An Interview with Bert Lloyd

Subject: An Interview with Bert Lloyd
From: Vic Smith
Date: 21 Jun 19 - 03:08 PM

Some Reflections, a 1974 interview with Bert Lloyd by Barry Taylor is well worth a read. It is a good, if personal, statement (reminder?) of the scene in the UK and that time. Obviously, Barry was after Bert's views rather than seeking out facts, but it does give a reminder of how broadminded the man was and not like the way he is sometimes portrayed today.

Subject: RE: An Interview with Bert Lloyd
From: The Sandman
Date: 21 Jun 19 - 07:31 PM

thanks

Subject: RE: An Interview with Bert Lloyd
From: GUEST,Karen
Date: 22 Jun 19 - 03:21 AM

I see that Lloyd was suggesting that there was an English song called 'St James Hospital'. He says:

But, also we performed, [that is] both sides, both the ballads lot and the blues lot - performed a certain amount of material, which came rather close together. You know, things like, for example, an English version of St James' Hospital and Humprey's Band would do a jazzed up version of Streets of Laredo [added: or St James' Infirmary], that kind of thing. And this had a considerable impact because the Lyttleton Band had prestige, and it had a big audience

As I have pointed out at length on other threads, there was not. All the evidence suggests that Lloyd himself created such a song. It was English, since he created it, but not a traditional song, though possibly based on the Such broadsheet about a Lock Hospital. There is no direct evidence that the words 'St James ….' appeared in a British version prior to the 20th century.

See the 'Unfortunate Rake' threads here for more information.

Subject: RE: An Interview with Bert Lloyd
From: GUEST,Karen
Date: 22 Jun 19 - 04:02 AM

First of all, I sing very few songs as I receive them - very few. I like to alter them around a bit, according to my fancy. Old Vaughan Williams once said to me, the practice of altering folksong is an obnoxious one and I trust nobody to do it, except myself [laughs]. I feel like that. But I do like to alter and remake songs. And, as for songs, which have remained in oblivion, partly because sometimes there doesn't exist, among all the variants, there doesn't exist a single complete one, it seems to me. If a songs going to be nicer if you splice three or four variants of it together and make the story more or less complete, so much the better. It's better than having it hang around as a ruin - a set of ruins. So, that's it, I don't feel that, in popular performance, the existing traditional model is sacrosanct

Subject: RE: An Interview with Bert Lloyd
From: Brian Peters
Date: 22 Jun 19 - 05:37 AM

That is actually a key quote, Karen (you might have placed it in quote marks for those who haven't read the whole interview). Exactly the kind of thing many of us had assumed when we spent time dissecting Lloyd's edits on the 'Bertsongs' thread a few years back, and here it is in his own words. I notice that he writes of backtracking to some extent from certain more far-fetched claims.

Also interesting to see differences emerging with Ewan MacColl.