mg, you didn't happen to catch the prog on TV t'other night on last years Celtic Connections did you?
As a big fan of English Folk Music, I just wondered what you made of the English Band?
If you didn't see it:
It was a double header.
first half:
- a brilliant group playing wonderful, wonderful Québécois music, a dazzling group of multi-instrumentalists playing, Boxes, Fiddles, H-Gurdy's, neat Guitar player, Jews Harp & smashing solo dancing etc etc all with skill, taste & imaginative arrangements - & just four of them.
- 2nd half:
an English band of about 2 dozen musicians, with a brass & horn section, which to me, sounded like they were all playing inside a Bin Lorry.
I thought the music was drab & dreary & made the thought of watching paint dry sound really exciting.
The tunes, for me had very little going for them & made me think of some of the great old French & Breton tunes which also have very few notes, but really kick ass.
I believe much of the English reportoire came originally from across the channel so it makes me wonder how they have managed to ruin so much of it!
It was such an amazing contrast, four guys who had it, & twenty odd, who, to me anyway, sounded like they were still looking for it, but perhaps in all the wrong places!
"If they're going to do this right they should do documentaries on featured artists e.g. Bert Jansch or Sandy Denny. "
Aye, but I think these progs are all supposed to be on English artists & I see they have Bert Jansch in there too!
Surely he's Scottish isn't he?
The Thieving Bast*rds!
"Bert began performing his unique synthesis of folk, blues and jazz on the folk club scene of the early sixties, having hitch-hiked to London from his hometown of Edinburgh."
English folk is exactly what it says, folk music, mainly songs and some tunes, from England.
The song tradition is embedded in the working classes, songs of war, love, sedition and the like. Millers' songs, Hatters' songs, miners' songs, songs of struggle, hunger more sedition. Absolutely marvellous, to the discerning ear.
I went back home after my first year in London to find a folk club where no folk club had been. "What's this I cry, what's this, that ever bannen be? A folk club on my home island, where no folk club had been ?"
It was there that someone told me about a club in Wood Green, not too far from where I was living. People there sang american songs, played 5-string banjos and autoharps and 12-string guitars, and introduced artists like Bert Jansch, and Davy Graham, and Alex Campbell. Then one evening the compere said, "Here's So-And-So, a traditional singer from South London", and this fellow with a beard and a pint pot stood up and began, "Well here's good luck to the pint pot, good luck to the barleymow", and it was like a lightbulb went on over my head, and suddenly, somehow, I understood a cultural reference when previously everyone had been singing about hunting with a dog named blue and it hadn't meant anything.
And so I came to love english folk music, because I understood it.
Then, of course, I got introduced to ITM, by a young lady with a fiddle, and a merry smile, and the rest is history.
But don't knock the english.
Oh, and, Ptarmy, England's best-loved, most influential guitarist, is called Martin. You decide which surname.
It wasn't really on the BBC, it was on a channel you have to pay for!!!
If I can get folk on the radio, why doesn't my license fee include folk on BBC 1 or 2 ???
I do love the tunes from the Northumbrian tradition.
Those barmy monologues from that part of the country too are good steam.
But I'm afraid I just don't get a huge percentage of the music I've heard.
Granted, I haven't heard it all, but what I have heard doesn't make me want to rush out & listen to more, I'm afraid.
I'm sure it's different for folk who are born into it or live amongst it.
Aye, I dare say yer right about 'Martin' but you have to hand it to Bert, he did pave a few ways for others to follow.
"Bert Jansch......Edinburgh" I live and learn, Ptarmigan. When I heard Jansch around the London clubs in the sixties, he sounded so 'mid-atlantic mumble' that it never occurred to me.
"BEST people...Edinburgh" ---First Wifey was from Auld Reekie---say no more, sport!
There used to be a sign in Collett's Record Shop: "Bert Jansch does NOT give guitar lessons"
It seems that whenever some aspiring young guitarist begged Jansch for lessons, at any price, he would reply "Sure, meet you tomorrow afternoon at Collett's"......
Never knew Richard Thompson's first name was Martin.
Many of the songs came from the people, and I spent many a night performing and listening in English folk clubs. Fair enough, in the clubs you had a mix of English, Irish and Scottish stuff, but songs like the "Dalesman", "A Sheffield Grinder" and thousands of others, about real life.
A lot of people didn't like Bellowhead's live appearance at CC, apparently it was pretty flat. A shame because the EP they put out which I picked up there was f*cking stunning. I don't know that English folk music needs any saviours - try Veteran records if you need convincing - but Bellowhead are certainly capable of taking the music to places other musicians can't reach.
Bert Jansch's accent varies according to who he last spoke to - if you see him on the last night of a Scottish tour he's back to the richt wye tae spik.
Anne Briggs? Is she performing again? Why wasn't I informed? I really must get out of my bubble from time to time.
As for folk on telly, bugger that. I don't have a telly and if I did I have no interest in watching sanitised crap like Kate Rusby's monotempo Yorkshire whine. Kelso Folk Club, OTOH, has a new PA system and a great guest list, so I shall stick to that.
Unless he's hinting that Edinburgh is now becoming full of English settlers. If that's the case, he's moving into dangerous territory because everyone(all decent people, that is) is welcome here.
Anyway, Edinburgh isn't unique in that respect.
Hey ptarmigan, I've recorded the progs but not watched them yet. I thought they were called 'Folk Britannia' do they not then include music from all over the British Isles? Being more a fan of ITM then ETM I surely hope so!
flossie, how did ye manage to get the video to record off digital ? - mine keeps refusing to recognize and re-programme to the digitals - it's a swine, they always keep advancing the technology to a point where you can't work it, IMNSHO.
And..... they've had Dick Gaughan, and Hamish Imlac, and Robin Hall and Jimmy McGregor. What more do ye scots folk want ?
And did you see Colin Wilkie and Shirley Hart, and a very young Martin Winsor if I'm not mistaken ? And Tom Paley. There's good stuff in there, and historical, it's just all mixed up together.
Hamish Henderson, Archie Fisher, Aly Bain, Jeannie Robertson, Stewars of Blair, Matt McGinn, even The Corries and The McCalmans to name but a very few!!!!!
No John, don't go there - PLEEZE? Don't even think of starting a list here, of all the great Scottish Folkies! Or we'll have a right royal battle on what constitutes a 'Folkie' & what constitutes a 'Traddie'! .......& that was traddie with two d's, not two n's!
Sunday 19th - BELFAST - Belfast Boat Club.
Tickets : Belfast Welcome Centre, Tel +44 (0)28 90 246609.
Book online at www.oldflattop.com - No Credit Card surcharge! (Due to the ongoing postal strike, tickets booked online can be collected at the door of Belfast Boat Club, 12 Lockview Road from 7pm on the evening of the show)
For Folks Sake!
For Folks Sake!
Folk on TV this weekend, check out...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/listings/index.shtml?day=today&service_id=4544
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
sh*te
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by llig leahcim
Re: For Folks Sake!
Ah ha mg, I see you caught the sarcasm in the title!
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
you see when I see a phrase like "neo-psychedelic and pastoral folk albums of the 1960s." I just vomit.
This is such cringing hideousness I really have nothing more to point out that it's ALL just fashion and nothing whatsoever to do with music
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by llig leahcim
Re: For Folks Sake!
WOW - the Avengers! And Marcus Brigstocke!
It just gets better and better.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by showaddydadito
Re: For Folks Sake!
"when I see a phrase like "neo-psychedelic and pastoral folk albums of the 1960s." I just vomit"
just vomit?
what no cringeing?
or running madly into the night, screaming?
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by showaddydadito
Re: For Folks Sake!
If they're going to do this right they should do documentaries on featured artists e.g. Bert Jansch or Sandy Denny.
On one hand we should be grateful there's any folk music at all on telly; on the other we should demand quality programing for the licence fee.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Conán McDonnell
Re: For Folks Sake!
Conán, what did you just mail me?
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by blas
Re: For Folks Sake!
mg, you didn't happen to catch the prog on TV t'other night on last years Celtic Connections did you?
As a big fan of English Folk Music, I just wondered what you made of the English Band?
If you didn't see it:
It was a double header.
first half:
- a brilliant group playing wonderful, wonderful Québécois music, a dazzling group of multi-instrumentalists playing, Boxes, Fiddles, H-Gurdy's, neat Guitar player, Jews Harp & smashing solo dancing etc etc all with skill, taste & imaginative arrangements - & just four of them.
- 2nd half:
an English band of about 2 dozen musicians, with a brass & horn section, which to me, sounded like they were all playing inside a Bin Lorry.
I thought the music was drab & dreary & made the thought of watching paint dry sound really exciting.
The tunes, for me had very little going for them & made me think of some of the great old French & Breton tunes which also have very few notes, but really kick ass.
I believe much of the English reportoire came originally from across the channel so it makes me wonder how they have managed to ruin so much of it!
It was such an amazing contrast, four guys who had it, & twenty odd, who, to me anyway, sounded like they were still looking for it, but perhaps in all the wrong places!
No doubt some will disagree?
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
A nice picture of The Fonz, Blás. Can't you open it?
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Conán McDonnell
Re: For Folks Sake!
"If they're going to do this right they should do documentaries on featured artists e.g. Bert Jansch or Sandy Denny. "
Aye, but I think these progs are all supposed to be on English artists & I see they have Bert Jansch in there too!
Surely he's Scottish isn't he?
The Thieving Bast*rds!
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
Would that have been "Bellowhead", the last (oops sorry Latest) great hope for English folk music?
I wouldn't disagree either.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Johannes J
Re: For Folks Sake!
With you, Ptarmigan, that is.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Johannes J
Re: For Folks Sake!
How often have you heard that "so and so" will the saviour or future of English folk music?
English folk music has had more futures than the FTSE.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Johannes J
Re: For Folks Sake!
You got it in 1 John J - the very dudes - 'Bellowhead'. With those guys, more is certainly less!
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
Bert Jansch...Scottish?? How so, Ptarmigan?
Anne Briggs an ACT? heh, heh.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by oldstrings
Re: For Folks Sake!
"Bert began performing his unique synthesis of folk, blues and jazz on the folk club scene of the early sixties, having hitch-hiked to London from his hometown of Edinburgh."
See:
http://www.stoneyport.demon.co.uk/bio/janschbio.html
[ Sure, didn't you know oldstrings, all the BEST people come frae Edinburgh! }
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
So, yes, this does mean that the so-called English Folk scene's, arguably, best & most influential Guitarist, is in fact SCOTTISH!
I'm not going to say another word!
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
English folk is exactly what it says, folk music, mainly songs and some tunes, from England.
The song tradition is embedded in the working classes, songs of war, love, sedition and the like. Millers' songs, Hatters' songs, miners' songs, songs of struggle, hunger more sedition. Absolutely marvellous, to the discerning ear.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by bodhran bliss
Re: For Folks Sake!
I went back home after my first year in London to find a folk club where no folk club had been. "What's this I cry, what's this, that ever bannen be? A folk club on my home island, where no folk club had been ?"
It was there that someone told me about a club in Wood Green, not too far from where I was living. People there sang american songs, played 5-string banjos and autoharps and 12-string guitars, and introduced artists like Bert Jansch, and Davy Graham, and Alex Campbell. Then one evening the compere said, "Here's So-And-So, a traditional singer from South London", and this fellow with a beard and a pint pot stood up and began, "Well here's good luck to the pint pot, good luck to the barleymow", and it was like a lightbulb went on over my head, and suddenly, somehow, I understood a cultural reference when previously everyone had been singing about hunting with a dog named blue and it hadn't meant anything.
And so I came to love english folk music, because I understood it.
Then, of course, I got introduced to ITM, by a young lady with a fiddle, and a merry smile, and the rest is history.
But don't knock the english.
Oh, and, Ptarmy, England's best-loved, most influential guitarist, is called Martin. You decide which surname.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Guernsey Pete
Re: For Folks Sake!
It wasn't really on the BBC, it was on a channel you have to pay for!!!
If I can get folk on the radio, why doesn't my license fee include folk on BBC 1 or 2 ???
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by geoffwright
Re: For Folks Sake!
You don't have to pay for BBC4 it's on Freeview.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Paul_draper
Re: For Folks Sake!
Sorry Pete, but I just don't get it - all.
I do love the tunes from the Northumbrian tradition.
Those barmy monologues from that part of the country too are good steam.
But I'm afraid I just don't get a huge percentage of the music I've heard.
Granted, I haven't heard it all, but what I have heard doesn't make me want to rush out & listen to more, I'm afraid.
I'm sure it's different for folk who are born into it or live amongst it.
Aye, I dare say yer right about 'Martin' but you have to hand it to Bert, he did pave a few ways for others to follow.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
"Bert Jansch......Edinburgh" I live and learn, Ptarmigan. When I heard Jansch around the London clubs in the sixties, he sounded so 'mid-atlantic mumble' that it never occurred to me.
"BEST people...Edinburgh" ---First Wifey was from Auld Reekie---say no more, sport!
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by oldstrings
Re: For Folks Sake!
There used to be a sign in Collett's Record Shop: "Bert Jansch does NOT give guitar lessons"
It seems that whenever some aspiring young guitarist begged Jansch for lessons, at any price, he would reply "Sure, meet you tomorrow afternoon at Collett's"......
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by oldstrings
Re: For Folks Sake!
Nice one! Bet that sign would be worth a shilling or two now!
As for Edinburgh lassies, well, all I'm sayin' is I married a German lass - Vorsprung Durk
Technique!
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
Never knew Richard Thompson's first name was Martin.
Many of the songs came from the people, and I spent many a night performing and listening in English folk clubs. Fair enough, in the clubs you had a mix of English, Irish and Scottish stuff, but songs like the "Dalesman", "A Sheffield Grinder" and thousands of others, about real life.
Eh, it were great lad.
# Posted on February 10th 2006 by bodhran bliss
Re: For Folks Sake!
A lot of people didn't like Bellowhead's live appearance at CC, apparently it was pretty flat. A shame because the EP they put out which I picked up there was f*cking stunning. I don't know that English folk music needs any saviours - try Veteran records if you need convincing - but Bellowhead are certainly capable of taking the music to places other musicians can't reach.
Bert Jansch's accent varies according to who he last spoke to - if you see him on the last night of a Scottish tour he's back to the richt wye tae spik.
Anne Briggs? Is she performing again? Why wasn't I informed? I really must get out of my bubble from time to time.
As for folk on telly, bugger that. I don't have a telly and if I did I have no interest in watching sanitised crap like Kate Rusby's monotempo Yorkshire whine. Kelso Folk Club, OTOH, has a new PA system and a great guest list, so I shall stick to that.
Cheers,
Calum
# Posted on February 11th 2006 by Calum
Re: For Folks Sake!
If people from Glasgow are called Glaswegians and people from Aberdeen are called Aberdonians
What are people from Edinburgh called?
# Posted on February 11th 2006 by Pied Piper
Re: For Folks Sake!
English
# Posted on February 11th 2006 by Pied Piper
Re: For Folks Sake!
If you'd followed up your first statement with Edinbegians or Edinbonians I could have seen some kind of logic Piper.
Or, has someone moved the border since I was last over.
With Yorkshire being, to all intents & purposes, a separate country now, I think we Scots have a safe buffer zone between us & the English.
Edinburgers is the only name I am aware of.
Now behave yersel' Piper or we'll tak awa' yer Pipin' licence!
# Posted on February 11th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
Unless he's hinting that Edinburgh is now becoming full of English settlers. If that's the case, he's moving into dangerous territory because everyone(all decent people, that is) is welcome here.
Anyway, Edinburgh isn't unique in that respect.
# Posted on February 11th 2006 by Johannes J
Re: For Folks Sake!
Hey John, Re: 'English Setters'
I worked with a number of English & Red Setters, in my time as a Gamekeeper, & found them to be some of the dopiest dogs around!
Now yer wee Scottie, on the other hand, is a thrawn wee bast*rd as a rule, so maybe these dogs adopt their respective nation's character?
# Posted on February 11th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
Hey ptarmigan, I've recorded the progs but not watched them yet. I thought they were called 'Folk Britannia' do they not then include music from all over the British Isles? Being more a fan of ITM then ETM I surely hope so!
# Posted on February 11th 2006 by flossie
Re: For Folks Sake!
flossie, how did ye manage to get the video to record off digital ? - mine keeps refusing to recognize and re-programme to the digitals - it's a swine, they always keep advancing the technology to a point where you can't work it, IMNSHO.
And..... they've had Dick Gaughan, and Hamish Imlac, and Robin Hall and Jimmy McGregor. What more do ye scots folk want ?
And did you see Colin Wilkie and Shirley Hart, and a very young Martin Winsor if I'm not mistaken ? And Tom Paley. There's good stuff in there, and historical, it's just all mixed up together.
# Posted on February 12th 2006 by Guernsey Pete
Re: For Folks Sake!
"What more do you Scots folk want?"
Hamish Henderson, Archie Fisher, Aly Bain, Jeannie Robertson, Stewars of Blair, Matt McGinn, even The Corries and The McCalmans to name but a very few!!!!!
# Posted on February 12th 2006 by Johannes J
Re: For Folks Sake!
No John, don't go there - PLEEZE? Don't even think of starting a list here, of all the great Scottish Folkies! Or we'll have a right royal battle on what constitutes a 'Folkie' & what constitutes a 'Traddie'! .......& that was traddie with two d's, not two n's!
# Posted on February 12th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
So any ideas where I can get the T-shirt that says:
"Keep playing - for Folk's sake!"
from?
# Posted on February 12th 2006 by Jay-eye
Re: For Folks Sake!
Hey Jay-eye, if they do make them, this is the place to find them:
http://www.t-shirtcountdown.com/t-shirts/weird.html
# Posted on February 12th 2006 by Ptarmigan
Re: For Folks Sake!
Speaking of Martins:
Martin Taylor in Ulster:
Wednesday 15th February - LETTERKENNY - Arts Centre. Tel +353 (0)74
91 29186
Thursday 16th - MONAGHAN - Market House Arts Centre. Tel +353 (0)47
71114
Saturday 18th - ARMAGH - Marketplace Theatre. Tel +44 (0)28 37 521821
Sunday 19th - BELFAST - Belfast Boat Club.
Tickets : Belfast Welcome Centre, Tel +44 (0)28 90 246609.
Book online at www.oldflattop.com - No Credit Card surcharge! (Due to the ongoing postal strike, tickets booked online can be collected at the door of Belfast Boat Club, 12 Lockview Road from 7pm on the evening of the show)
# Posted on February 13th 2006 by Ptarmigan