UK 60s Folk Club Boom?

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 05:17 AM

For those who might still be dropping in to this thread and do not read the Observer can I point out that there is an article in today's review section on what the majority of the general public appear to understand as Folk Song and singers.
Seemingly folk is on the rise again.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: The Sandman
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 04:59 AM

Dave , i was being very specific , i was not condemning singer songwriters in general, only certain particular kinds and at the same time explaining that is my subjective taste.
I run a festival, I have found when i booked Martin Carthy[ who sings trad material] and Andy Irvine i had full houseS.
I am not interested in your tastes or your opinions THERE ARE MANY PERFORMERS WHO ARE GOOD BUT WOULD NOT DRAW AUDENCES IN MY LOCATION. INCLUDING YOUR FAVOURITE SONG WRITER

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 04:39 AM

No, I'm not prepared to do anything about it, Jim. I have had my share of head, heart and ear ache. I will leave the running of folk clubs to others. I would like to see more traditional singers but I am not passionate enough about that to do anything about it. I am not lamenting the passing, just saying it would be nice.

My point about 70 years ago, or maybe 60, is that the need and inclination for traditional singing was far higher. There is still some enthusiasm for it, as you so ably demonstrate, but it is not what it was before the advent of cheap Japanese guitars and mass media. I know there was more in the 80's too. I was there then. It does take a generation of two for the effects of major developments to be seen sometimes.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 04:27 AM

To be fair, Dick, there are the type of singer songwriters you describe but there are some brilliant ones too. The ones you mention are generally limited to floor spots at their "home" clubs while the best go on to achieve national or global fame. Jim has mentioned Eric Bogle and Leon Rosselson who can fill venues wherever they go. My own favourite is Anthony John Clarke and I have never seen empty seats at any of his gigs. When one of the ones you mention sings of his (yes, they are usually blokes) latest lost love, most people to go the bar :-)

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 04:16 AM

"Derek was a very clever entertainer and skilled peformer but he had an agenda"
Annybody who stands up on stage and says that traditional singers are "a plague" has an agenda Dick - nobody with principle attacks fellow performers publicly in that manner in my book, no matter how entertaining they are
"I would love to see more traditional unaccompanied singers at folk clubs."
Unless you are prepared to do something about it that's little more than lip service for anybody involved in the 'folk scene'
No idea what winding the clock back 70 years means unless you are suggesting that traditional songs and singing no longer have a place in the present folk scene - it worked for audiences fine into the eighties, until the locusts moved in - it's happening here in Ireland today with singers Like Frank Harte, Joe Heaney and Geordie Hanna being annually celebrated with annual weekend singing events named after them - that's long been happening with Musicians like Willie Clancy, Joe Cooley, et al
If you don't traditional songno longer has a place oyu need to say - all I can reply is 'I'm sorry for your loss'
JIm

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: The Sandman
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 04:10 AM

to be fair ,tradtional singers clubs had an agenda too, when i first walked in to a club in 1966 most club had a much more inclusive policy. i was quite happy to see joanne kelly sing blues or willie scott sing trad material, and still am,but i am not keen on singer songwriters who sing song after song about their failed personal relationships, taste is subjective

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: The Sandman
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 03:58 AM

Stewie, my son davy is a fine song and Jeannies version was inspiring.
I had a conversation with Derek Brimstone which was similar only he said that he would never book a certain revival singer who sang tradtionl material, because his fans would only come to see that singer but would not come back to see other guests he had booked.
That was possibly because they wanted trad songs not folk comedians or singer songwriters, they would presumably be people like Jim and me, that is why[in my opinion] the strongest CLUBS had good residents and did not have to rely upon guests.
in my opinion that tells me more about the audiences at Dereks club they wanted either singer song writers or folk entertainers, A REFLECTION OF DEREK HIMSELF.
But a similr argument could be made about derek brimstone, if he was to be booked at a predominantly tradtional song club. a lot of his fans would not turn up the next week to see fred jordan, it was a facile and shallow comment.
Derek was a very clever entertainer and skilled peformer but he had an agenda

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 03:52 AM

Believe it or not, Jim, I would love to see more traditional unaccompanied singers at folk clubs. I was not lucky enough to see the heyday of the singers but one of my favourite artists was Ian Woods who had a vast repertoire of songs he could sing unaccompanied, including some he had written that were indistiguishable from the "real thing". Mind you, I also saw Fred Jordan at a couple of concerts and can't honestly say I enjoyed a lot of his stuff. I think that may have been the venues though and am sure he would have come across better in more intimate surroundings. Sadly, both of those have passed away, as have the ones you have mentioned.

Wind the clock back 70 years and there was not the availability of instruments there is now, nor was there the mass communication media. Entertainment was at home or in the pub. Lots of people learned and performed unaccompanied songs. There is neither the need or inclination to do that now. Sad but the introduction of affordable instruments and instant global communications have done more to reduce the number of folk singers than a couple of Beatles songs ever did.

In my opinion.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 03:09 AM

"well, Dickens famously had people queuing up for the next instalment. "
Yes he di Al, but he no longer has a captive audience, go find me a dozen people in your local whu have read him today (unless they went to schools where hiss works were taught)
I have read steadily since I was old enough to appreciate books, but I had never read Hardy or Dickens until I met Walter Pardon - he intoduced both Pat and I to their works - and Mrs Gaskell)
Shakespeare is still regarded as being for 'them' - now that they've started filming The RSC plays, we sit in cinemas with no more than a dozen people in them (about two dozen for Cumberbatch's Hamlet last week - but the Irish have a thing about 'good' literature !)
The point i was making was if something is important it's worth arguing for - folk song was important enough not to have to when I came to it, thanks top what's happened to the clubs it no longer is to enough people
You, with your political leanings, should have some feeling of the importance of songs which reflect your forefather lives - field labourers, mill workers, people fighting top make a living from the land, working men who were ripped from their homes to fight in wars, couples whe were torn apart because one of them wasn't 'good enough' to marry the other....
That's what our songs are - lumps of our history set in verse and music.... tragedy and comedy and everything in between all set into song
My grandfather was a merchant seaman - he sang shanties (not enough and not complete enough to make him a traditional singer, but enough to make him a carrier of his history)
His immediate forebears fled the Great Famine - there are many hundreds of songs that recorded those events
May dad went to Spain and came back singing songs his fellow volunteers made - in English and in Spanish
He became a navvy - not many songs, (but plenty of stories, which I still tell) - the bundle of songs about navvies that MacColl made are now part of my repertoire because I can link them with my own upbringing
Whether you like them or not, these songs and the form they were made in are important enough to have lasted for many centuries and have become part of our social history - they are every bit as enjoyable as Shakespeare and Dickens, and far less hard work to understand
In some ways, because of the burden they carry, they are more important - they are our unwritten history

"Derek Brimstone said the trad singers were like a plague"
I knew there must have been something about Brimstone that made me think him superficial - don't care what he thought abouut something he obviously didn't understand
Don't you find it disturbing that artists can make such snidey remarks about large groups of their fellow performers - I do
I worked with MacColl for over twenty years and never heard his say that about other singers yet it is MacColl who has the reputation for nastiness and the likes of Brimstone who are admired
Funny old work eh ?

I'm not asking you to change your opinions Al - as you say, we're old men (I'm a damn sight older than you); I don't care what you think, but I do care that the songs and music I love survives to give those coming after us have teh same opportunity to enjoy it that I had
Twenty years ago I would have said that Irish traditional music had no future, now thousands of youngsters are playing it as well as I've ever heard it played - it now has at least a tweo generation future and what was saved of the old traditions in the form of recordings and manuscripts stand a fair chance of lasting forever

Song has some way to go but the leaves are beginning to appear
Three years ago you hardly heard a traditional ballad sung here; a couple of friends, Aileen Lambert and Mick Fortune, started a project called Man, Woman and Child, got the backking of the National Library of Ireland and took mini concerts of some of Ireland's best singers of traditional songs to various places around Ireland
People began to sing the Child Ballads
It takes a little work and a little thought and a lot of dedication
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Stewie
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 10:50 PM

Well said, Al. I too am reasonably old [76] and am not about to change my opinions. I too love unaccompanied singing - Eddie Butcher singing his lengthy version of Coleraine Regatta is an all-time favourite of mine, as are Margaret Barry's Galway Shawl or Jeannie Robertson's My Son John. It is a pity that this style has disappeared from clubs and festivals. However, as a record collector, I also enjoy exploring the wealth of traditional folk and folk idiom that is available from talented musicians and writers all around the English-speaking world. And with Spotify, Youtube etc we have not previously had access to such a vast reservoir of music.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 07:57 PM

well to be honest, his actions have destroyed it for me. Who knows who's right.

Derek Brimstone said the trad singers were like a plague. Clubs that had been going for years , booked one after the glowing account of then Melody Maker, and the next time he heard the place had perished and closed down. Derek had no reason to say otherwise - he played nearly everywhere in his time.

Jim doesn't get what I'm on about. And I don't really understand what he's proposing.

That if we booked unaccompanied trad singers everywhere the folk clubs would have been full. Can't see it myself. There was only really Tommy dempsey, Ian Campbell and Roy Harris in our neck of the woods that could do a whole evening unaccompanied. The rest kind of accepted their limitations and hung out at The Crown in Digbeth or The Prince of Wales.   That was Brum in the hay day.

I stuck my neck out a few times booking unaccompanied singers . But the results weren't encouraging.

Dave, we're old men, Jim and I. We saw what saw. we know what we know.   you're asking a lot for us to change our opinions at this stage in the game.

And I feel quite sure you played no part in the end of the Folk club Boom. set your mind at rest.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 06:17 PM

I have already conceded it, Al. And I am not so precious as to think my beliefs make any difference to anyone or anything. I am quite flattered to hear Jim say that my actions have destroyed folk music :-)

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 06:10 PM

What you don't seem to get Dave is that those beliefs have been the motor that has driven his creative life.

Just like your and my beliefs motivate us.

Why are you seeking Jim's approval?

Don't concede anything. there's no need. He's not after getting elected (I don't think).

I'm sure he's happy for you to have your beliefs.

Who knows he might be right. there is no final reckoning, as far as anyone knows.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 05:34 PM

Can anyone here put their hand up and honestly say they have conceded a single point here

Yes. I have. I no longer refer to contemporary folk songs. At your request they are now "contemporary songs using folk forms and functions". Now, what have you conceded and what do you think of my last two links?

Captain Marvel was marvellous and the curry was the same BTW:-)

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 05:21 PM

well, Dickens famously had people queuing up for the next instalment. And Shakespeare is a fairly safe 'bums on seats ' proposition for most theatres.

wesker -I've never seen in a theatre, but he must have been successful. He captured a mood of a certain point in history. Frustration with a long period of Tory government. post-war idealism and optimism. I read Wesker because my Mum was a Quaker, leftist, CND, etc. Stuck in a small rural community (Boston in Lincs), a cultural desert. I can see how she might have identified with Beattie Bryant.

contempt for the audience. that's an interesting subject Do you know Albert Goldman's very incisive Lenny Bruce biography.

It was my bible in the years when I was getting to grips with the tough club audiences in WMC's and the like. Lenny was an artist who believed there was a more aware and intelligent audience that he could reach out to. I always felt this. Ewan and Peggy represented something of this to me. but it has to be said, there were others. And it was this questing for a less bland reaction that inspired me - rather than any sort of particular brand of folk music.

Performance wise - I think. I didn't come to my audience with an agenda of what I believed. It was a voyage of discovery. discovery of what my strengths were. And weaknesses. And their strengths and weaknesses. Contempt - maybe comes into the equation. But respect as well.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 03:33 PM

"But these songs I could make an audience listen."
They also managed to drive thousands of long term folkies who came to look for folk songs away
"But I've heard Ewan say - if you don't think ballads are your thing, and you can't listen for nearly fifteen minutes - perhaps it would be best if you left the room, before I start.
"
Don't think you heard it very often Al - Ewan made about thirty odd albums of ballads - people came to The Singers Club from as far afield as the U.S. (in parties sometimes) to hear him sing them
He used to tell of how, wen he first started to sing ballads in public, he used to break one particularly long one (Gil Morrice) in two halves, one half before the interval, one at the beginning of the second half
He stopped when an audience member said to hem, "For ****'* sake will you stop doing that, it's like waiting for the other ***** shoe to drop"
Audiences will take what you give them if you do it well enough - it shows contempt for them if you believe they can't
The Singers Club was set up i the early sixties and continued to pull in audiences for traditional ballads, among other things, till Ewan fell into his last illness and couldn't perform any more
You don't abandon something because it's not widely popular otherwise you may as well pack it in and put in a juke Box
You go with what you love and hope you can take enough people with you - if people hadn't done that we wouldn't have Shakespeare, Dickens, Hardy... or any of the 'difficult playwrights and writes
Bet you never got a full house of strangers for you Wesker Trilogy - we never did
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 03:08 PM

I agree i didn't phrase that very well.

i was thinking of my own moderate abilities.
Some of the stuff that Ewan did. I'm not denying its status as folksong. Like Tam Linn. But I've heard Ewan say - if you don't think ballads are your thing, and you can't listen for nearly fifteen minutes - perhaps it would be best if you left the room, before I start.

I wouldn't know how to do that.

But these songs I could make an audience listen. I could present it with something interesting to introduce them. An ordinary English speaking audience with a normal degree of intelligence. be it in a pub, a family gathering - whatever...
Frankly I don't know if its folk song. But they are songs that are within the apprehension of an English speaking audience. the commonality of them. Not a specialist audience. And therefore songs that can make them feel something. And that's what works for me.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 03:02 PM

A quick question before Casualty
"Inflexible" - "closed minded"
Can anyone here put their hand up and honestly say they have conceded a single point here, or can anyone point to anybody who has ?
A rhetorical question, of course
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 12:22 PM

Sorry Al
Duidn't understand any of that
ritish folk songs are basically unnacompained so chords don't come into it for a start
You can sing anything in a pub - are you suggesting that anything you can is a folksong ?
"If he or dave wants to call it a folk song - why not?
Dave can call whatever he wants a fok song - he has left me with the impression he does, which is why we have no grounds to communicate with each other on a treead which claims =t be about "Traditional Music and Folklore Collection and Community"
We give things names so wr can find them when we want them - otherwise we may as well call them "things" or "songs" or "whatsits"
AS I said, I didn't understand a word of that
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 11:29 AM

Well you explain to us the qualitative difference between the Brennan on the Moor, and Jesse James, and this bloke blethering on about his family.

It all sounds the same to me. If there is a difference, you need a bloody good ear to spot it.

In all cases its a bloke telling a story, three or four chords - no benjamin Britten stuff here. In all the cases - you could sing it in a pub. Although the bloke in Ed's song didn't rob any banks, or anything much except have kids. And there isn't a chorus for the gang to join in on. Although - he could write one later.

If he or dave wants to call it a folk song - why not? It certainly sounds a bit like some things you would call folk songs. Lets let Ed into the tent. If he pisses in your ear, its Dave's fault.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 11:01 AM

"IN YOUR OPINION."
youmade the claims - it is down to you to to explain your chioices and produce comparisons
I have to say that I find your putting this down to "my opinion" and refusal to produce these comparisons or resspond to most of what I have put up downright insulting Dave
I have insuklted bno-one here , and I have had a degree or personal insulting from some people aimed at me
I expected more from you
Sadly, I think we're finished here - don't you ?
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 10:52 AM

Anyroads, I have a date with Captain Marvel and curry in Keighley. No folk songs will be harmed...

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 10:34 AM

Nothing that has been put up so far vaguely rembles folk style or utterance

IN YOUR OPINION.

no response to the damage that has been done to the real thing

Because the songs we have put up have done no damage. They have in fact done the reverse. If we stick purely to traditional songs or contemporary songs with etc. etc. only written by people born before 1950 we will encase the whole thing in Amber never to change again. Introducing new material assists growth and encourages younger people to find out about the tradition for themselves.

Let's have one more try to tempt you to the dark side with
This set of young upstarts or This pair of reprobates

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 09:09 AM

And still no response to the damage that has been done to the real thing
Shame
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 09:07 AM

"fruitless diatribes to which you have subjected Dave."
Dave has chosen to be part of this - that you describe my postings as "diatribes" makes your participation in the discussion pretty pointless I am prepared to accept those you mention because they cohose to use the tradition to make their songs - their compositions fitted into the evenings for decades without complaint because ther sources of inspiration were recognised for what they were
I can't see any point in your throwing mnames and have myu bat them back at you - if you know what genuine folk song sounds like you should be able to judge for yourself
Nothing that has been put up so far vaguely rembles folk style or utterance
Once again   
CAN ANYONE MATCH THIS WITH A FOLK SONG OR STYLE
More and more bizarre
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Stewie
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 09:01 AM

Dave, I didn't see your latest post. Your last 2 sentences sum it up perfectly. Let it lie.
We can go on enjoying great music.

--Stewie.,

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 09:00 AM

Thanks Stewie. Nice to know I am not a lone voice crying in the wilderness. I thought we were talking about songs too. I suspect Roy Bailey will be OK as he was born before 1950. ;-)

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Stewie
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 08:47 AM

Jim, i have given my honest opinion. I have no intention of getting into the fruitless
diatribes to which you have subjected Dave. I know a folk song when I hear it. I have collected recorded folk and roots music for 55 years. As for 'folk idiom' contemporary
songs I agree totally with Dave. You are prepared to accept songs from Bogle, MacColl,Rosselson etc but rubbish others. Your reaction to my clips is total bullshit.
If you couldn't hear most of 'what was being said/sung, you need to have your
ears syringed. The only one that might have presented some difficulty would be the
Stick in the Wheel clip. Maybe I was mistaken that the thread drift was about songs not
performances. 'Shores of America' was orchestrated but could well be presented with minimal accompaniment. Indeed, Argonne Wood is by an American - Mike Craver of the first-rate old-timey group, the Red Clay Ramblers. So what? You asked for examples of what might be acceptable in folk clubs. What about Roy Bailey? He is a master of finding
wonderful songs from songwriters around the globe. Because these are 'folk idiom' songs in his opinion, would he be unwelcome in your folk clubs? That's my lot.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 08:28 AM

canyou compare it to any real folk song

Yes thanks. I can hear the influences many folk songs in the melodic structure. Of any number of polkas in the timing. Of forbidden love winning through in the lyrics. Millions of people would agree. I am equally amazed that you can not see it.

You are right though. Aside from a vote on who thinks the songs that Stewie and I proposed have the necessary form and function there is no way to resolve this. Even then you would not accept the results if the vote were not in your favour.

Let it lie. You carry on mourning the loss of folk clubs and we will continue to enjoy being fooled by good music posing as folk in the folk clubs that no longer exist. :-)

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 08:05 AM

Interesting. Its more Big Tom and Johnnie McEvoy than sean nos, and   Jim's style.

In a way its a problem the folkscene has brought on itself. Its all very well criticising Jim, but hundreds of times, I've heard folkies say - I HATE COUNTRY MUSIC.

And yet this song, along with Show of Hands Galway farmer would fit vet very comfortably into the repertoire of Big Tom, or Johnny - or even Daniel O'Donnell. Its a bit like Pretty Little Girl from Omagh that Daniel starts his shows with. Which I always think is a bit like Oh Lonesome Me!

I don'tknow why we can't all just get along. It wouldn't bother me hearing it in a folk club. Or much else come to that, as long as it was done competently. Thats the bugbear!

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 07:48 AM

Sounds like a client=avast&ei=BqWDXNHpLqeX1fAP3reX4A8&q=nancy+mulligan+youtube&oq=Nancy+Mulligan+Utube+&gs_l=psy">PSEUDO=AMERICAN POP song to me Dave
Cnyou compare it to any real folk song - doggeral to boot
It doesn't even sound like an Anmerican folk song
As I said - different planet
Is that really all you've got ?
And still you refuse yto respond to anything else
Bit off a waste of both our times
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 07:19 AM

That's the one, Al. I did provide a link to it much earlier but thanks for doing it again. Does it sound like it has folk forms and functions to you? IE, strip away the studio production, would it be at home in a folk club?

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 07:09 AM

Give us a blue clickie to nancy mulligan, and who knows and let the rest of know what you're talking about. This perchance


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VFlZXlfda6Y

I was twenty-four years old
When I met the woman I would call my own
Twenty-two grand kids now growing old
In that house that your brother bought ya
On the summer day when I proposed
I made that wedding ring from dentist gold
And I asked her father, but her daddy said, "No
You can't marry my daughter"

[Chorus]
She and I went on the run
Don't care about religion
I'm gonna marry the woman I love
Down by the Wexford border
She was Nancy Mulligan
And I was William Sheeran
She took my name and then we were one
Down by the Wexford border

[Verse 2]
Well, I met her at Guy's in the second World War
And she was working on a soldier's ward
Never had I seen such beauty before
The moment that I saw her
Nancy was my yellow rose
And we got married wearing borrowed clothes
We got eight children, now growing old
Five sons and three daughters

[Chorus]
She and I went on the run
Don't care about religion
I'm gonna marry the woman I love
Down by the Wexford border
She was Nancy Mulligan
And I was William Sheeran
She took my name and then we were one
Down by the Wexford border

[Verse 3]
From her snow white streak in her jet black hair
Over sixty years I've been loving her
Now we're sat by the fire in our old armchairs
You know Nancy, I adore ya
From a farm boy born near Belfast town
I never worried about the king and crown
'Cause I found my heart upon the southern ground
There's no difference, I assure ya

[Chorus]
She and I went on the run
Don't care about religion
I'm gonna marry the woman I love
Down by the Wexford border
She was Nancy Mulligan
And I was William Sheeran
She took my name and then we were one
Down by the Wexford border

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 07:02 AM

One song, Jim. Nancy Mulligan. Full of folk forms and functions. The songs I am referring to all are, which is my answer as to why they are related to folk and that is my honest answer. You are the only one that is saying they are not. Little wonder that you say you are finished if you cannot or will not explain why.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 06:42 AM

Sorry Dave,
Can't be arsed any more until you start responding to what I say and referring to it as a diversion - which they are most certainly not
"let them sing it at a folk club and then tell me it is not a "contemporary song using folk forms and functions"
Delighted to Dave - they are most certainly not "contemporary songs using folk forms and functions"
Explain to me how, apart from being song in folk clubs (where they wouldn't have been given time of day not so long ago) they can possibly claim to be related to folk in any way
Start responding and stop dodging the issue or this is finished an I'll wait to see somebody else is prepared to deal with this honestly Jim,

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 06:21 AM

Diversion, diversion, diversion. Focus, Jim. Let's take one song only. The extreme one, Nancy Mulligan written by Ed Sheeran. Forget him singing it. Forget the studio production of it. Pick any singer you like, give them the words and music, let them sing it at a folk club and then tell me it is not a "contemporary song using folk forms and functions" and why. Because, to me, it has all the folk forms and functions you could ask for.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 05:42 AM

" It has nothing to do with the singers and everything to do with the songs. "
Not so
It has to do with the way the songs are sung and how they fit into the description 'folk'
"that our only bone of contention is a number of contemporary songs, "
Tal about spectacularly missing the point
Quite frankly, I wouldnt care how many contemporary songs were sun if they represented a repertoire which was an extension of the tradition
The people I know/knew respected and liked traditional song would be happy to go on singing it, but I would be over the moon if I thought the that tradition had given rise to the creation of a significant number of songs which used the tradition as a template - the stuff put up here are far nearer to the modern disposable genre than anything like folk styles - non-narrative, introspected, over-accompanied.... everything that makes for the short lived output of the music industry
Why do you continue repeating nonsense - I have never suggested that people born after 1950 can't make traditional songs - I am saying they are not - not by those you've put up
By describing a folk scene with only 180 clubs as "health" you are deluding yourself
The link you gave for that claim largely features paid and successful performers - some superstars,a as being indicative of an upsurge in the folk scene
When I first came to the scene I was an apprentice electrician workign on the Liverpool docks - my fellow enthusiasts were warehousemen working in 'Paddy's Market', bus drivers, building workers, shopworkers..... ordinary lads and girls who, without the clubs, would have been confined to listening to thee pap poured out daily on the radio or the occasional Concerts - Cliff Richard and the Shadows, The Crickets, Billy Fury.... saw them all at the Liverpool Empire
The clubs gave us the chance to go out at night and make our own music and song
Now you put up booked stars who made it on the scene enough to get paid - or those who win prizes on the media controlled 'Folkie of tee Year competitions - as "success"
If they's lucky and can afford it, ther are the annual somewhat impersonal festivals where, if you are lucky, you might get the odd song in an overcrowded pub session - the festivals are another sign of the folkie success story
As far as I'm concerned, not only has the music been sold up the Swanee, but so has the very reason it was made in the first place, or ordinary people like me and my friends to communicate with each other artistically and become singers and songmakers in our own right
Missing the point me - not in a million years Dave
Youu and yors have spent a deal of time here avoiding the point - and your responsibility for bringing pout the dying mess that the folk scene has become
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 05:32 AM

As captain Manwaring said, i think we're getting into the realms of fantasy now...

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 05:31 AM

Dunno about a booking, but I'd definitely let Kiri do a floorspot - sell the raffle tickets too, if she wanted.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 04:48 AM

You spectacularly miss the point once again, Jim. It has nothing to do with the singers and everything to do with the songs. The songs can live forever, the singers cannot. I put it to you that our only bone of contention is a number of contemporary songs, not singers, that many of us consider to have folk forms and functions and you do not. Folk clubs are not going to book big names from the pop world anyway but any singer at that club can sing their songs if they consider them to have folk forms and functions.

The argument we are having is whether the songs that Stewie and I proposed do have folk forms and functions. We believe they do. You do not. Simple as that. It is subjective and every time that is pointed out you try to divert the subject or simply deride our choices as nonsense. You do not explain why you think they do not have folk forms and functions and accuse every man and his dog of destroying folk clubs. Diversionary tactics at their worst.

Sorry that you feel that the folk clubs I visit would make you want to kill yourself. I'm afraid that I cannot turn the clock back and make sure that the only contemporary music performed is that written by people born before 1950 or already dead. In fact, I wouldn't want to. I like to hear new songs with folk forms and functions sometimes.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 04:20 AM

"Why on earth would anyone want to compare Seth Lakeman to Harry Cox? "
Wh should anyone put Seth Lakeman's name up on a discussion on what should happen in folk clubs ?
Nothing to do with what they are "capable of doing" - I'm sure Kiri Ti Kanwa could makw a fist of Foggy Dew, but would you book her for a folk club (I'm beginning to thing you might)
It's not what they can singg, it's how they sing it surely ?
THis gets beyond a joke - I really do see little point in continuing Dave - many thanks for describing how you see folk clubs - confirms all my worst fears
I'm realy not goiung to "tell yuo any more" until you address the points I have made
If you don't understand that folk song has an individual identity which distinguishes it from all other forms, in style, sound, in narrative, in function and certainly in importance then we're just on different planets
Not one of you have3 had the decency to address the damage I to a people's culture that I believe you are doing to folk song - instead we got "tolerated" and "inappropriate" ballads and 'ya gotta move on with the times'
Sad, sad, sad, and very disheartening
I think "Sirley Baswey" and "Rod Stewart" has just about done it for me - as far from fok song as it has been known for centuries as you could possibly get
Enjoy your world Dave - I'm glad I never accepted your invitation - would probably end up throwing myself of Malham Cove
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: GUEST,Derrick
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 04:17 AM

Dave, re early one morning,you could say it is evolving tradition.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 03:40 AM

Morris practice was good BTW but for one of the dances I play "Early one morning". I suspect that is far from being a traditional dance tune and the dance itself is quite recent. Should I refer to it as contemporary dance using Morris forms and functions? :-)

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 03:35 AM

Er, Sorry Jim, I thought we were talking about folk song (or contemporary songs using folk forms and functions) not folk singers. Why on earth would anyone want to compare Seth Lakeman to Harry Cox? They are both capable of singing The Foggy Dew just as they are both capable of singing The White Hare. Well, they would be if Harry was still with us. And if Rod Stewart turned up at our folk club singing The Wild Mountain Time unaccompanied at our folk club or Shirley Bassey singing Men of Harlech they would not be out of place. They both have fine voices capable of singing folk songs.

The one and only argument we have is whether a certain songs within a sub genre of folk music (contemporary songs using folk forms and functions) has a place in folk clubs. You say that you know a folk song when you hear it. Well, funnily enough, so do I. So does Stewie. So does Steve. So do millions of others. After all, "There is nothing specialised about knowing what a folk song is or sounds like".

So, if it is not subjective, tell us why the examples of contemporary songs using folk forms and functions that both Stewie and I put up would not be welcome performed acoustically at your folk club. Other than you do not like them of course.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 09 Mar 19 - 02:58 AM

"but, if that is the case, in my opinion that would be his loss."
Now that is a matter of choice, but whty shoupld it be "my loss" if the singing does nothing for me?
Reducing this to like and dislike is totally meaningless - somebody might have made exactly the same remark about Rod Stewart or Shirley Bassey
I might have said exactly the same about the singing of Paddy Tunney, or Mary Delaney or Sheila Stewart
Totally meaningless
The clips themselves, as far as I can see, owe little to folk song for their creation, they are what they are (whatever that is) and it's unimportant who likes them as far this discussion is concerned - nothing whatever to do with whether they are suitable for the title 'folk song' (contemporary or otherwise)
Most of them I found difficult to listen to because I couldn't here what was being said/sung - over-accompanied, badly balanced and, in one case, orchestrated
No way to pass on information, feelingsd or stories, which is what folk song is about
I assume Argonne Wood is American, their accent appears to be
"Than kyou"
For what - were you ever in doubt?
"I prefer the work of Homer and Jethro,"
I'm sure you do - but thanks for making clear where you stand on folk song, much more humour.
It's about time others were as honest so we know where we stand
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Stewie
Date: 08 Mar 19 - 07:39 PM

In one of the other threads that are currently on foot, I indicated what sort of contemporary songs I would consider acceptable within the folk idiom. It is easy enough to find songs in the repertoires of contemporary 'folk' singer/songwriters that would be out of place in a folk club. However, there are many that would compare favourably with the offerings of Bogle, MacColl etc mentioned by Jim. To give a few examples, I would be more than happy to hear any of the following performed alongside traditional songs in a folk club.

Minstrel show

Burn away

The last bird to sing

Ankle tattoo

Shores of America

Take a chance

Me n Becky

Argonne wood

Jim might not want to hear any of those in a folk club but, if that is the case, in my opinion that would be his loss.

--Stewie.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 08 Mar 19 - 05:12 PM

21st. i still sing the Frog and the Mouse.

then I segue into The Frog on the Tyne.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 08 Mar 19 - 05:04 PM

So it's down to educated guesswork.

Thankyou

Regarding Homer and Chi=ucer, I prefer the work of Homer and Jethro, much more humour.

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 08 Mar 19 - 03:05 PM

"Are you seriously telling us that you do know the origin of every song which you describe as folk and how it was acquired?"
Have I said that ?
Must have lost the thread for a minute
There is a large set repertoire that have long become regarded as folk because of the process there underwent - well documented and established as what they are and represent
We don't the origins of any folk songs for certain, we can onluy use what we do know and can work or to make an educated guess
We know what folk songs sound like and what form they take (in general)
If it's old, it sounds like a folk song and can't be attributed to a specific maker, it's probably a folk songs
If anybody tells you they know who made our folk songs or attempts to apply statistics based on how many have appeared in print they're telling porkies
The motifs in many of our older songs go back as far as Homer and Chi=ucer and we do know for certain that songs weer being sung from memory as far back as The Venerable Bede (672/3 to 26 May 735)
The song 'The Frog and the Mouse' was attributed to shepherds in 1549 - it was still doing the rounds in the latter half of the 20th century
That has to stand for something
Jim

Subject: RE: UK 60s Folk Club Boom?
From: GUEST,Hootenanny
Date: 08 Mar 19 - 02:29 PM

Jim,

Are you seriously telling us that you do know the origin of every song which you describe as folk and how it was acquired?

I find that hard to believe unless you have a very limited collection.

I seem to remember you stating somewhere something like that we don't know the origins of many folk songs.