Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'

Subject: Discuss this Article
From: RTim
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 01:04 PM

If you have the time and inclination - read this article and discuss amongst friends - or even on Mudcat.......
I warn - it is quite long...

It is called - There’s nowt so fake as “folk" By DOMINIC GREEN
Tim Radford

http://standpointmag.co.uk/node/7428?fbclid=IwAR3nY5tPiFPHzPrrmqSabxm5JL2Tstt1kFerWl7AKq5jEyKF8yqW4aUIHMw

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Howard Jones
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 01:35 PM

Good grief! There's something to challenge in nearly every paragraph, but I simply can't be arsed.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Jack Campin
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 01:38 PM

I've no idea who Dominic Green is.

In case anyone can think of a cliche he might have left out (I can't) maybe we could have a contact address so we can send it to him in a suitably leakproof bag?

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Bonnie Shaljean
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 01:41 PM

LOL, Jack. I suggest a douche bag.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Tattie Bogle
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 01:56 PM

Googled the name: several Dominic Greens, one of whom is son of jazz musician, Benny Green, and described as musician and writer, jazz guitarist and manager at Ronnie Scott's jazz club. FWIW, Mr Green, I'm not that keen on jazz.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: meself
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 01:57 PM

From the 3rd paragraph: 'As Matthew Gelbart explains in The Invention of “Folk Music” and “Art Music”, Morley could not have wondered whether this music originated among “professional composers” or “the folk”. These categories did not exist [in 1597].' - when it is obvious from everything earlier in the paragraph that 'Morley' WAS categorizing, and that he put 'villanelle, country songs' - and, implicitly, their composers, into their own category - no, he didn't use the same terminology as we do, but it's pretty clear he was talking about the same thing - not to mention that we don't draw a hard line between 'folk' and 'professional', do we?

Anyway, that's enough for me - I'm out.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Iains
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 03:13 PM

He makes a good windup merchant! I wonder where he hides after lighting the blue touch paper?

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 03:15 PM

Dominic Green?- sounds too like a Tory politician to be of interest

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 05:09 PM

I managed 3 lines before my brain started to melt.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: GUEST
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 05:17 PM

A couple of good points burried in there but the bulk of it was more inpenitrable than the typical Mudcat arguement between pro and anti MacColl factions.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 06:09 PM

I found it very interesting. I'd like to see knowledgeable arguments against his thesis. He seems to know his stuff. (Lights blue touchpaper and stands back!)

The clichés are simply journalese. Makes it look more chatty.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: RTim
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 06:40 PM

Note that it is not published in a Folk or Music Journal - Who are - Standpoint?

Tim Radford

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: RTim
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 06:43 PM

Standpoint -
Launched in May 2008, Standpoint Magazine is a monthly cultural and political magazine published by Social Affairs Unit Magazines Ltd, a right wing think tank based in London, UK. Standpoint Magazine was founded by Daniel Johnson and he is the current director.

Tim Radford

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: RTim
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 06:47 PM

The Wiki article is interesting......I should have posted these 3 posts as one...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standpoint_(magazine)

Tim Radford

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: meself
Date: 28 Feb 19 - 08:33 PM

Okay, I went back and read the rest, in hope of picking up some factoids, which I did. I don't have a particular issue with the thesis - it's all the specious argument and sneering dismissal on the way that bugs me.

E.g.:

"Similarly, the collectors preferred oral transmission to notated transcription." Maybe they figured 'notated transcription' was safe in the hands of churchmen, publishers and librarians?

"They took a recent variation on a loosely fixed lyric or melody for an original and standard form" - i.e., sometimes they were mistaken.

"the songs of African Americans which white intellectuals call “blues.” So what on earth do Black intellectuals - or even non-intellectuals - call those songs? What did W.C. Handy call them? Or Louis Armstrong? Or B.B. 'Blues Boy' King? Or does he mean white intellectuals like, say, Mick Jagger or Jimmy Page?

"the “folk boom” of the Sixties, when singers like Muddy Waters and John Lee Hooker, who had been playing electric urban music for years, realised there was money to be made from gullible students in Europe." Question: did Muddy and/or John Lee Hooker ever do 'acoustic "folk-blues"' tours of the European college circuit (if there is/was such a thing)? And if so, is there any reason to believe they didn't welcome the chance to sit down and play acoustically to an attentive audience, apart from financial considerations?

"Yet electric blues already met every “folk” criterion. It was unique to African Americans," No, it wasn't; certainly not by the "Sixties", which is the time period he's on about at this point (Hello, Paul Butterfield - oh, and there's John Mayall! And wait - that looks like Long John Baldry back there!).

"Inevitably, Sharp was a vegetarian and socialist." No comment.

"“Greensleeves” didn’t come out of English folkmusic." He spends two paragraphs on Greensleeves, as the quintessence of English folksong, in the minds of 'folk fetishists' ... apparently. Okay, folk fetishists, tell us how distressed you are to learn that Greensleeves is not a spontaneous creation of the folk.

There's more - and it's not really that long an article.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: GUEST,Rigby
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 06:42 AM

I'm puzzled as to why this article was written or published. It's not as though the authenticity of folk music is the topic on everyone's mind, or the subject of heated political discussion up and down the land.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Manitas_at_home
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 07:07 AM

It turns out the morris dancer pictured is actually German!

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 10:09 AM

'right wing think tank'. Curiouser and curiouser! So is the thinking -- because the folk scene is heavily populated with middle class lefties, he's having a swipe? I don't remember seeing any reference to oral tradition in the article. Sharp as a socialist? Hmmm that's very debatable! He was a member of the Fabians, but was quite an authoritarian figure who fell out with some of the true socialists he associated with, Charles Marson in particular. Regarding the music, his overt agenda is well documented. He and the likes of Vaughan Williams and other contemporary composers were initially motivated by the desire to give English music a rebirth to counter all the German/Italian music that dominated the 19th century.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: leeneia
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 10:15 AM

People can argue about what is folk music till the cows come home, and that's because the phrase 'folk music' is not an intelligent phrase.    Music isn't described by who wrote it or who sang it. It is described by its rhythm, melody and harmony. And nobles and peasants, scholars and the illiterate can use any kind of rhythm, melody or harmony.

To take a parallel instance, the Jeep was invented to drive in rough country during World War II. We could have called it a war vehicle. But now jeeps are used by suburbanites and hunters, back-country nurses and paleontologists. It's not a war vehicle anymore, and now we realize that 'war vehicle' like 'folk music,' is not an intelligent name.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 10:23 AM

I haven't read the article yet [if ever...]...
but it might be in context to remind ourselves that in fairly recent years
the B'n'P actively appropriated British Trad folk music for their own nefarious purposes...

.. and even without that political party's grubby fingers grabbing our music,
the lefty 'bias' of UK folk has always been counter-balanced
by a perhaps even more prevalent 'bias' of very conservative jingoistic folkies...

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 10:34 AM

OK, the melody to Greensleeves uses the harmonic minor scale, but that hardly makes it of Spanish flamenco descent. Most of the minor key tunes in collections like Playford’s also feature the same intervals, though some might argue we can’t be sure of that where sharps and flats were not indicated in the original texts.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: GUEST,Nick Dow
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 11:25 AM

They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. I get the feeling he's read a page or two of Harker's discredited 'Fakesong' and fancied having an ill informed waffle to gain attention to himself.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 11:41 AM

well in that case its worked. His post has got more attention than most of the stuff I post on mudcat.

Theres like a scintilla of sense in there. We DONT recognise relationships of songs that stare us in the face. And are the bare bones of folksong.

However its the snotty putdown of people who do their best that hints that he might not be the sort of person you'd give a shit about what they'd think, that undermines the article.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 05:23 PM

pfr
I presume you mean 'Conservative jingoistic folkies'. Are there really any of these left? I thought they'd all shuffled off. I can't think of any left alive. If there are they're keeping a low profile.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 05:54 PM

'Greensleeves' is surely only perceived as a folksong by the general public. I can't think of anyone who knows a little about the subject who would think of it as a folk song. Vaughan Williams set it as a folksong in a classical setting which I suppose might have had some bearing on people regarding it as a folksong. Whilst it's one of my favourite tunes I would never regard it as anything but artsong. The tune in a much corrupted state has been used in various folk contexts and I've actually sung a 16th century ballad set to it. I can't imagine it actually having been a folksong in the 16th century. It was very much a court song even if Harry didn't compose it and the ballad I sang it to was about a whole load of nobility at an archery contest written by one of the century's most celebrated balladists.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: GUEST,Observer
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 07:06 PM

"To take a parallel instance, the Jeep was invented to drive in rough country during World War II. We could have called it a war vehicle. But now jeeps are used by suburbanites and hunters, back-country nurses and paleontologists."

Poor parallel example. The iconic Jeep of WWII made by Willys and Ford, the Willys designation was Willys MA and the Ford GP. It was the GP standing for "Government" P type (chosen by Ford to designate a car with a wheelbase of 80 ins), that gave rise to the Jeep name (GEE PEE). Lots think that GP stood for General Purpose - it didn't. In 1941 the US Government decided on simplification through standardisation and the Willys model won the contest because of its more powerful engine, the best features of both were incorporated into the design and they became Willys MB and the Ford GPW (the W standing for Willys as Ford made them under licence).

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Acorn4
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 07:11 PM

Don't quite get the Greensleeves/Runaway thing.

Both start in a minor key for verse and go into major for the chorus but Greensleeves can be chorded in a number of ways and goes Am for verse to C major for chorus - Runaway goes Am verse/ A major chorus - my bullshit detectors were twitching quite heavily while reading it.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:"There’s nowt so fake as “folk"
From: Acorn4
Date: 01 Mar 19 - 07:13 PM

... oh, and does Private Eye still do "Pseuds Corner"?

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 01:49 AM

The Wiki article about "Standpoint" makes it look very much like a rerun of the CIA-controlled British reactionary magazine "Encounter" from the Cold War, with the same value system of "if it isn't American it's crap".

If you wanted to know what the music criticism equivalent of Nigel Lawson weaseling on about climate change was, now you know.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: Big Al Whittle
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 02:18 AM

'I presume you mean 'Conservative jingoistic folkies'. Are there really any of these left? I thought they'd all shuffled off'

i think the problem you have is that before the foundation of the Labour Party - there was no organised left in England.

And much folksong predates this. I know my family came from the ghettoes of Victorian   St Helens in Lancashire - poor Irish immigrants. Really the poorest - deficiency diseases etc.

And yet
The songs they sang were for the main patriotic stuff. Goodbye Dolly Grey, The Baby's Name, We Do Not Want to Fight but by Jingo if we Do....etc.

I know some people don't reckon this is folksong. But that's how it was for us, and we were pretty folkie - clog dancers, banjo players etc.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 03:25 AM

The Greensleeves point was, as I read it, that the melody partly uses the harmonic minor scale similar to Spanish tunes in the Phrygian mode (where typically Am, G, F and E chords could be used). Runaway does so too, only for the verse and solo, but then so partly do countless early country dance tunes, plus a host of more contemporary songs (One Meat Ball, St. James Infirmary, The House of the Rising Sun, The Cat Came Back, One More Cup of Coffee, Things We Said Today, Lady Darbanville, Portland Town, Babe, I’m Gonna Leave You, Anathea, plus some by Leonard Cohen). So yes, it’s hard to see what point the writer is making....

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: Jim Carroll
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 03:39 AM

Dominic Green
It appears Dave Harker has found himself a new name and career (see someone has already spotted the similarities)
Jim Carroll

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 09:14 AM

The harmonic basis of Greensleeves is Italian, not Spanish. It doesn't have the flattened second of the hijaz scale (what flamenco wonks call "phrygian").

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: GUEST,Nick Dow
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 12:05 PM

Jack my interest is aroused, maybe you can help me. How does that make it Italian? Likewise the phrygian scale is found I am told in many other countries (but rarely the UK). Could you explain a bit further?

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 01:21 PM

Harmonic minor turns up in a fair few Lowland Scottish songs of the 1700s. In a British context it derives from the Italian early Baroque, where it's used to fit a major V-I cadence onto a Dorian or minor tune. (In Turkish and Arabic music the same scale pattern is called nihavend/nihavent/nahawand, but has no harmonic implications).

The flamenco "phrygian" is the same as Arabic/Turkish "hijaz" and has no relation to the phrygian of Gregorian chant (which is called "kurdi" in Turkish theory). Hijaz has a minor second and a major third; it never occurs in folk tunes from the British Isles.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: GUEST,Nick Dow
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 02:13 PM

A rose by any other name! So would the Baroque influence have been introduced by secular music? Is that influence only found in Scotland, or does it turn up in English Folk Song. If it does could you quote a well known example to demonstrate for me/us? I am aware that Folk and art music are roots from the same tree, however musical origins have always been a little awkward for me to understand. I realise of course nothing is hard and fast, but we are left with a balance of probabilities I suspect.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: Jack Campin
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 02:21 PM

I'm in a little village in Slovenia right now and won't be near my own books again for a couple of weeks. You find the sharpened seventh of harmonic minor in a lot of the "Scotch tunes" written in England around 1700. I have some in my modes tutorial, I think.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: GUEST,Nick Dow
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 03:36 PM

Have a good trip. I shouldn't have hijacked Tim's thread really, however I'll follow up what you have said about modes. Thanks again.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 04:12 PM

All very relevant Nick and I'm sure Tim wouldn't mind anyway. Fascinating stuff. Can we get Jack on a free transfer? I'm certainly interested in the 'Scotch' phenomeneon and very interested to know it gave colour to the tunes as well.

Interesting that we should have DG likened to DH. I would have thought they were diametrically opposed to each other.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 05:50 PM

Rightly or wrongly, we tend to play Playford tunes like Childgrove, Parsons Farewell and possibly Grimstock in harmonic minor, but the original manuscripts didn’t always indicate whether the seventh was intended to sharp or natural. I certainly can’t think of any English tunes with a Phrygian flat second note, unless Dark Eyes originated here.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: leeneia
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 10:14 PM

Hi, Acorn4. I've never heard 'Runaway', but I think a critic who can't tell the difference between Am going to C and Am going to A major is not worth our time.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 10:43 PM

From the little research I did while mudcat was down yesterday...
Green sounds like the kind of jobbing freelancer
who trades on his highly qualified academic profile, and moderately famous Dad,
to con gullible commisioning editors
into believing he knows what he is writing about...???

He also has obvious prejudices which are at home with the ethos
of such a right wing website...

eg.. a sample of the most commented articles linked from "There’s nowt so fake as “folk”"

"Corbyn's road map to a communist Britain

In Corbyn’s mind, there is no place for the Jews

Overrated: Billy Bragg" [this one is another Green article]...

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: punkfolkrocker
Date: 02 Mar 19 - 10:52 PM

leeneia - Del Shannon - Runaway

You must have heard this sometime...???

It's only one of the greatest recordings from the golden era of pop...

Subject: RE:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: GUEST,Jim Knowledge
Date: 03 Mar 19 - 06:35 AM

I `ad that Dominic Green in my cab the other day. `e wanted to go to `is office at "STANDPOINT".`e said `e was planning on doing an article about banning books `cos their production destroys the forests? `ark at `im!
I said, "Morning Dommers. I see that article you wrote about "fake music" `as really put the cat among the pigeons. It`s got all them Mudcatters going ape. Although it does look like you`ve done your `omework and read a bit"
`e said, "I really don`t know why Jim. Too me it`s as plain as a pikestaff. If you read all the old tomes you will find they sussed out, even in those times the `ype that was going on. They knew that the Nordic `otpoint Fridgian chord scale that included inverted triads would `armonise with any raised 7th. The singers of that time were always doing this, specially when the collectors were around. Minor progressions were the order of the day to express the sadness of their live until their ship came in then major scales with the odd augmented root and diminished diatonic thirds were to be heard. With the increase of sea trade these traits found their way from the cold north to Spain and Italy, `ence the the strains to be found in flamenco and Itie songs such as "Just One Cornetto" today."
I said, "KINELL!!"


Whaddam I Like??

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: GUEST,Jerry
Date: 03 Mar 19 - 10:31 AM

Excellent. Loved it, though I suspect you probably need to get out a bit more than the rest of us.

Subject: RE: Article discussion:'There’s nowt so fake as folk'
From: GUEST,Nick Dow
Date: 03 Mar 19 - 11:38 AM

'Oly Muvver 'ave Moses!