[mplpost] what's folk?

[Richard L. Hess]

Nancy White wrote, in part:

>    In 1975,when the gifted comedienne Gay Claitman was looking for a 
> songwriter for a show called "Hey Seester Do You Want My Sailor?", 
> someone recommended me.
>    "Who is she?" Gay asked.
>    "Well, she's a folksinger," the person replied.
>     Gay told me she almost didn't call me because to her, a folksinger 
> was someone who sang "a twenty-minute song about an old man".
>     After I heard that story, I started describing my stuff as "cabaret".

I have a terrible time with the definition of "folk" and to some extent I 
either put it in quotes or try to think of some other word....especially 
for the Canadian artists I talk about a lot (like Nancy).

One of the problems that I have, as an American, is that there are people 
who have become gatekeepers who have subdivided the term "folk" and have 
carved little niches out for themselves. Here in LA, I see the same people 
going to a cross section of concerts that could broadly be designated as 
"folk" but each of them would not accept for "their" audience something the 
other would accept.

That causes, in my opinion, small and isolated groups of fans who don't get 
exposed in the individual concert series to a wide variety of music.

I would suggest to Canadians that they not necessarily follow the pattern 
of the US and divide into all the compartments such as traditional, modern, 
cabaret, folk-pop, folk-rock, worldbeat, world-folk and a zillion other 
names I've heard. One of the things I find REFRESHING about Canadian music 
is that artists feel free to cross the subtle genre boundaries. Crossing 
these boundaries and escaping easy classification can bring criticism in 
the US.

As a great fan and sometimes supporter of Canadian "folk" music, I would 
urge Canadians while developing a definition to keep it as broad as 
possible and not fall into the constraining trap that we have here. Oh, and 
even some US artists who I support have received substantial criticism over 
the years for "straying" from their folk roots.

OK enough of the blather (thanks, Nancy for a great word) from south of the 
border!

Cheers,

Richard


Richard L. Hess                              richard@richardhess.com
Glendale, CA USA                           http://www.richardhess.com/
Web page: folk and church music, photography,
                  broadcast engineering, home wiring, and more

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