Maybe I'm being twitchy, but does anyone else find the term 'folk' music, to describe what we do, to be a rather patronising generalised term. Often heard when reading anything about classical music (Yeah, I know, I'm using a generalised term by saying 'classical music'), whether it be Dvorak using 'folk' melodies for the New World, or wrt wooden simple system flutes, which classical heads might call 'folk' flutes. Many other examples exist.
It's not the term itself, nor the people who use it (well, not ALL of them), but just the dismissive sense in which it is used. We are binned into this category which is simpler, not as sophisticated as high art music. That afficionados of the former said genre be likened to mediaeval village idiots, prancing around full of scrumpy...ooh arr ooh arr. (nor am I an anglophobe...similar scenes may be pictured for us and the Irish, Americans, etc.)
The notion is infused with class awareness, that the working classes are only intellectually capable of understanding silly little folk music, whereas the brainy middle and upper classes can apply their collective mind to comprehending the spiritual depth of eg Mahler's 2nd.
The whole thing does get on my t!ts every so often, and was certainly not what Beethoven strove for. Nor Dvorak, nor Sibelius.
I generally think of folk music as things like Peter Paul and Mary or John Denver. Did you see the movie A Mighty Wind? I would also put Davy Spillane, Moving Hearts and most "World Music" etc into the folk category.
Generally I think of most of what is played at sessions as Traditional Music and describe it as that to interested parties ( it is really originally dance music if you're daring enough to call it that and can be bothered explaining to whoever that it is not doofff). Much of what is listed by people here as their fav music I would call traditional music rather than folk music.
I think that folk music is more like popular music. Traditional music becomes folk music when it is blended with contemporary styles to appeal to the masses. I guess that at one time traditional music was popular music as well, though in these days of media control that is probably not possible. In our consumerist world sometimes the masses do appreciate traditional music though once some corporate body realises it, it is often boxed and packaged and sold etc etc...
Out here in Oz there is a definate scene seperate from the trad scene that is known as the folk scene... Heaps more (mostly english) song based, with a sprinkling of tunes from various traditions (from south african whistle tunes to irish to balkan) played occasionaly (and often quite dubiously)
As the child of a "Folky" parent, I have a bit of a soft spot for it, but it is pretty generaly derided by the majority of trad players (are u there bb?)
almost all the trad festy's here are called 'Folk Festivals", a hang over of the seventies? i dunnio....
And in regard to classism in the music, you only have to hear one of the billion technically excellant classical players who regularly inflict themselves on sessions to realise that these "Intellectual superiours" have know knowledge, understanding or ability in our "Silly little folk music"
Check out this link: http://www.coe.ufl.edu/courses/edtech/Vault/Folk/DEFINITION.HTM
Danny, I see where you're coming from, but I don't think it's anything to fash yersel about. A dictionary definition on the net describes folk music as "the traditional and typically anonymous music that is an expression of the life of people in a community". I don't think that the linguistic term "folk" itself necessarily has to imply a lack of intellectual capacity - it just means (or *should* just mean) "music for the people of a community" rather than "music reserved for the upper classes who can afford it". That's not to say that people don't use the term in a dismissive, patronising sense as you describe. I think that reflects the attitudes of those people rather than the terminology itself.
Perhaps "folk" has come to mean more of a general thing as SirNose describes, or maybe a more popular singer-songwriter style of music in some cases, but I don't think you can completely divorce one term from another. Because of the origins of trad, I'd say that folk encompasses trad, and that trad is a particular subgenre of folk. To say that you have 1) classical, 2) folk and 3) trad is a little bit silly - it implies that trad has as much to do with classical music and all that it stands for, as it has with folk music.
Well met Sirnose...I'm SURE I know you but can't place you yet. Is your last name alot? Heh heh...hope you are flirtin and flautin up a storm still.
Have to agree with most of your sentiments re: folk music in oz.
For the rest of you out there there are a few subgroups to most folk festivals here in oz that you may recognise from the National Folk Festival in Easter
English folk circuit wannabes
Bluegrass sniffers
Old timey
Staunch Ostralian folkies
Scottish fuddlers
Latino guitar hearthrobs
Irish traditional dance music appreciation/worship society
Ratbags and bumrot boys and the general sort of people who enjoy/encourage music to be played and drink to be spilt.
I'm the child of folky parents as well. But I hate to say somewhere along the line I turned into a big snob and only have time for Irish trad. Dont get me wrong, I love funk, soul, hip hop, 80's etc etc but for some reason I dont like 'Folk' as a general kind of music. Bit strange, butananyways.....Sir Nose knows (hhehehhehe)
It has been known for the term "classical player" to be used as a term of abuse in trad circles...
Good point dow-man, and I was just wondering if trad (and folk) differenciates itself by the whole aural thing. All the (I hate using this phrase) world musics i can think of pass on their tradtion auraly, the only exception i can think of being India... but don't they call that Indian "classical" music anyway?
Heya greenwiggle of the octave banjo frolics...
I don't know you, never have, i deny all knowledge,i don't know what you mean, but i DEFINATLY never played in an ill-advised Ceili band witcha.....
And you forgot a group:
Out of work rock muso's who form bad paddy bands to sing dirty old town and that bloody waterboys fisherman thingy and get booked by festival organisers whose aquantance to folk music consists of listening to that cheiftains album with bono and the rolling stones a couple of times, meaning that people who devote there lives to the betterment of the tastes of this great countries folkies never get a gig.
SirNose's comment re separate folk & trad scenes on Oz is interesting - it's never occured to me before but I would never have though to call Irish trad "folk" for that reason.
I had a folk-sympathetic background too but got turned off by those that think there's a "Naive Art" virtue in sounding like you bought your instrument last week and those that think "folk" = "recently composed politically leftist song accompanied by guitar". Maybe that's why some trad players have little time for some segments of the folk scene.
I also have encountered some of the dismissiveness Danny mentions and agree with Dow's point that it is attitude rather than terminology.
In my experience the people who use the term in the way Danny describes have little ability to understand any musical concept outside the Romantic repertoire and view the symphony orchestra/string quartet/piano trio as some kind of pre-determined musical destinies that mankind has been evolving towards ever since a humanoid first placed a blade of grass between two thumbs and blew. But it isn't just "folk" or "trad" that is regarded this way - even small-c-classical music prior to Beethoven gets the same treatment. Mozart usually gets a bit of a look-in, and Bach and Handel squeak across the line with one or two items (usually the ones the huge choral societies like to drag out at Easter and Christmas) and that's the end of that. The early music movement had to bang its collective head against a lot of this attitude for a long time.
(Of course, I hasten to add that there are people who just really love their brand of classical music and aren't particularly interested in anything else who manage not to be dismissive.)
When I think about it, my views on the term "folk" come from my background and acquaintance with the term from an early age. In my home county of Northumberland, the "trad" music that gets played there doesn't really get called "trad". It's a mix of native Northumbrian, Scottish, Irish, Shetland, even Faeroes and sometimes Norwegian tunes that is often just referred to as "folk music". That's why I'm always surprised when people talk about folk as being world music or popular singer-songwriter type stuff - I just don't identify with that. Certainly up until 2 or 3 years ago the idea of a separate folk and trad scene would not have made any sense to me.
SirNose, it's interesting that you view the Aussie folk festivals as "trad festivals with a strange 70s name". Maybe you want it to be a trad festival, but in reality it really *is* what it says it is, simply because that's what people (and festival organisers perhaps!) appreciate over here. Imagine if it were just a festival for the (Irish) trad players. There'd be nobody there! There'd be like us lot - maybe 20 odd people from Sydney and the Blue Mountains, discounting those who couldn't make it or didn't want to go - the sort of people who might turn up to a local party session; then there'd be maybe one or two from Brisbane; 20-30 from Melbourne and the surrounding area.... think of the people who play at the biggest sessions at the national - it's all the same people. And have you ever noticed how the only people who listen to our music and appreciate it are a bunch of drunken pool-playing yobbos?
So much for "music for the people of a community", more like "music for the small minority of people who play it"
All my crew are classically trained, most speak Greek and Latin, but they listen to ITM all the time rather than classics. We all think it trains the ear, making it quicker to pick tunes up and remember them. It also means you are not frightened by silly key signatures or 7/8.
P.S. Mahlers 1 and 5 (slow movement) are my favorites
It's about music not semantics. If a word upsets you, you've missed the point. There are alot of people who get into this stuff for reasons other than the sound of it (some people even think it's trendy).
The more I get into The Music, and the more people I meet, the more I am aware of the musicians of all levels of ability who are active in both camps - the "classical" (for want of a better word) and non-classical (irishtrad, "folk" - whatever that means, jazz, etc).
Speaking for myself, I have no difficulty in reconciling both; when I'm in an orchestra I'm not thinking about ITM, and when I'm in a session, "classical" music is the furthest from my thoughts. When I'm practicing at home I'll regularly change from one instrument to the other (fiddle for ITM, and cello for classical) without a problem - confuses the neighbours no end, they can't work out who the invisible second player is!
Trevor
Michael, semantics, in this case, are used to convey mental images of a particular musical genre. It's not exactly upsetting, more bemusing. I'm bemused, not by the F-word itself, but, to repeat, the sense in which it can be used.
If I've missed a particular point, I await you to put me right on it, with your vastly greater knowledge of such things.
I suppose it's mostly about labels - I'd agree with earlier postings that folk music conjures up images of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, the Clancy Brothers (remember the Aran jumpers!), the Dubliners and more recently the Fureys. Having lived some time in England I also recall Folk clubs where singers would sing those interminable songs with their eyes closed and in between we might get a rendition of Miss McCleod's reel, the Boys of Bluehill or the Irish Washerwoman from a couple of musicians. With the arrival of the Bothy Band and, in my case, the discovery of Fleadh Cheoils instrumental music and what we all understand as trad became "yer only man" !! I don't intend in any way to denigrate the Folk scene - it's just a matter of personal taste.
I don't think there is anything wrong with the term folk music. It's not a precise enough description to describe what we play, because the term covers many other forms of music as well, but it would be true to say that Irish Traditional music is a folk music, as is blues, Gallego Music, Calypso etc etc ad nauseum. The term has picked up certain maybe unfortunate associations over the years (Arran jumpers, and wimpy long haired girls sitting on stools intoning Appalachian dirges included), but these nearly all reflect the nexus where folk meets the commercial mainstream, which was always inevitably going to be an embarrassingly crass point.
As far as the folk music being infused with notions of class, of course it is, as it is an artform which comes from people themselves who are not trained to do certain things in an established (Establishment?) manner. The growth of the awareness and 'revival' of folk music in England and and America were always associated with left wing political moments (In America the Communists and Wobblies, and in England The Communist Party and The Workers Music Association, which led to the formation of Topic Records). But a lot of people interested in 'Folk' music for political reasons were (are?) also interested in the re-appropriation of "intellectual' musics (Classical et al) and a general raising of cultural consciousness.
I think Mahler's Second Symphony is ALMOST as exciting as hearing a good session in full swing, it's just shame we can't hear it down the boozer, pint of Guinness in hand...
Bannerman - you have a problem with people singing with their eyes closed? I can't remember precisely what Joe Heaney had to say on the subject, but in essence I think it was that the singer sang with eyes closed or cap pulled down or even facing the wall out of modesty, and a need to inhabit the song in order to communicate it to the listener (I don't mean to suggest there's only one person listening, but that ideally each person present will fell that the music is being rendered personal, and personally, to them). Of course it's to be hoped that the song is one worthy of such care and attention. Which often they're not. And it seems to me that, singing being such an intimate act, it's much more toe-curlingly awful when it's not "just right". And that seems, unfortunately, to put many off singing altogether.
You know, I've heard people use the N word (nyah - spelled?) perjoratively as well, but I can't see that bothering anyone here. Follow the example of dykes and n!ggas everywhere and RECLAIM THE F WORD!
I don't have a problem with singers performing with their eyes closed - it's just one of those images which I always associate with "Folk" music. While I would be the first to admit that any good session should always have one or two (maybe more depending on the quality of the singers present) songs they should definitely not be more than 10 verses long or be of the "Paddy McGinty's Goat" type! Sorry I don't mean to start a new thread here on songs at sessions as I think the subject has already been well covered some months ago.
Ottery, in mentioning "people interested in 'Folk' music for political reasons" I think you've brought into focus my problem with the particular bunch of "folkies" that put me off in my ignorant and misguided youth.
In folk music (or church music, or early music, or any other kind of music) when politics or ideology or whatever else you want to call it takes over, when music becomes a vehicle for axe-grinding, the music itself always suffers, it seems to me. And I think I met a few of that sort of folkie before I knew that they didn't constitute the whole scene.
That's one thing that has kept me hanging round the fringes of Irish trad and staying in touch with what the good folk on this discussion board have to say about it - the *music* is first and foremost, and sure, the historical/political background is there... but the music it is never reduced to being a vehicle for a message.
(Sorry, Danny, that's a diversion from your original post.)
(Aside No.2 - all this talk of Mahler reminds me of a giggle we often have to ourselves when couples come to choose their wedding music - they've obviously had some terrible experience with classical music in their past and they often say "well, we'd like something classical but we don't want anything *heavy*". Then we laugh to ourselves - we're a quartet, for pete's sake, whadda they think we're gonna play, Mahler's Fifth?)
Umm, that could be read as implying that I think the expression of human emotion and struggle in a lot of folk music is "axe grinding" and I didn't mean to say that at all. I see politics and ideology as a quite separate thing.
On that note, I'll go the way of Dow. Aussie shift signing off for the day, g'night.
Tish - "The Knot Garden", perhaps - sorry, that's just one of my terrible experiences with (what's commonly known as) classical music rearing it pug-ugly head!
Lucky you, Tish - I've heard Irish Trad used as a vehicle for a message too often for comfort; in fact I've avoided it in the past for that very reason, but these days I have more sense.
Well, a little more.
And self-conciously musical "sophisticates" can shove it where the sun don't shine. Music of whatever genre is neither use nor ornament if it doesn't communicate to people and move them. I used to know an opera singer who was forced, being relatively unknown, to perform a lot of new music, and she used to bewail the fact that she couldn't tell half the time whether whether it was over her head or just sh!te. I don't think the problem was entirely with her. Michael Tippett I saw quoted as saying he refused to "write down" to people - for f##k's sake!
Semantics is indeed used to convey mental images of musical genres, that's the problem. Music is not about mental images, it's about abstract aural images.
It don't matter if you wear an arran jumper and drink old speckled hen from a puter tankard. That's just fashion, but if you're into it for that then you are truly sad.
And if you are sad because people lump you together with the arran jumpers, try closing your eyes.
Tish, depending on where you are coming from, you could say that, say, The Workers Music Association facilitated the preservation/revival of folk music, or hijacked it for their own ends. Either way Ewan McColl would never have bothered collecting and broadcasting all those songs about herring fishing without the ideological commitment in addition to the love of the tunes.... Um I think I'm digging myself into a hole here.
I thought that distinction was quite simple. In crafts, it's about making nice beautiful objects per se, for their own intrinsic aesthetic. In art, you may well do that also, but true art's real function was to convey higher human values, such as the emotional, intellectual and spiritual. Like all of these definitions there will be huge expanses of grey areas in between these two poles.
Conversely, if you were to apply those definitions to The Music or Folk music vis-avis "classical" music, then The Music does the intellectual/emotional/spiritual job nearly as well as classical does.
Most of the people I know here in Manchester, would rather have their fingernails pulled out than go to a folk club .
Some clubs are relaxed and friendly most are not. If your not one of the "in crowd" you will be made to feel uncomfortable.
I don't much like the term Folk used to describe UK trad music because to my ears it has an early 20th century semi fascist ring to it, especially when used as "The Folk".
I see myself as a musician first and a trad music is just one of the pies (all be it the biggest) I've got my fingers in. I don't see any barriers between musical genres and if I like some thing I'll have it.
I see your point there, Ottery, and would agree that sometimes music and ideology can coexist.
In my case, I was referring more to individuals whose personal brand of politics dominates their playing - for example, those that adopt a style of music and a particular way of playing (and a particular attitude to their audience and the "employer" who's paying the bill) not not out of a love or aptitude but because it fits their brand of *-ism (*insert appropriate flavour here). Music from that sort of player can be soul-destroying and seems to please only like-minded individuals.
(Nastyweegirl, there is a definite downside to coming into this scene completely cold and late-ish in life but the upside is that what little I know about Irish trad comes from this site and from links/recordings/contacts obtained from it, which is why I have indeed been lucky to avoid experiences such as you mention!)
Sorry to hark back to (much) earlier posting, (I havn't been on for a while),
Dow-man, I LOVE that aussie festivals are 'Folk' festivals! that was one of the huge problems i had with festivals in Ireland, That it's ALL irish trad... I love how here you can go and get dose of balkan dance music or georgian singing or indian dance at all the festies, I'd go mad otherwise! I think the beautiful thing in the aussie scene is that even though you devote your life to trad, you exist in a musical environment that encoureges and supports many cultures, and that there all treated pretty much the same (and where there not, its fairly generaly recognised that they should be). Probably my LEAST favourite festies here are the 'celtic' ones, that just serve up the same scottish and irish acts year after year..
(cue Australian anthem, tim brooke-taylor style...) thats what makes the australian so bloody good, that all musicians can come together as brothers and sisters, arm in arm, in one big group hug of musical experience, building a bridge to a future without prejudice and segregation of styles, where a corkman plays a Chinese tune with an Argentinian, backed by a digeridoo and one of those african harp things!
(or is that just the latest exercise in musical banality from RealWorld?)
I think the fact that they're called "folk festivals" must be an English thing originally (think Cambridge/Sidmouth etc). And I found that really weird because Aussies generally seem to be more interested in their Irish ancestry than anything Pommie. But the folk festivals are more based on the English model I think. I also love the fact that it's not all just Irish trad. Also it's not always separate types of music going on either, they are sometimes truly mixed - like when people drop a couple of Macedonian tunes into an Irish set of jigs. That would be completely normal at the National. I guess you have to start somewhere. As for building a bridge to the future? With the Howard government in power you're working against the powerful machine that is the real Aussie attitude to people who are different - you'd be building an illegal bridge over the barbed wire fence of Woomera... (brothers and sisters my a*se!)
Yeah, It's hard to be proud of your countries multicultural heritage when the current government seems hell bent on creating a south-east asian south africa....
And I agree that the current folk scene was an offshoot of the english scene (i mean the national was started up by Danny spooner and Martin Wyndham-read in the sixties, how englishy can you get!) But even the english festies i went to (Sydmouth/Witby) were still almost exclusivly (to use a aussie folk scene cacthword) Anglo-Celtic in content.
I do think australia has something vauguly unique to offer there. This reminds me (gratuitous name drop ahead!) of a conversation with monseir Andy Irvine earlier this year, where he commented that Oz IS different from the US and UK models, were they tend to have 'theme' festivals, like an African or a asian music festival, and the irish model, were they pretty much only ever play Irish music from the 30sq/km district around the fest.
As for that bridge... well, after we remove the hard-righters in power now, at least we can start to REbuild the bridge to where we were 10 or so years ago!
And come to think of it, the director of the national in its early to mid ninties heyday is now director of that great depository of english music archives, Cecil Sharpe House.... Its a pommy conspiracy! their is no aussie scene, its all just a neo-colonial facade! i new i'd been humming morris tunes WAY too often recently...
Why do you think they sent ME here SirNose? Didn't you suspect that I was supposed to infiltrate the scene and pollute it with some English tunes?! Let's have some Morris dag on Thursday - see how bb likes that
I was thinking maybe Sidmouth/Cambridge etc have been too affected by commercial "folky" singer-songwriter acts to have any room for a multicultural "scene". They *do* have big acts from exotic places, but you're right I don't think you get as much of the enthusiasts-sitting-down-together-in-a-bar-to-play-Macedonian-tunes type thing going on over there as here in Oz. I rather think that things would be different if the Aussie festivals could afford to fly out more big, commercial acts. You know how it is over here - they won't fly out 'cause they'll make a loss and it wouldn't be worth their while Well, maybe it actually works to the advantage of the session scene in the long-run, a scene which has been allowed to develop on its own, so that now (as you've said yourself) an Aussie trad "style" seems to have emerged. Because of the huge distance between Oz and its ex-mum, the "folk" and "trad" scenes have gone off in different directions. Perhaps the music itself has become "an expression of the people of the community" rather than "an expression of a minority of musicians" or "an offshoot of the English scene"...
Dow, your a wise man, even for an english music mole... I think the best thing abour the scene is that it can't support 'superstars" it a)keeps the muso's a bit more normal and less "holier than thou" and b)stops the development of Rusbyism.. where every player wants to sound like Kate Rusby or Mick McGoldrick coz they'll sell more CDs... and the 'big name' artists themselves pump out middle of the road easy-listening dross so they don't lose their audience
(not that that will stop me complaining about how you can't make any money in the music here....)
"English music mole!"... watch it or next time I hear you start a set I shall wait until you've finished playing the 1st tune and then jump right in with a morris tune as loudly as I can on my concertina. I'll swing it round in the air to get more volume to drown out your flute, and I'll just... keep on playing until you have to stop (-:
Fair play Sirnosealot and Dowindex. Struth mate shes a banging like a dunny door on a windy day in here. I think bb has gone over to another site where they serve Vb...as to the Aussie shrift, maybe its because they've all got their heads down on the dark side of the world.I myself enjoy typing a few lines on music and related threads in my breaks at work.Yes the national may have it's downside-but it IS OUR festival and has not yet succumbed to the Corporate mind of other major Oz festivals.Get on the committee and change it for the better (except you musicmoleman) and be proactive. Couldn't agree more about the recycling of acts at the "Celtic Theme Park" festivals.
Have a great and glorious second day of spring!
Hi - I'm here, just busy. yes the National is our festival - very much agreed. I heard that they had one irish dance act this last fest and 8 morris dance acts. I mean - that is seriously *8* too many!! Maybe I should go for grahams job and turn the national around
BB...IMO one Irish dance act is enuf...only kidding, at least they try to remain semi-traditional and none of the riverdancing/hair extensions/pre-recorded taps palava.
Dow: dubious morris festival...an oxymoron?
Nothing wrong with a bit o morris every know and then...once every twenty years should suffice I don't mind the rumptytumpty style of music on the accordion, but what is it dancing with the handkerchiefs, bells and smacking bits of sticks??? (Please note this is a wind-up-ALL traditional musics have the right to exist and deserve respect for riding the waves of oppressive fashion and fads.)
Second day bb- I slept through the first one.
There's absolutely nothing wrong with a bit of dag now and then. There's so much more to morris than the Rakes Of Mallow. Now there's a tune I haven't heard in far too long. Have to put it into a set with something else. What about the Up Downey reel (Please note this is a wind-up - I would never juxtapose the Up Downey reel with such a great tune)
the worst part is that coz i'm an ABC newbie i just played through that little post on me flute....! i think i'm psychlogically scarred forever! d*mn u Englishmoleman!
Sirnose,
I used to trawl through Dows ABC postings but now I just ignore them (Very cheeky grin !8>).
Maybe we should call him morrismusicmoleman?
Dow- could you please consider the neighbours and stop coming home p*%$ed at all hours? It's not the swearing and fumbling and technicolour yawns on their postbox that annoys them...its the bloody bells you wear on your boots! You have all the dogs in the street yowling in terror and running from an imaginary herd of fuelled up cursing cats!
But don't worry, I have some fotos of bb from a few years back that bring new meaning to the term "dag". I would download them 'cept I have no scanner and a few scruples...or is that scruloose?
willnae see yez 2night, but talk soonish.
M
"Folk"?
"Folk"?
Maybe I'm being twitchy, but does anyone else find the term 'folk' music, to describe what we do, to be a rather patronising generalised term. Often heard when reading anything about classical music (Yeah, I know, I'm using a generalised term by saying 'classical music'), whether it be Dvorak using 'folk' melodies for the New World, or wrt wooden simple system flutes, which classical heads might call 'folk' flutes. Many other examples exist.
It's not the term itself, nor the people who use it (well, not ALL of them), but just the dismissive sense in which it is used. We are binned into this category which is simpler, not as sophisticated as high art music. That afficionados of the former said genre be likened to mediaeval village idiots, prancing around full of scrumpy...ooh arr ooh arr. (nor am I an anglophobe...similar scenes may be pictured for us and the Irish, Americans, etc.)
The notion is infused with class awareness, that the working classes are only intellectually capable of understanding silly little folk music, whereas the brainy middle and upper classes can apply their collective mind to comprehending the spiritual depth of eg Mahler's 2nd.
The whole thing does get on my t!ts every so often, and was certainly not what Beethoven strove for. Nor Dvorak, nor Sibelius.
Danny.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Rudall the time
Re:
I generally think of folk music as things like Peter Paul and Mary or John Denver. Did you see the movie A Mighty Wind? I would also put Davy Spillane, Moving Hearts and most "World Music" etc into the folk category.
Generally I think of most of what is played at sessions as Traditional Music and describe it as that to interested parties ( it is really originally dance music if you're daring enough to call it that and can be bothered explaining to whoever that it is not doofff). Much of what is listed by people here as their fav music I would call traditional music rather than folk music.
I think that folk music is more like popular music. Traditional music becomes folk music when it is blended with contemporary styles to appeal to the masses. I guess that at one time traditional music was popular music as well, though in these days of media control that is probably not possible. In our consumerist world sometimes the masses do appreciate traditional music though once some corporate body realises it, it is often boxed and packaged and sold etc etc...
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by geb
Re:
Out here in Oz there is a definate scene seperate from the trad scene that is known as the folk scene... Heaps more (mostly english) song based, with a sprinkling of tunes from various traditions (from south african whistle tunes to irish to balkan) played occasionaly (and often quite dubiously)
As the child of a "Folky" parent, I have a bit of a soft spot for it, but it is pretty generaly derided by the majority of trad players (are u there bb?)
almost all the trad festy's here are called 'Folk Festivals", a hang over of the seventies? i dunnio....
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by SirNose
And in regard to classism in the music, you only have to hear one of the billion technically excellant classical players who regularly inflict themselves on sessions to realise that these "Intellectual superiours" have know knowledge, understanding or ability in our "Silly little folk music"
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by SirNose
Re:
Check out this link: http://www.coe.ufl.edu/courses/edtech/Vault/Folk/DEFINITION.HTM
Danny, I see where you're coming from, but I don't think it's anything to fash yersel about. A dictionary definition on the net describes folk music as "the traditional and typically anonymous music that is an expression of the life of people in a community". I don't think that the linguistic term "folk" itself necessarily has to imply a lack of intellectual capacity - it just means (or *should* just mean) "music for the people of a community" rather than "music reserved for the upper classes who can afford it". That's not to say that people don't use the term in a dismissive, patronising sense as you describe. I think that reflects the attitudes of those people rather than the terminology itself.
Perhaps "folk" has come to mean more of a general thing as SirNose describes, or maybe a more popular singer-songwriter style of music in some cases, but I don't think you can completely divorce one term from another. Because of the origins of trad, I'd say that folk encompasses trad, and that trad is a particular subgenre of folk. To say that you have 1) classical, 2) folk and 3) trad is a little bit silly - it implies that trad has as much to do with classical music and all that it stands for, as it has with folk music.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Dr. Dow
Re:
Well met Sirnose...I'm SURE I know you but can't place you yet. Is your last name alot? Heh heh...hope you are flirtin and flautin up a storm still.
Have to agree with most of your sentiments re: folk music in oz.
For the rest of you out there there are a few subgroups to most folk festivals here in oz that you may recognise from the National Folk Festival in Easter
English folk circuit wannabes
Bluegrass sniffers
Old timey
Staunch Ostralian folkies
Scottish fuddlers
Latino guitar hearthrobs
Irish traditional dance music appreciation/worship society
Ratbags and bumrot boys and the general sort of people who enjoy/encourage music to be played and drink to be spilt.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Greenwiggle
Re:
I'm the child of folky parents as well. But I hate to say somewhere along the line I turned into a big snob and only have time for Irish trad. Dont get me wrong, I love funk, soul, hip hop, 80's etc etc but for some reason I dont like 'Folk' as a general kind of music. Bit strange, butananyways.....Sir Nose knows (hhehehhehe)
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by bb
Re:
Latino guitar hearthrobs....hmmmm sounds like someone I know - Paddy maybe
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by bb
Re:
It has been known for the term "classical player" to be used as a term of abuse in trad circles...
Good point dow-man, and I was just wondering if trad (and folk) differenciates itself by the whole aural thing. All the (I hate using this phrase) world musics i can think of pass on their tradtion auraly, the only exception i can think of being India... but don't they call that Indian "classical" music anyway?
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by SirNose
Heya greenwiggle of the octave banjo frolics...
I don't know you, never have, i deny all knowledge,i don't know what you mean, but i DEFINATLY never played in an ill-advised Ceili band witcha.....
And you forgot a group:
Out of work rock muso's who form bad paddy bands to sing dirty old town and that bloody waterboys fisherman thingy and get booked by festival organisers whose aquantance to folk music consists of listening to that cheiftains album with bono and the rolling stones a couple of times, meaning that people who devote there lives to the betterment of the tastes of this great countries folkies never get a gig.
not that i'm bitter.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by SirNose
Re:
SirNose's comment re separate folk & trad scenes on Oz is interesting - it's never occured to me before but I would never have though to call Irish trad "folk" for that reason.
I had a folk-sympathetic background too but got turned off by those that think there's a "Naive Art" virtue in sounding like you bought your instrument last week and those that think "folk" = "recently composed politically leftist song accompanied by guitar". Maybe that's why some trad players have little time for some segments of the folk scene.
I also have encountered some of the dismissiveness Danny mentions and agree with Dow's point that it is attitude rather than terminology.
In my experience the people who use the term in the way Danny describes have little ability to understand any musical concept outside the Romantic repertoire and view the symphony orchestra/string quartet/piano trio as some kind of pre-determined musical destinies that mankind has been evolving towards ever since a humanoid first placed a blade of grass between two thumbs and blew. But it isn't just "folk" or "trad" that is regarded this way - even small-c-classical music prior to Beethoven gets the same treatment. Mozart usually gets a bit of a look-in, and Bach and Handel squeak across the line with one or two items (usually the ones the huge choral societies like to drag out at Easter and Christmas) and that's the end of that. The early music movement had to bang its collective head against a lot of this attitude for a long time.
(Of course, I hasten to add that there are people who just really love their brand of classical music and aren't particularly interested in anything else who manage not to be dismissive.)
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Tish
Re:
When I think about it, my views on the term "folk" come from my background and acquaintance with the term from an early age. In my home county of Northumberland, the "trad" music that gets played there doesn't really get called "trad". It's a mix of native Northumbrian, Scottish, Irish, Shetland, even Faeroes and sometimes Norwegian tunes that is often just referred to as "folk music". That's why I'm always surprised when people talk about folk as being world music or popular singer-songwriter type stuff - I just don't identify with that. Certainly up until 2 or 3 years ago the idea of a separate folk and trad scene would not have made any sense to me.
SirNose, it's interesting that you view the Aussie folk festivals as "trad festivals with a strange 70s name". Maybe you want it to be a trad festival, but in reality it really *is* what it says it is, simply because that's what people (and festival organisers perhaps!) appreciate over here. Imagine if it were just a festival for the (Irish) trad players. There'd be nobody there! There'd be like us lot - maybe 20 odd people from Sydney and the Blue Mountains, discounting those who couldn't make it or didn't want to go - the sort of people who might turn up to a local party session; then there'd be maybe one or two from Brisbane; 20-30 from Melbourne and the surrounding area.... think of the people who play at the biggest sessions at the national - it's all the same people. And have you ever noticed how the only people who listen to our music and appreciate it are a bunch of drunken pool-playing yobbos?
So much for "music for the people of a community", more like "music for the small minority of people who play it"
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Dr. Dow
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All my crew are classically trained, most speak Greek and Latin, but they listen to ITM all the time rather than classics. We all think it trains the ear, making it quicker to pick tunes up and remember them. It also means you are not frightened by silly key signatures or 7/8.
P.S. Mahlers 1 and 5 (slow movement) are my favorites
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by geoffwright
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It's about music not semantics. If a word upsets you, you've missed the point. There are alot of people who get into this stuff for reasons other than the sound of it (some people even think it's trendy).
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by ...
"Folk"?
The more I get into The Music, and the more people I meet, the more I am aware of the musicians of all levels of ability who are active in both camps - the "classical" (for want of a better word) and non-classical (irishtrad, "folk" - whatever that means, jazz, etc).
Speaking for myself, I have no difficulty in reconciling both; when I'm in an orchestra I'm not thinking about ITM, and when I'm in a session, "classical" music is the furthest from my thoughts. When I'm practicing at home I'll regularly change from one instrument to the other (fiddle for ITM, and cello for classical) without a problem - confuses the neighbours no end, they can't work out who the invisible second player is!
Trevor
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Trevor Jennings
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Michael, semantics, in this case, are used to convey mental images of a particular musical genre. It's not exactly upsetting, more bemusing. I'm bemused, not by the F-word itself, but, to repeat, the sense in which it can be used.
If I've missed a particular point, I await you to put me right on it, with your vastly greater knowledge of such things.
Danny.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Rudall the time
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I suppose it's mostly about labels - I'd agree with earlier postings that folk music conjures up images of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, the Clancy Brothers (remember the Aran jumpers!), the Dubliners and more recently the Fureys. Having lived some time in England I also recall Folk clubs where singers would sing those interminable songs with their eyes closed and in between we might get a rendition of Miss McCleod's reel, the Boys of Bluehill or the Irish Washerwoman from a couple of musicians. With the arrival of the Bothy Band and, in my case, the discovery of Fleadh Cheoils instrumental music and what we all understand as trad became "yer only man" !! I don't intend in any way to denigrate the Folk scene - it's just a matter of personal taste.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Bannerman
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I don't think there is anything wrong with the term folk music. It's not a precise enough description to describe what we play, because the term covers many other forms of music as well, but it would be true to say that Irish Traditional music is a folk music, as is blues, Gallego Music, Calypso etc etc ad nauseum. The term has picked up certain maybe unfortunate associations over the years (Arran jumpers, and wimpy long haired girls sitting on stools intoning Appalachian dirges included), but these nearly all reflect the nexus where folk meets the commercial mainstream, which was always inevitably going to be an embarrassingly crass point.
As far as the folk music being infused with notions of class, of course it is, as it is an artform which comes from people themselves who are not trained to do certain things in an established (Establishment?) manner. The growth of the awareness and 'revival' of folk music in England and and America were always associated with left wing political moments (In America the Communists and Wobblies, and in England The Communist Party and The Workers Music Association, which led to the formation of Topic Records). But a lot of people interested in 'Folk' music for political reasons were (are?) also interested in the re-appropriation of "intellectual' musics (Classical et al) and a general raising of cultural consciousness.
I think Mahler's Second Symphony is ALMOST as exciting as hearing a good session in full swing, it's just shame we can't hear it down the boozer, pint of Guinness in hand...
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Ottery
Re: the F word
Bannerman - you have a problem with people singing with their eyes closed? I can't remember precisely what Joe Heaney had to say on the subject, but in essence I think it was that the singer sang with eyes closed or cap pulled down or even facing the wall out of modesty, and a need to inhabit the song in order to communicate it to the listener (I don't mean to suggest there's only one person listening, but that ideally each person present will fell that the music is being rendered personal, and personally, to them). Of course it's to be hoped that the song is one worthy of such care and attention. Which often they're not. And it seems to me that, singing being such an intimate act, it's much more toe-curlingly awful when it's not "just right". And that seems, unfortunately, to put many off singing altogether.
You know, I've heard people use the N word (nyah - spelled?) perjoratively as well, but I can't see that bothering anyone here. Follow the example of dykes and n!ggas everywhere and RECLAIM THE F WORD!
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by nastyweegirl
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I don't have a problem with singers performing with their eyes closed - it's just one of those images which I always associate with "Folk" music. While I would be the first to admit that any good session should always have one or two (maybe more depending on the quality of the singers present) songs they should definitely not be more than 10 verses long or be of the "Paddy McGinty's Goat" type! Sorry I don't mean to start a new thread here on songs at sessions as I think the subject has already been well covered some months ago.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Bannerman
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Ottery, in mentioning "people interested in 'Folk' music for political reasons" I think you've brought into focus my problem with the particular bunch of "folkies" that put me off in my ignorant and misguided youth.
In folk music (or church music, or early music, or any other kind of music) when politics or ideology or whatever else you want to call it takes over, when music becomes a vehicle for axe-grinding, the music itself always suffers, it seems to me. And I think I met a few of that sort of folkie before I knew that they didn't constitute the whole scene.
That's one thing that has kept me hanging round the fringes of Irish trad and staying in touch with what the good folk on this discussion board have to say about it - the *music* is first and foremost, and sure, the historical/political background is there... but the music it is never reduced to being a vehicle for a message.
(Sorry, Danny, that's a diversion from your original post.)
(Aside No.2 - all this talk of Mahler reminds me of a giggle we often have to ourselves when couples come to choose their wedding music - they've obviously had some terrible experience with classical music in their past and they often say "well, we'd like something classical but we don't want anything *heavy*". Then we laugh to ourselves - we're a quartet, for pete's sake, whadda they think we're gonna play, Mahler's Fifth?)
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Tish
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Umm, that could be read as implying that I think the expression of human emotion and struggle in a lot of folk music is "axe grinding" and I didn't mean to say that at all. I see politics and ideology as a quite separate thing.
On that note, I'll go the way of Dow. Aussie shift signing off for the day, g'night.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Tish
Re:
I don't mind "asides" like those, as they are written clearly, intelligently and from the heart, unlike the outpourings from he of the painful digits.
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by Rudall the time
Re: Folk
Tish - "The Knot Garden", perhaps - sorry, that's just one of my terrible experiences with (what's commonly known as) classical music rearing it pug-ugly head!
Lucky you, Tish - I've heard Irish Trad used as a vehicle for a message too often for comfort; in fact I've avoided it in the past for that very reason, but these days I have more sense.
Well, a little more.
And self-conciously musical "sophisticates" can shove it where the sun don't shine. Music of whatever genre is neither use nor ornament if it doesn't communicate to people and move them. I used to know an opera singer who was forced, being relatively unknown, to perform a lot of new music, and she used to bewail the fact that she couldn't tell half the time whether whether it was over her head or just sh!te. I don't think the problem was entirely with her. Michael Tippett I saw quoted as saying he refused to "write down" to people - for f##k's sake!
# Posted on September 1st 2003 by nastyweegirl
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Semantics is indeed used to convey mental images of musical genres, that's the problem. Music is not about mental images, it's about abstract aural images.
It don't matter if you wear an arran jumper and drink old speckled hen from a puter tankard. That's just fashion, but if you're into it for that then you are truly sad.
And if you are sad because people lump you together with the arran jumpers, try closing your eyes.
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by ...
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Tish, depending on where you are coming from, you could say that, say, The Workers Music Association facilitated the preservation/revival of folk music, or hijacked it for their own ends. Either way Ewan McColl would never have bothered collecting and broadcasting all those songs about herring fishing without the ideological commitment in addition to the love of the tunes.... Um I think I'm digging myself into a hole here.
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Ottery
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reminds me a bit of the art/craft debate in the visual arts, kinda silly...
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by geb
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I thought that distinction was quite simple. In crafts, it's about making nice beautiful objects per se, for their own intrinsic aesthetic. In art, you may well do that also, but true art's real function was to convey higher human values, such as the emotional, intellectual and spiritual. Like all of these definitions there will be huge expanses of grey areas in between these two poles.
Conversely, if you were to apply those definitions to The Music or Folk music vis-avis "classical" music, then The Music does the intellectual/emotional/spiritual job nearly as well as classical does.
*In my view.*
Danny
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Rudall the time
Re:
Most of the people I know here in Manchester, would rather have their fingernails pulled out than go to a folk club .
Some clubs are relaxed and friendly most are not. If your not one of the "in crowd" you will be made to feel uncomfortable.
I don't much like the term Folk used to describe UK trad music because to my ears it has an early 20th century semi fascist ring to it, especially when used as "The Folk".
I see myself as a musician first and a trad music is just one of the pies (all be it the biggest) I've got my fingers in. I don't see any barriers between musical genres and if I like some thing I'll have it.
All the best PP
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Pied Piper
Re:
I see your point there, Ottery, and would agree that sometimes music and ideology can coexist.
In my case, I was referring more to individuals whose personal brand of politics dominates their playing - for example, those that adopt a style of music and a particular way of playing (and a particular attitude to their audience and the "employer" who's paying the bill) not not out of a love or aptitude but because it fits their brand of *-ism (*insert appropriate flavour here). Music from that sort of player can be soul-destroying and seems to please only like-minded individuals.
(Nastyweegirl, there is a definite downside to coming into this scene completely cold and late-ish in life but the upside is that what little I know about Irish trad comes from this site and from links/recordings/contacts obtained from it, which is why I have indeed been lucky to avoid experiences such as you mention!)
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Tish
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Sorry to hark back to (much) earlier posting, (I havn't been on for a while),
Dow-man, I LOVE that aussie festivals are 'Folk' festivals! that was one of the huge problems i had with festivals in Ireland, That it's ALL irish trad... I love how here you can go and get dose of balkan dance music or georgian singing or indian dance at all the festies, I'd go mad otherwise! I think the beautiful thing in the aussie scene is that even though you devote your life to trad, you exist in a musical environment that encoureges and supports many cultures, and that there all treated pretty much the same (and where there not, its fairly generaly recognised that they should be). Probably my LEAST favourite festies here are the 'celtic' ones, that just serve up the same scottish and irish acts year after year..
(cue Australian anthem, tim brooke-taylor style...) thats what makes the australian so bloody good, that all musicians can come together as brothers and sisters, arm in arm, in one big group hug of musical experience, building a bridge to a future without prejudice and segregation of styles, where a corkman plays a Chinese tune with an Argentinian, backed by a digeridoo and one of those african harp things!
(or is that just the latest exercise in musical banality from RealWorld?)
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by SirNose
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I think the fact that they're called "folk festivals" must be an English thing originally (think Cambridge/Sidmouth etc). And I found that really weird because Aussies generally seem to be more interested in their Irish ancestry than anything Pommie. But the folk festivals are more based on the English model I think. I also love the fact that it's not all just Irish trad. Also it's not always separate types of music going on either, they are sometimes truly mixed - like when people drop a couple of Macedonian tunes into an Irish set of jigs. That would be completely normal at the National. I guess you have to start somewhere. As for building a bridge to the future? With the Howard government in power you're working against the powerful machine that is the real Aussie attitude to people who are different - you'd be building an illegal bridge over the barbed wire fence of Woomera... (brothers and sisters my a*se!)
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow
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Yeah, It's hard to be proud of your countries multicultural heritage when the current government seems hell bent on creating a south-east asian south africa....
And I agree that the current folk scene was an offshoot of the english scene (i mean the national was started up by Danny spooner and Martin Wyndham-read in the sixties, how englishy can you get!) But even the english festies i went to (Sydmouth/Witby) were still almost exclusivly (to use a aussie folk scene cacthword) Anglo-Celtic in content.
I do think australia has something vauguly unique to offer there. This reminds me (gratuitous name drop ahead!) of a conversation with monseir Andy Irvine earlier this year, where he commented that Oz IS different from the US and UK models, were they tend to have 'theme' festivals, like an African or a asian music festival, and the irish model, were they pretty much only ever play Irish music from the 30sq/km district around the fest.
As for that bridge... well, after we remove the hard-righters in power now, at least we can start to REbuild the bridge to where we were 10 or so years ago!
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by SirNose
And come to think of it, the director of the national in its early to mid ninties heyday is now director of that great depository of english music archives, Cecil Sharpe House.... Its a pommy conspiracy! their is no aussie scene, its all just a neo-colonial facade! i new i'd been humming morris tunes WAY too often recently...
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by SirNose
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Why do you think they sent ME here SirNose? Didn't you suspect that I was supposed to infiltrate the scene and pollute it with some English tunes?! Let's have some Morris dag on Thursday - see how bb likes that
Well, 
maybe it actually works to the advantage of the session scene in the long-run, a scene which has been allowed to develop on its own, so that now (as you've said yourself) an Aussie trad "style" seems to have emerged. Because of the huge distance between Oz and its ex-mum, the "folk" and "trad" scenes have gone off in different directions. Perhaps the music itself has become "an expression of the people of the community" rather than "an expression of a minority of musicians" or "an offshoot of the English scene"...
I was thinking maybe Sidmouth/Cambridge etc have been too affected by commercial "folky" singer-songwriter acts to have any room for a multicultural "scene". They *do* have big acts from exotic places, but you're right I don't think you get as much of the enthusiasts-sitting-down-together-in-a-bar-to-play-Macedonian-tunes type thing going on over there as here in Oz. I rather think that things would be different if the Aussie festivals could afford to fly out more big, commercial acts. You know how it is over here - they won't fly out 'cause they'll make a loss and it wouldn't be worth their while
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow
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Dow, your a wise man, even for an english music mole... I think the best thing abour the scene is that it can't support 'superstars" it a)keeps the muso's a bit more normal and less "holier than thou" and b)stops the development of Rusbyism.. where every player wants to sound like Kate Rusby or Mick McGoldrick coz they'll sell more CDs... and the 'big name' artists themselves pump out middle of the road easy-listening dross so they don't lose their audience
(not that that will stop me complaining about how you can't make any money in the music here....)
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by SirNose
Is Thursday for real?
Yobbo pool players, monostable meditators, inverted millinery, lunatics armed with knives and rubber bands... and now *Morris tunes*?
?8>/
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Tish
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"English music mole!"... watch it or next time I hear you start a set I shall wait until you've finished playing the 1st tune and then jump right in with a morris tune as loudly as I can on my concertina. I'll swing it round in the air to get more volume to drown out your flute, and I'll just... keep on playing until you have to stop (-:
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow
It's the Aussie shift again dudes, but where's bb? I was just reading on another thread how the Aussie shift is supposedly dominating this site ',:-\
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow
Re:
Fair play Sirnosealot and Dowindex. Struth mate shes a banging like a dunny door on a windy day in here. I think bb has gone over to another site where they serve Vb...as to the Aussie shrift, maybe its because they've all got their heads down on the dark side of the world.I myself enjoy typing a few lines on music and related threads in my breaks at work.Yes the national may have it's downside-but it IS OUR festival and has not yet succumbed to the Corporate mind of other major Oz festivals.Get on the committee and change it for the better (except you musicmoleman) and be proactive. Couldn't agree more about the recycling of acts at the "Celtic Theme Park" festivals.
Have a great and glorious second day of spring!
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Greenwiggle
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If I was on the committee I'd make the whole thing a dubious morris festival!
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow
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Hi - I'm here, just busy. yes the National is our festival - very much agreed. I heard that they had one irish dance act this last fest and 8 morris dance acts. I mean - that is seriously *8* too many!! Maybe I should go for grahams job and turn the national around
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by bb
3rd day of spring greenwiggle - the date is all wrong cause this site is from the other side of the world
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by bb
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BB...IMO one Irish dance act is enuf...only kidding, at least they try to remain semi-traditional and none of the riverdancing/hair extensions/pre-recorded taps palava.
I don't mind the rumptytumpty style of music on the accordion, but what is it dancing with the handkerchiefs, bells and smacking bits of sticks??? (Please note this is a wind-up-ALL traditional musics have the right to exist and deserve respect for riding the waves of oppressive fashion and fads.)
Dow: dubious morris festival...an oxymoron?
Nothing wrong with a bit o morris every know and then...once every twenty years should suffice
Second day bb- I slept through the first one.
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Greenwiggle
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There's absolutely nothing wrong with a bit of dag now and then. There's so much more to morris than the Rakes Of Mallow. Now there's a tune I haven't heard in far too long. Have to put it into a set with something else. What about the Up Downey reel
(Please note this is a wind-up - I would never juxtapose the Up Downey reel with such a great tune)
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow
Re:
gfeg fegf|egfe a3g|bagb agfB|egfd e4||G2B2 G2B2|G2B2 cBAG|F2A2 F2A2|F2A2 dcBA.... hehehe
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow
Re:
Hmm - you'd be the expert on *dag* Mr Dow!
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by bb
Re:
the worst part is that coz i'm an ABC newbie i just played through that little post on me flute....! i think i'm psychlogically scarred forever! d*mn u Englishmoleman!
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by SirNose
Re:
Sirnose,
I used to trawl through Dows ABC postings but now I just ignore them (Very cheeky grin !8>).
Maybe we should call him morrismusicmoleman?
Dow- could you please consider the neighbours and stop coming home p*%$ed at all hours? It's not the swearing and fumbling and technicolour yawns on their postbox that annoys them...its the bloody bells you wear on your boots! You have all the dogs in the street yowling in terror and running from an imaginary herd of fuelled up cursing cats!
But don't worry, I have some fotos of bb from a few years back that bring new meaning to the term "dag". I would download them 'cept I have no scanner and a few scruples...or is that scruloose?
willnae see yez 2night, but talk soonish.
M
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Greenwiggle
Re:
hey!!!!!!! I was always cool - at the cutting edge of fashion - sure I was a hippie - but that was really cool 5 years ago!!
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by bb
Re:
Got to see those photies Wiggle-man!
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow
PS I was a bit of a hippy 5 years ago too. Very very embarrassing wacky clothes, but then you'll never see them. What a shame!
# Posted on September 2nd 2003 by Dr. Dow