electronics and folk! Aye or nay?

Subject: elecronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: GUEST,Horace Bone III
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:12 PM

So there it is ladys and gents. You can't avoid the fact that there are some superb people mixing traditional with electronic, sampled or otherwise "processed" music.... But does that mean its ok?
Afro Celts, Martyn Bennet, Liza Carthy & Jim Moray say Aye but what say you folks?

Horace Bone III of the Horatio Bone Orchestra.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: smallpiper
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:21 PM

Oh I say aye! If folk dosn't grow it stagnates and will die

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: GUEST,Horace B3
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:34 PM

Good call! No one wanted elecric guitars @ Cambridge and now few people care. Progression is beautiful, so are traditional tunes. It can't be a bad thing!

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: RolyH
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:36 PM

Everything must progress.What would the singers of the first revival made of the singing of the second revival.
When I first heard Shirley Collins 'Just as the tide was flowing'with just a hint of 'phasing'thirty years ago,I thought things would progress electronically a lot quicker than they have done.
Maybe this shows one of the better ways to perform a folk song is 'simply'.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Horace Bone III
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:42 PM

quite. I thought the idea was that Folk music was someting that everyone could do. everyone uses computers.... coincidence?
i don't think you can substitute traditonal instruments but you can supliment them and create new sounds with them. hopefully we'll have a website soon so people can understand better what i'm ranting about!

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: John Routledge
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:45 PM

If music progresses too far or too fast electronically so that it is no longer reasonably considered folk music there is no problem. The earlier music is still available and performers/listeners can continue to progress or in turn reflect. Exactly what has happened over many many years.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: treewind
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:47 PM

Jim Moray's doing stuff that was done 30 years ago. Funny sort of progress.

The only thing that's different is he's doing it live with a laptop instead of having to do it offline in a recording studio.

Of course people will experiment with it for fun, but one thing that makes folk music special is that it's still produced by people, not by engineers with digital effects processors.under the direction of accountants, PR and marketing strategists.

I'm not saying electronics is bad, but I am saying there's always be a place for doing it with real instruments and real voices.

Anahata

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Horace Bone III
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:48 PM

I quite agree. i see it as yet another string to the proverbial fiddle bow of tradition!

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Horace Bone III
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:50 PM

BUT it is still a "musician" thing. Embrace the technology without the cliches and hang-ups that go with them

HB3
x

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: SeanM
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 05:58 PM

Why would it not be? If you're talking about sampling and mixing into something like a techno piece (or what have you), it's a) no longer "folk", but of the genre that the whole piece would be part of, and b) might just encourage people to seek out the source and get interested in it.

Same holds true with taking traditional pieces and "reimagining" them into different genres - it is the style the piece is done with that it'll be remembered for in more cases than the fact it came from a "folk" source (a la Metallica's... "odd" version of Whiskey in the Jar).

As to the recording process itself, if you're talking about using the latest bells and whistles in the making of the recording - hell yes, go for it! The better sounding and more technically proficient the final product is, the better the audience you have a chance of reaching. Saying a performer must stick to an analog recording process to make it "authentic" and truly "folk" is like telling a great modern painter that they must work on cave walls with ochre and blood paints with frayed sticks, as that's "authentic".

M

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: GUEST,Russ
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 06:51 PM

Don't matter whether we say aye or nay. It's gonna happen anyway. The times are always a changin.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Amos
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 06:58 PM

I think we kind of hashed this out after Dylan's first performance of "Hey Mister Tambourine Man" with an electric guitar. Newport, 1964? Something like that....


A

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 08:19 PM

It's an interesting thing to play around with where the technology is available. Neither good nor bad in itself. People who insist that it's "the future" are lacking in imagination (as Treewind pointed out, the kind of thing that people like Jim Moray are doing at the moment is pretty much the same as we were doing a quarter of a century ago, except that we had to make do with analogue technology and all that attendant line hiss) but it's an option, so why not use it? Don't rely on it too much, though. When there's a power cut, you'll have to fall back on the old-fashioned thing with strings on and whatever singing voice you can manage without digital help.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: mack/misophist
Date: 28 Apr 03 - 09:23 PM

My greatest complaint about electronic is that it's much too easy to go 'overboard' with the effects. Joan Baez proved that not all good musicians have good taste.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Thomas the Rhymer
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 03:51 AM

I'm still pissed off that my sweet guitar sound went crappy in the middle of a gig-gle and my mood went sour trying to figure out what was wrong... I needed a battery, and felt even stupider than usual. It was distorting in a most unappealing way...

My beef with the sampling and effects is pretty straight forward. I find that clutter is soon to gather, and that the 'sounds' are often more interesting than the music. Believe me, I've been there and I've done that. Quite finished with it... I am!

So long as the song is the focus, I can try to open up my mind to the electric digital sampling thing... But please, please don't make me listen to Afro-Celt Soundsystem...

I like acoustic resonance so much though... It took me so long to get here, I'm not going to give it up. ttr

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Strupag
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 05:09 AM

There's room for it all but let's not forget the most beautiful instrument of them all- the human voice.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: fogie
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 05:33 AM

Listen- how are you going to balance them hurdy-gurdies, church organs and trumpets without a) electronics, or b) hundreds of socks. Support the local hoisery industry is what I say.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 05:34 AM

Malcom - I saw Jim Moray the other week. He was superb, and used a lot of different techniques & approaches - including singing completely unacompanied. He'll be unruffled by any power cuts! He is not putting all his eggs in the techie basket, but he is using computer techniques to very good effect. Inspiring! As you say - it is not "the future" - but will hopefully form a part thereof.
Anyways - if you were doing it 25 years ago - does that make it traditional already? :>)

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 07:40 AM

Probably! I ought to get my old synthesizer repaired; the Roland analogue jobs have quite the retro appeal nowadays...

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: GUEST
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 07:48 AM

Yeah - and someone was on about things called "copy cats" the other night. Apparantly they were some sort of tape loop that was used in live situations to get some phasing effects or something. Apparantly they are much sought after retro thingies these days.
Don't it make you feel OLD!!!!!!

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: A Wandering Minstrel
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 07:55 AM

If the music comes from the heart are the mechanics that relevant? I recall some years ago going to see an "unaccompanied"! singer who used a small synthesiser and ingenious application of sticky tape to certain keys to create himself a 'backing band'

in some very big rooms a small amplifier can be a godsend

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 07:57 AM

John Martyn used to use several copycats in his live set, I remember. The tapes used to misbehave sometimes, though not as much as the ones they used in mellotrons. Mind, the early electronic delays could be a bit temperamental, too; I knew one that had to spend nights in the airing cupboard or it would go on strike when you were least expecting it.

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Pied Piper
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 07:57 AM

I use a sequencer most days and I'm usually doing arrangements of Trad stuff. It's made me a better musician, and allows me to listen to ideas before I can play them.
I also use a Deger Electronic Pipe which allows me to practice on the bus or train using earphones, and in my Ceilidh band in any Key. It has a midi out and I play the Mozart Rondo on the French horn sound of my Mu90.
Of cause I still play the big Pipes; the electronics enhancing my ability to learn tunes tremendously.

All the best PP

Subject: RE: electronics and folk! Aye or nay?
From: Bill D
Date: 29 Apr 03 - 05:19 PM

"If folk dosn't grow it stagnates and will die"....

...like it did in the 300-400 years BEFORE electronic manipulation?
'growth' can take many forms...