

But let us go back to the first part of your post:

shite is shite. whether its traditional English shite or pop shite.

Now as long as we are on the same wavelength as to what you refer to as traditional English shite would you agree that the following is true:

1. Traditional English shite as far as songs go are generally unaccompanied.

2. That pop shite as far as songs go are generally accompanied and more importantly they are/were performed by bands.

3. So if someone wants to perform traditional English shite all they need to do is have it somewhere in their mind the belief that they can sing.

4. Alternatively if someone as a solo performer wishes to perform pop shite, they not only have to be able to sing, they must also be able to play and be competent enough to play make up for the deficiency of their not being a band. So the potential is manifestly there for making a far greater horlicks and produce pop shite than there would be for a simple would be singer of singing traditional English shite.

If you run a folk club you get to be tolerant of most kinds of musical shite. No Big Al if you run a folk club you only have to get tolerant of folk shite, they do after all run a folk club.

not too many virtuosi turn up on singers nights. - They do not have to be virtuosi Big Al for them to perform and put over what they do, and I for one have picked up many, many songs from such performers at what they call singers nights in many folk clubs over the last five decades.

the underscript to your posting is that you are tolerant of lazy, unmusical bores as long as they like the same music as you do. - Nothing is further from the truth.

Shite stinks, whoever shits it. - Very true Big Al but at a folk club I only expect to hear folk shite - up with any other form of shite I am not prepared to put.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 06:03 PM

one man's shite is another man's fetish...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 12 Sep 18 - 06:10 PM

"You're happy with one load of shite but the other bothers you.

Now where did you get that from? Certainly not from me"

and in the same post:-

"at a folk club I only expect to hear folk shite - up with any other form of shite I am not prepared to put."

man speak with forked tongue!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 01:09 AM

No Big Al, I said at a folk club I only expect to hear folk shite - I said nothing at all about being happy having to listen to it. But I think you know what I meant and mean.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: r.padgett
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 02:57 AM

The current folk revival seems to me to be led by the younger generation with many coming from the product of the folk degree programmes at Newcastle/Gateshead, Sheffield and Leeds in particular ~ the whole attitude by graduates and indeed the current crop of folkies and established professionals is much more "professional" in its attitude

The folk clubs tend to be taken very much for granted or just ignored and the new "young thruster" quite rightly do their own thing and alternative venues and concert clubs seem to be coming to the fore

Venues and a professional attitude are the major revival changes in my view

Ray

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 03:35 AM

The vast majority of music I see in folk clubs is still well performed folk music as per any definition. The runner up but well behind is well performed music that may or may not be folk depending on definitions. A small amount is well performed music that will never be considered folk. There is a tiny amount of shite including poorly performed folk music. Sadly, it is the shite that people remember and talk about.


There is also performed poetry. Some good, some bad. Not sure where to fit that in.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 05:44 AM

I suppose in the end its to do with your own personality.

I like to think, I'm pretty easy going. I practice my guitar every day, but I understand that other people have other priorities - but they're folk. they have music. they read from books and ipads, they play badly, forget the words.

but its their music - not mine to dictate to them what's what.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 08:01 AM

I'm in agreement there, Al (although I don't play every day, and it shows, and I seldom actually do any formal practice, I noodle about, sing a couple of songs, that's it!).

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 08:04 AM

What put me off Folk clubs when I was 19
was happy clappy singalongafolkies, trite unfunny comedy songs,
and raffle and bingo old fogey atmosphere...


Now then, as for pop and rock shite being performed in folk venues...

Try to remember the 1990s fad for MTV UNPLUGGED TV shows and CDs...
Established bands and solo artists realised there was a lucrative new market for them
performing old back catalogue songs in intimate acoustic style.

In the UK this new emerging fashion perculated down to young teens
studying school and FE college performance arts courses.
So a generation of competant young singers jumped on the bandwagon
and swamped any opportunities where they could find an audience
for wannabe stars showing off their talents...

Local folk clubs were tailor made for their 'showcase' acoustic performances.
and in addition, more newer acoustic nights in pubs and clubs...

That first wave of unplugged kids are now knocking on 40,
but many thousands more churned out by performance courses
continue to be following after them...

Like it or not, this is now a very popular acoustic 'folkie' sub culture;
acoustic renditions of big pop and rock hits...

Then, the mumford 'softie folkie' phenomena inclined these positive enthusiastic yoofs
to put Hobgoblin trad folk instruments on their xmas lists...

That's enough for now - what I describe mostly predates the TV X Factor route to fame....

...don't get me started on the acoustic youth scene being dominated by public school kids...


One bonus however, cheap unwanted reasonable quality acoustic guitars in near mint condition in cash converters..

I got a 15 year old Yamaha for 50 quid... but it still reeks of perfume...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: The Sandman
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 10:11 AM

how about respect for the audience and material this includes practising material including practising if you use words.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 10:36 AM

Sandman - personally I don't agree with any excuses for poor preparation and insufficient practise...

[ I hold my hand up to occasionally not learning new songs until the last minute before a gig,
and then being too stressed out to remember them...
In a band I could just turn my instrument volume down and mime ]

But am happy to make allowances for individuals with memory impairing health conditions,
using tablets and phones with lyric reminders..
providing they can still sing and play instruments to an acceptable level of proficiency...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 10:40 AM

I agree, Dick. It is common courtesy to respect your audience. I have no issue with crib sheets but people not knowing what they going to do before they take the floor or fluffing words and tune even with a crib sheet shows a distinct lack of respect.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST,kenny
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 11:47 AM

"But am happy to make allowances for individuals with memory impairing health conditions, using tablets and phones with lyric reminders.."
Me too, but that is very unlikely to apply to someone aged around 20, who seem to use them even more than the relatively few elderly performers I have seen using them, and that's not just in Folk Clubs.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 12:52 PM

practise is a verb and practice is a noun

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 03:52 PM

At the 'Folk & Acoustic Music Club' I go to, the youngsters all read from sheets of paper or their phones. They seem bemused by people like me who (mostly) sing from memory. One regular who never uses a crib-sheet of any kind, and who knows his extensive repertoire by heart, is Musket - formerly of this parish. Hats off to him, his memory is amazing!

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 04:51 PM

I'm sure my memory is wonderful. I just can't remember why...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 05:22 PM

Which musket is that..??? carbon fibre guitar...???

he's the one I used to get on with...

I hope he's not the bloke / lady bloke using new names recently, who I dont seem to get get on with...

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 11:04 PM

He's the one you used to get on with! In the real world we get along very well - he says what he means, no bullshit. I like that.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 13 Sep 18 - 11:34 PM

And I think he moved the Rainsong along. The guitars I see him playing nowadays are all made of tree-wood! ;-)

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 14 Sep 18 - 04:19 AM

Well I get welcomed in most folk clubs that know the standards that I work to. Out of respect for their club policy, because I've been round about a million years, I can generally play something that won't cause too much outrage.

However I didn't come out of the box like that. There was a time when I worked hard at a day job, and my week revolved about the ten minutes they'd put up with my 10 minute floorspot at The Beggars Bush, Sutton Coldfield, under the benign stewardship of Bob Lines.

For me it was an exciting experiment every week. The audience was always kind and forgiving, Bless them for that. but my God sometimes it must have been rank.

I'm sorry if you don't get that function of a folk club, because you're an unelected curator of your vision of folk music. But please take my word for it - its an important function.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 14 Sep 18 - 04:41 AM

I couldn't agree more, Al. It was the openness and inclusiveness of the club's i first attended that encouraged me. They had a good mix of styles, they were non-judgmental of my dithery efforts, and they made anyone and everyone feel welcome to 'have a go'.

And I read all my lyrics from a loose leaf binder for many years, until I suddenly realised I was actually not reading most of the time - I just had it in front of me as a 'comfort-blanket'. So I started singing and playing (mostly) without it - still have my iPad as a prop when I do a new song the first couple of times, and I feel no shame.

Subject: RE: UK Folk Revival 2018
From: Will Fly
Date: 14 Sep 18 - 07:06 AM

Familiar to me too - my first performance in front of a tolerant folk club audience... fingers shaking... sweating with nerves... and the elation at my first experience of applause. This was the 1960s and the clubs, at that time, were (mainly) where you went when you wanted to be a solo, acoustic performer.

All too soon I joined up with others, got an amp, and spent much of the next 50 years in pubs and clubs - Trades & Labour, British Legions, Con Clubs, Working Men's CLubs, works staff clubs. I still did the folk clubs occasionally, but I have to say that the club and pub circuit hardened me up no end as a performer - because they were certainly not as forgiving as the folk clubs.

When I started doing the odd spots at folk clubs again, and then eventually guesting, the hard sweat of the commercial club and pub circuit paid off in terms of presentation, getting to grips with audiences, etc.