September 2010 Issue 102

Older members of my family always seemed to have an inexhaustible supply of enjoyable old songs. Folk songs, on the other hand, were quite a different kettle of fish. Brutal tone-deaf school music teachers used them every Friday afternoon in term time to torture small children. I also discovered, at a musical evening one of [...]

The sounds of ships, freshening winds and pounding seas heralded the start of my first line-voyage. My vessel, a wartime cargo cow refitted to carry passengers in peacetime bobbed around in a big sea like a demented cork. Out from Southampton Water, round the corner and into the entrance of the Bay of Biscay was [...]

I first heard this cautionary tale late in the nineteen fifties. The second British Folk Revival was taking wings and old folkies with old folk songs were much in demand. This song and its singer featured in a program of traditional music on the home service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The focus of the [...]

Clearing an old cabinet I found a notebook containing several unfinished songs from the early seventies, when I spent much of my time as the MC in a musical café frequented by US servicemen, on rest and recuperation leave from the Vietnam War. Names, notes, fragments of verse brought back memories with disturbing clarity, incidents [...]

The hardest working characters in the “tradition” are “The Folk Collectors”. We owe this dedicated band of resilient individuals a mighty vote of thanks. Where would we be without their pursuit of wisdom, truth and beauty? They are heroes and heroines in folk and in fact, with no rights – only responsibilities. Most folk heroes [...]

Beer has not always been the domain of the men of the tribe. A 4000 years old clay tablet found in Mesopotamia indicated that brewing was an ongoing and highly respected profession. The master brewers were women. In Babylon, famous for its hanging (beer?) gardens, the goddesses Siris and Nimkasi were the patronesses of beer. [...]