Folk music
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from
Ethnic music)
includes both traditional
music
and the genre that evolved from it during the 20th century folk
revival. The term originated in the 19th century but is often applied to
music that is older than that. Some types of folk music are also called
world music.
Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as
music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music
with unknown composers. It has been contrasted with commercial and
classical styles. One meaning often given is that of old songs, with no
known composers; another is music that has been transmitted and evolved
by a process of
oral transmission or performed by custom over a long period of time.
Starting in the mid-20th century a new form of popular folk music
evolved from traditional folk music. This process and period is called
the (second) folk revival and reached a zenith in the 1960s. This form
of music is sometimes called
contemporary folk music or
folk revival music to distinguish it from earlier folk forms.
[1]
Smaller similar revivals have occurred elsewhere in the world at other
times, but the term folk music has typically not been applied to the new
music created during those revivals. This type of folk music also
includes fusion genres such as
folk rock,
folk metal,
electric folk,
and others. While contemporary folk music is a genre generally distinct
from traditional folk music, in English it shares the same name, and it
often shares the same performers and venues as traditional folk music.
Even individual songs may be a blend of the two.
Traditional folk music
| Traditional folk music |
| Stylistic origins |
Traditional music |
| Cultural origins |
Individual nations or regions |
| Typical instruments |
See Folk instruments |
| Derivative forms |
|
(complete list) |
| Fusion genres |
|
|
| Other topics |
| Roots revival |
Definitions
A consistent definition of traditional folk music is elusive. The terms
folk music,
folk song, and
folk dance are comparatively recent expressions. They are extensions of the term
folk lore, which was coined in 1846 by the English antiquarian
William Thoms to describe "the traditions, customs, and superstitions of the uncultured classes."
[2] The term is further derived from the German expression
Volk, in the sense of "the people as a whole" as applied to popular and national music by
Johann Gottfried Herder and the German Romantics over half a century earlier.
[3] Traditional folk music also includes most
indigenous music.
However, despite the assembly of an enormous body of work over some
two centuries, there is still no certain definition of what folk music
(or
folklore, or the folk) is.
[4] Folk music may tend to have certain characteristics
[2]
but it cannot clearly be differentiated in purely musical terms. One
meaning often given is that of "old songs, with no known composers",
[5] another is that of music that has been submitted to an evolutionary "process of
oral transmission.... the fashioning and re-fashioning of the music by the community that give it its folk character."
[6]
Such definitions depend upon "(cultural) processes rather than abstract musical types...", upon "
continuity and
oral transmission...seen
as characterizing one side of a cultural dichotomy, the other side of
which is found not only in the lower layers of feudal, capitalist and
some oriental societies but also in 'primitive' societies and in parts
of 'popular cultures'."
[7] One widely used definition is simply "Folk music is what the people sing".
[8]
For Scholes,
[2] as well as for
Cecil Sharp and
Béla Bartók,
[9]
there was a sense of the music of the country as distinct from that of
the town. Folk music was already, "...seen as the authentic expression
of a way of life now past or about to disappear (or in some cases, to be
preserved or somehow revived),"
[10] particularly in "a community uninfluenced by art music"
[6] and by commercial and printed song. Lloyd rejected this in favour of a simple distinction of economic class
[9] yet for him true folk music was, in
Charles Seeger's words, "associated with a lower class"
[11]
in culturally and socially stratified societies. In these terms folk
music may be seen as part of a "schema comprising four musical types:
'primitive' or 'tribal'; 'elite' or 'art'; 'folk'; and 'popular'."
[12]
Music in this genre is also often called
traditional music. Although the term is usually only descriptive, in some cases people use it as the name of a genre. For example, the
Grammy Award previously used "traditional music" for folk music that is not contemporary folk music.
Characteristics
From a historical perspective, traditional folk music had these characteristics:
[11]
- It was transmitted through an oral tradition.
Before the 20th century, ordinary farm workers and factory workers were
usually illiterate. They acquired songs by memorizing them. Primarily,
this was not mediated by books, recorded or transmitted media. Singers
may extend their repertoire using broadsheets, song books or CDs, but
these secondary enhancements are of the same character as the primary
songs experienced in the flesh.
- The music was often related to national culture. It was culturally
particular; from a particular region or culture. In the context of an
immigrant group, folk music acquires an extra dimension for social
cohesion. It is particularly conspicuous in immigrant societies, where
Greek Australians, Somali Americans, Punjabi Canadians and others strive
to emphasize their differences from the mainstream. They learn songs
and dances that originate in the countries their grandparents came from.
- They commemorate historical and personal events. On certain days of
the year, such as Easter, May Day and Christmas, particular songs
celebrate the yearly cycle. Weddings, birthdays and funerals may also be
noted with songs, dances and special costumes. Religious festivals
often have a folk music component. Choral music at these events brings
children and non-professional singers to participate in a public arena,
giving an emotional bonding that is unrelated to the aesthetic qualities
of the music.
- The songs have been performed, by custom, over a long period of time, usually several generations.
As a side-effect, the following characteristics are sometimes present:
- There is no copyright on the songs. Hundreds of folk songs from the
19th century have known authors but have continued in oral tradition to
the point where they are considered traditional for purposes of music
publishing. This has become much less frequent since the 1940s. Today,
almost every folk song that is recorded is credited with an arranger.
- Fusion of cultures: In the same way that people can have a mixed
background, with parents originating in different continents, so too
music can be a blend of influences. A particular rhythmic pattern, or a
characteristic instrument, is enough to give a traditional feel to
music, even when it has been composed recently. It is easy to recognize
the presence of a bagpipe or a tabla in a piece of music. The young are
usually much less offended by the dilution or adaptation of songs this
way. Equally an electric guitar can be added to an old song. The
relevant factors may include instrumentation, tunings, voicings,
phrasing, subject matter, and even production methods.
Origins
Indians always distinguished between classical and folk music, though in
the past even classical Indian music used to rely on the unwritten
transmission of repertoire.
Throughout most of human prehistory and history, listening to
recorded music was not possible. Music was made by common people during
both their work and leisure. The work of economic production was often
manual and communal.
Manual labor
often included singing by the workers, which served several practical
purposes. It reduced the boredom of repetitive tasks, it kept the rhythm
during synchronized pushes and pulls, and it set the pace of many
activities such as planting, weeding, reaping, threshing, weaving, and
milling. In leisure time, singing and playing musical instruments were
common forms of entertainment and history-telling—even more common than
today, when electrically enabled technologies and widespread literacy
make other forms of entertainment and information-sharing competitive.
[13]
Opinions differed on the origins of folk music. Some said it was art
music that was changed and probably debased by oral transmission—others
said it reflects the character of the race that produced it.
[2] Traditionally, the cultural transmission of folk music is through
learning by ear, although
notation
may also be used. The competition of individual and collective theories
of composition set different demarcations and relations of folk music
with the music of tribal societies on the one hand and of "art" and
"court" music on the other. The traditional cultures that did not rely
upon written music or had less social stratification could not be
readily categorized. In the proliferation of popular music genres, some
traditional folk music became also referred to "World music" or "Roots
music".
The English term "
folklore",
to describe traditional folk music and dance, entered the vocabulary of
many continental European nations, each of which had its folk-song
collectors and revivalists.
[2]
The distinction between "authentic" folk and national and popular song
in general has always been loose, particularly in America and Germany
[2] - for example popular songwriters such as
Stephen Foster could be termed "folk" in America.
[2][14] The
International Folk Music Council
definition allows that the term can also apply to music that, "...has
originated with an individual composer and has subsequently been
absorbed into the unwritten, living tradition of a community. But the
term does not cover a song, dance, or tune that has been taken over
ready-made and remains unchanged."
[15]
The post–World War II folk revival in America and in Britain started a
new genre, contemporary folk music and brought an additional meaning to
the term folk music. The popularity of "contemporary folk" recordings
caused the appearance of the category "Folk" in the
Grammy Awards
of 1959: in 1970 the term was dropped in favor of "Best Ethnic or
Traditional Recording (including Traditional Blues)", while 1987 brought
a distinction between "Best Traditional Folk Recording" and "Best
Contemporary Folk Recording". After that they had a "Traditional music"
category that subsequently evolved into others. The term "folk", by the
start of the 21st century, could cover
singer song-writers, such as
Donovan from Scotland and American
Bob Dylan,
who emerged in the 1960s and much more. This completed a process to
where "folk music" no longer meant only traditional folk music.
[5]
Subject matter
Apart from
instrumental music that forms a part of traditional folk music, especially
dance music traditions, much traditional folk music is
vocal music, since the instrument that makes such music is usually handy. As such, most traditional folk music has meaningful
lyrics.
Narrative verse looms large in the traditional folk music of many cultures. This encompasses such forms as traditional
epic poetry,
much of which was meant originally for oral performance, sometimes
accompanied by instruments. Many epic poems of various cultures were
pieced together from shorter pieces of traditional narrative verse,
which explains their episodic structure and often their
in medias res plot developments. Other forms of traditional narrative verse relate the outcomes of
battles and other
tragedies or
natural disasters.
Sometimes, as in the triumphant
Song of Deborah found in the
Biblical Book of Judges,
these songs celebrate victory. Laments for lost battles and wars, and
the lives lost in them, are equally prominent in many traditions; these
laments keep alive the cause for which the battle was fought. The
narratives of traditional songs often also remember
folk heroes such as
John Henry to
Robin Hood. Some traditional song narratives recall
supernatural events or mysterious deaths.
Hymns and other forms of
religious music are often of traditional and unknown origin. Western
musical notation was originally created to preserve the lines of
Gregorian chant, which before its invention was taught as an oral tradition in
monastic communities. Traditional songs such as
Green grow the rushes, O present religious lore in a mnemonic form. In the Western world,
Christmas carols and other traditional songs preserve religious lore in song form.
Work songs frequently feature
call and response
structures and are designed to enable the laborers who sing them to
coordinate their efforts in accordance with the rhythms of the songs.
They are frequently, but not invariably, composed. In the American
armed forces, a lively tradition of
jody calls ("Duckworth chants") are sung while soldiers are on the march. Professional sailors made use of a large body of
sea shanties.
Love poetry, often of a tragic or regretful nature, prominently figures in many folk traditions.
Nursery rhymes and
nonsense verse also are frequent subjects of traditional songs.
Folk song transformations and variations
Korean traditional musicians
Naxi traditional musicians
Music transmitted by word of mouth through a community, in time,
develops many variants, because this kind of transmission cannot produce
word-for-word and note-for-note accuracy. Indeed, many traditional
singers are quite creative and deliberately modify the material they
learn.
For example the words of "
I'm a Man You Don't Meet Every Day" (Roud 975) are known from a broadside in the
Bodleian Library.
[16]
The date is almost certainly before 1900, and it seems to be Irish. In
1958 the song was recorded in Canada (My Name is Pat and I'm Proud of
That). Scottish traveler
Jeannie Robertson
from Aberdeen, made the next recorded version in 1961. She has changed
it to make reference to "Jock Stewart", one of her relatives, and there
are no Irish references. In 1976 Scottish artist
Archie Fisher deliberately altered the song to remove the reference to a dog being shot. In 1985
The Pogues took it full circle by restoring all the Irish references.
Because variants proliferate naturally, it is naive to believe that
there is such a thing as the single "authentic" version of a
ballad such as "
Barbara Allen".
Field researchers in traditional song (see below) have encountered
countless versions of this ballad throughout the English-speaking world,
and these versions often differ greatly from each other. None can
reliably claim to be the original, and it is possible that the
"original" version ceased to be sung centuries ago. Any version can lay
an equal claim to authenticity, so long as it is truly from a
traditional singing community and not the work of an outside editor.
Cecil Sharp
had an influential idea about the process of folk variation: he felt
that the competing variants of a traditional song would undergo a
process akin to biological
natural selection:
only those new variants that were the most appealing to ordinary
singers would be picked up by others and transmitted onward in time.
Thus, over time we would expect each traditional song to become
aesthetically ever more appealing — it would be collectively composed to
perfection, as it were, by the community.
A literary interest in the popular ballad was not new; it dates back to
Thomas Percy and
William Wordsworth. English Elizabethan and Stuart composers had often evolved their music from folk themes, the classical
suite was based upon stylised folk-dances and
Joseph Haydn's
use of folk melodies is noted. But the emergence of the term "folk"
coincided with an "outburst of national feeling all over Europe" that
was particularly strong at the edges of Europe, where
national identity was most asserted.
Nationalist composers emerged in Central Europe, Russia, Scandinavia, Spain and Britain: the music of
Dvorak,
Smetana,
Grieg,
Rimsky-Korsakov,
Brahms,
Liszt,
de Falla,
Wagner,
Sibelius,
Vaughan Williams,
Bartók and many others drew upon folk melodies.
Regional forms
While the loss of traditional folk music in the face of the rise of
popular music
is a worldwide phenomenon, it is not one occurring at a uniform rate
throughout the world. While even many tribal cultures are losing
traditional folk music and folk cultures, the process is most advanced
"where industrialization and commercialisation of culture are most
advanced".
[17]
Yet in nations or regions where traditional folk music is a badge of
cultural or national identity, the loss of traditional music can be
slowed; this is held to be true, for instance in the case of
Bangladesh,
Hungary,
India,
Ireland,
Scotland,
Latvia,
Turkey,
Portugal,
Brittany, and
Galicia,
Greece and
Crete
all of which retain their traditional music to some degree, in some
such areas the decline of traditional music and loss of traditions has
been reversed.
This is most obvious where tourist agencies brand some regions with the word "
Celtic". Guide books and posters from
Ireland,
Scotland in Gaelic, English, Doric and Scots,
Cornwall,
Brittany and
Nova Scotia
refer to live music performances. Local government often sponsors and
promotes performances during tourist seasons, and revives lost
traditions.
Early folk music, fieldwork and scholarship
Much of what is known about pre-recording-era folk music comes to us
from scholarly fieldwork and writings. Most documented activity
regarding folk music from the era prior to electronic recording,
distribution and broadcast of folk music consists of the work of
scholars, collectors and proponents.
19th century Europe
Starting in the 19th century, interested people – academics and
amateur scholars – started to take note of what was being lost, and
there grew various efforts aimed at preserving the music of the people.
One prominent such effort was the collection by
Francis James Child in the late 19th century of the texts of over three hundred
ballads in the English and Scots traditions (called the
Child Ballads) most of which predated the 16th century.
[8]
Contemporaneously with Child came the Reverend
Sabine Baring-Gould, and later and more significantly
Cecil Sharp
who worked in the early 20th century to preserve a great body of
English rural traditional song, music and dance, under the aegis of what
became and remains the
English Folk Dance and Song Society
(EFDSS). Sharp also worked in America, recording the traditional songs
of the Appalachian Mountains in 1916–1918 in collaboration with
Maud Karpeles and
Olive Dame Campbell and is considered the first major scholar covering American folk music.
[18]
Campbell and Sharp are represented under other names by actors in the modern movie
Songcatcher.
Throughout the 1960s and early to mid-1970s, American scholar Bertrand
Harris Bronson published an exhaustive, four-volume collection of the
then-known variations of both the texts and tunes associated with what
came to be known as the Child Canon. He also advanced some significant
theories concerning the workings of oral-aural tradition.
Similar activity was also under way in other countries. One of the most extensive was perhaps the work done in
Riga by
Krisjanis Barons who between the years between 1894 and 1915 published six volumes including the texts of 217 996 Latvian folk songs; the
Latvju dainas. In Norway the work of collectors such as
Ludvig Mathias Lindeman was extensively used by Edvard Grieg in his
Lyric Pieces for piano and in other works, which became immensely popular.
Around this time, composers of
classical music
developed a strong interest in traditional song collecting, and a
number of outstanding composers carried out their own field work on
traditional song. These included
Percy Grainger and
Ralph Vaughan Williams in England and
Béla Bartók
in Hungary. These composers, like many of their predecessors, both made
arrangements of folk songs and incorporated traditional material into
original classical compositions. The
Latviju dainas are extensively used in the classical choral works of
Andrejs Jurāns,
Jānis Cimze, and
Emilis Melngailis.
North America
Locations in Southern and Central Appalachia visited by the British folklorist
Cecil Sharp
in 1916 (blue), 1917 (green), and 1918 (red). Sharp sought "old world"
English and Scottish ballads passed down to the region's inhabitants
from their British ancestors. He collected hundreds of such ballads, the
most productive areas being the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina
and the Cumberland Mountains of Kentucky.
Earliest American scholars were with the The American Folklore
Society (AFS), which emerged in the late 1800s. Their studies expanded
to include Native American music, but still treated folk music as a
historical item preserved in isolated societies as well
[19] since it is a very popular type of music. In North America, during the 1930s and 1940s, the
Library of Congress worked through the offices of traditional music collectors
Robert Winslow Gordon,
Alan Lomax
and others to capture as much North American field material as
possible. Lomax was the first prominent scholar to study distinctly
American folk music such as that of cowboys and southern blacks. His
first major published work was in 1911,
Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads.
[20]
and was arguably the most prominent US folk music scholar of his time,
notably during the beginnings of the folk music revival in the 1930s and
early 1940s.
People who studied traditional song sometimes hoped that their work
would restore traditional music to the people. For instance,
Cecil Sharp
campaigned, with some success, to have English traditional songs (in
his own heavily edited and expurgated versions) to be taught to school
children.
One strong theme amongst folk scholars in the early decades of the
20th century was regionalism. This tended to recognize the diversity of
folk music (and related cultures) based on regions of the US rather than
based on just its roots. Later, a dynamic of class and circumstances
was added to this.
[21]
The most prominent regionalists were literary figures with a
particular interest in folklore. Carl Sandburg often traveled the U.S.
as a writer and a poet. He also collected songs in his travels and, in
1927, published them in a book
American Songbag. "In his
collections of folk songs, Sandburg added a class dynamic to popular
understandings of American folk music. This was the final element of the
foundation upon which the early folk music revivalists constructed
their own view of Americanism. Sandburg's working class Americans joined
with the ethnically racially and regionally diverse citizens that other
scholars, public intellectuals, and folklorists celebrated their own
definitions of the American folk, definitions that the folk revivalists
used in constructing their own understanding of American folk music, and
an overarching American identity".
[22]
Prior to the 1930s, larger scale themes and linkages between were
mostly drawn by folk music scholars and collectors. The 1930s saw the
beginnings of larger scale themes, commonalities, themes and linkages in
folk music developing in the populace and practitioners as well, often
related to the great depression.
[23]
Regionalism and cultural pluralism grew as influences and themes.
During this time folk music began to become enmeshed with political and
social activism themes and movements.
[23] Two related developments were the U.S. Communist Party's interest in folk music as a way to reach and influence Americans,
[24]
and politically active prominent folk musicians and scholars seeing
communism as a possible better system, through the lens of the Great
Depression.
[25] Woody Guthrie is a great example of a songwriter and artist with such an outlook.
Much of the folk music growth in the 1930s was in the area of live
performance, particularly in folk festivals that began during the 1930s.
[26]
President Franklin Roosevelt was a fan of folk music, hosted folk
concerts at the White House and often patronized folk festivals.
[27]
One prominent festival was Sarah Gertrude Knott's National Folk
Festival. It moved to Washington D.C. in 1937 under the sponsorship of
the Washington Post. It remained there, held at Constitution Hall
through 1942.
[28]
Folk festivals were activist, seen as forces for social good,
integrating wartime perspectives into the process. The folk music
movement, festivals, and the wartime effort were seen as forces for
democracy, cultural pluralism, and the removal of culture and race-based
barriers.
[29]
The American folk music revivalists of the 1930s approached folk music in different ways.
[30]
"Traditionalists like Sarah Gertrude Knott and John Lomax viewed folk
music as cultural traditions from a bygone era. Functionalist
folklorists like Botkin and Alan Lomax recognized that, though rooted in
the past, folk music remained culturally relevant for the communities
that maintained the traditions. Left-wing revivalists like Charles
Seeger and Lawrence Gellert interpreted folk music as a grass-roots
cultural form that came from the people and was written for the people
such that it could be used in 'people's' struggles for social and
political rights. Despite the revivalists' various political views and
different opinions regarding the nature of authentic folk music, they
all shared an understanding of Americanism that grounded the nation's
identity in cultural pluralism and political democracy"
[30] By the end of the 1930s they along with the musicians and others had turned American folk music into a social movement.
[30]
Sometimes folk musicians became scholars and advocates themselves. For example,
Jean Ritchie
(born in 1922) was the youngest child of a large family from Viper,
Kentucky that had preserved many of the old Appalachian traditional
songs. Ritchie, living in a time when the Appalachians had opened up to
outside influence, was university educated and ultimately moved to New
York City, where she made a number of classic recordings of the family
repertoire and published an important compilation of these songs. (See
also
Hedy West)
In January 2012, the
American Folklife Center at the
Library of Congress,
with the Association for Cultural Equity, announced that they would
release Lomax's vast archive of 1946 and later recording in digital
form. Lomax spent the last 20 years of his life working on an
interactive multimedia educational computer project he called the
Global Jukebox, which included 5,000 hours of sound recordings, 400,000 feet of film, 3,000 videotapes, and 5,000 photographs.
[31]
As of March, 2012 this has been accomplished. Approximately 17,400 of
Lomax's recordings from 1946 and later have been made available free
online.
[32][33]
This is material from Alan Lomax’s independent archive, begun in
1946, which has been digitized and offered by the Association for
Cultural Equity. This is "distinct from the thousands of earlier
recordings on acetate and aluminum discs he made from 1933 to 1942 under
the auspices of the Library of Congress. This earlier collection—which
includes the famous Jelly Roll Morton, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, and
Muddy Waters sessions, as well as Lomax’s prodigious collections made in
Haiti and Eastern Kentucky (1937) — is the provenance of the American
Folklife Center"
[32] at the library of Congress
National and regional forms
Africa
Africa is a vast continent and its
regions and
nations have distinct musical traditions. The
music of North Africa for the most part has a different history from
Sub-Saharan African music traditions.
[34]
The music and dance forms of the
African diaspora, including
African American music and many
Caribbean genres like
soca,
calypso and
Zouk; and
Latin American music genres like the
samba,
rumba,
salsa; and other
clave (rhythm)-based genres, were founded to varying degrees on the music of
African slaves, which has in turn influenced
African popular music.
Asia
Many Asian civilizations distinguish between art/court/classical
styles and "folk" music, though cultures that do not depend greatly upon
notation and have much anonymous art music must distinguish the two in
different ways from those suggested by western scholars. For example the
late
Alam Lohar is a good example of a classical South Asian folk singer of great repute.
[citation needed]
Folk music of China
Archaeological discoveries date
Chinese folk music back 7000 years; it is largely based on the
pentatonic scale.
Han traditional weddings and funerals usually include a form of
oboe called a
suona and apercussive ensembles called a
chuigushou. Ensembles consisting of
mouth organs (
sheng), shawms (
suona),
flutes (
dizi) and percussion instruments (especially
yunluo gongs) are popular in northern villages; their music is descended from the imperial temple music of
Beijing,
Xi'an,
Wutai shan and
Tianjin.
Xi'an
drum music, consisting of wind and percussive instruments, is popular
around Xi'an, and has received some commercial popularity outside of
China. Another important instrument is the
sheng,
pipes, an ancient instrument that is ancestor of all Western
free reed instruments, such as the
accordion. Parades led by Western-type
brass bands are common, often competing in volume with a shawm/chuigushou band.
In southern
Fujian and
Taiwan, Nanyin or
Nanguan is a genre of traditional ballads. They are sung by a woman accompanied by a
xiao and a
pipa,
as well as other traditional instruments. The music is generally
sorrowful and typically deals with a love-stricken women. Further south,
in
Shantou,
Hakka and
Chaozhou,
erxian and
zheng ensembles are popular.
Sizhu ensembles use
flutes
and bowed or plucked string instruments to make harmonious and
melodious music that has become popular in the West among some
listeners. These are popular in
Nanjing and
Hangzhou, as well as elsewhere along the southern
Yangtze area. Sizhu has been secularized in cities but remains spiritual in rural areas.
Jiangnan Sizhu (silk and bamboo music from
Jiangnan) is a style of instrumental music, often played by amateur musicians in tea houses in
Shanghai; it has become widely known outside of its place of origin.
Guangdong Music or
Cantonese Music is instrumental music from
Guangzhou
and surrounding areas. It is based on Yueju (Cantonese Opera) music,
together with new compositions from the 1920s onwards. Many pieces have
influences from jazz and Western music, using syncopation and triple
time. This music tells stories, myths and legends. One of the most
popular folk songs of China is
Mo Li Hua ("Beautiful Jasmine").
Traditional folk music of Sri Lanka
The genre of Sri Lankan music is known as
Oriental music.
The art, music and dances of Sri Lanka were derived from the elements
of nature, and have been enjoyed and developed in the Buddhist
environment.
[35]
The music is of several types and uses only a few types of instruments.
The folk songs and poems were used in social gatherings to work
together. The Indian influenced classical music has grown to be unique.
[36][37][38][39]
The traditional drama, music and songs are typically Sri Lankan. The
temple paintings and carvings used birds, elephants, wild animals,
flowers and trees, and the Traditional 18 Dances display the dancing of
birds and animals. For example:
- Mayura Wannama – The dance of the Peacock
- Hanuma Wannama – The dance of the Monkey
- Gajaga Wannama – The dance of the elephant
Musical types include:
- Local drama music includes Kolam, Nadagam and Noorthy types. Kolam
music is based on low country tunes and it is not a developed form of
music. It is limited to approximately 3-4 notes and is used by the
ordinary people for pleasure and entertainment.
- Nadagam music is a more developed form of drama influenced from
South Indian street drama which was introduced by some south Indian
Artists. Phillippu Singho from Negombo in 1824 Performed “Harishchandra
Nadagama” in Hnguranketha which was originally written in Telingu
language. Later “Maname”, “Sanda kinduru” and few others were
introduced. Don Bastian of Dehiwala introduced Noorthy firstly by
looking at Indian dramas and then John De Silva developed it as did
Ramayanaya in 1886.
- Sinhala light music is currently the most popular type of music in
Sri Lanka and enriched with the influence of folk music, kolam music,
nadagam music, noorthy music, film music, classical music, western music
and others. Some artists visited India to learn music and later started
introducing light music. Ananda Samarakone was the pioneer of this and
also composed the national anthem.
The classical Sinhalese Orchestra consists of five categories of
instruments, but among the percussion instruments, the drum is essential
for dance.
[40]
The vibrant beat of the rhythm of the drums form the basic of the
dance. The dancers feet bounce off the floor and they leap and swirl in
patterns that reflect the complex rhythms of the drum beat. This drum
beat may seem simple on the first hearing but it takes a long time to
master the intricate rhythms and variations, which the drummer sometimes
can bring to a crescendo of intensity. There are six common types of
drums falling within 3 styles (one faced. two faced, and flat faced):
- The typical Sinhala Dance is identified as the Kandyan dance and the Gatabera drum is indispensable to this dance.
- Yak-bera is the demon drum or the, drum used in low country dance in
which the dancers wear masks and perform devil dancing, which has
become a highly developed form of art.
- The Dawula is a barrel shaped drum, and it was used as a companion drum in the past, to keep strict time with the beat.
- The Thammattama is flat, two faced drum. The drummer strikes the
drum on the two surfaces on top with sticks, unlike the others where you
drum on the sides. This is a companion drum to the afore mentioned
Dawula.
- A small double headed hand drum, used to accompany songs. It is mostly heard in the poetry dances (vannam).
- The Rabana is a flat faced circular drum and comes in several sizes.
The large Rabana has to be placed on the floor like a circular
short-legged table and several people (especially the womenfolk) can sit
around it and beat on it with both hands. This is used in festivals
such as the Sinhalese New Year and ceremonies such as weddings. The
resounding beat of the Rabana symbolizes the joyous moods of the
occasion. The small Rabana is a form of mobile drum beat since the
player carries it wherever he goes.
Other instruments include:
- The "Thalampata" - 2 small cymbals joined together by a string.
- The wind section, is dominated by an instrument akin to the
clarinet. This is not normally used for the dances. This is important to
note because the Sinhalese dance is not set to music as the western
world knows it; rhythm is king.
- The flutes of metal such as silver & brass produce shrill music
to accompany Kandyan Dances, while the plaintive strains of music of the
reed flute may pierce the air in devil-dancing. The conch-shell
(Hakgediya) is another form of a natural instrument, and the player
blows it to announce the opening of ceremonies of grandeur.
- The Ravanahatha
(ravanhatta, rawanhattha, ravanastron or ravana hasta veena) is a bowed
fiddle popular in Western India. It is believed to have originated
among the Hela civilisation of Sri Lanka in the time of King Ravana. The
bowl is made of cut coconut shell, the mouth of which is covered with
goat hide. A dandi, made of bamboo, is attached to this shell. The
principal strings are two: one of steel and the other of a set of
horsehair. The long bow has jingle bells[41][42] Sri Lankan composer Dinesh Subasinghe
brought few changes to this ancient instrument, he brought a unique
style and technique to play it like a Sarangi, in year 2007 for the
first time he brought this instrument to electronic media in Sri Lanka
and to the recording music industry, he also used this instrument for
A.R.Rahman's rhymes school cd and for some Indian Tamil movies.[42][43][44][45]
Australia
Folk song traditions were taken to Australia by early settlers from
England, Scotland and Ireland and gained particular foothold in the
rural
outback. The rhyming songs,
poems and tales written in the form of
bush ballads often relate to the itinerant and rebellious spirit of Australia in
The Bush, and the authors and performers are often referred to as bush bards.
[46] The 19th century was the golden age of bush ballads. Several collectors have catalogued the songs including
John Meredith whose recording in the 1950s became the basis of the collection in the
National Library of Australia.
[46]
The songs tell personal stories of life in the wide open country of
Australia. Typical subjects include mining, raising and droving cattle,
sheep shearing, wanderings, war stories, the
1891 Australian shearers' strike, class conflicts between the landless working class and the
squatters (landowners), and outlaws such as
Ned Kelly, as well as love interests and more modern fare such as
trucking.
[47] The most famous bush ballad is
Waltzing Matilda, which has been called "the unofficial national anthem of Australia."
[48]
Indigenous Australian music includes the music of
Australian Aborigines and
Torres Strait Islanders, who are collectively called
Indigenous Australians; it incorporates a variety of distinctive traditional
music styles practiced by Indigenous Australian peoples, as well as a range of contemporary musical styles of and
fusion
with European traditions as interpreted and performed by indigenous
Australian artists. Music has formed an integral part of the
social,
cultural
and ceremonial observances of these peoples, down through the millennia
of their individual and collective histories to the present day. The
traditional forms include many aspects of performance and
musical instrumentation unique to particular regions or
Indigenous Australian groups. Equal elements of musical tradition are common through much of the
Australian continent, and even beyond. The culture of the Torres Strait Islanders is related to that of adjacent parts of
New Guinea and so their music is also related. Music is a vital part of Indigenous Australians' cultural maintenance.
[49]
Europe
Celtic traditional music
Celtic music is a term used by artists, record companies, music stores and music magazines to describe a broad grouping of
musical genres that evolved out of the folk musical traditions of the
Celtic peoples. These traditions include
Irish,
Scottish,
Manx,
Cornish,
Welsh,
Breton traditions.
Asturian and galician music is often included, though there is no significant research showing that this has any close musical relationship.
Brittany's Folk revival began in the 1950s with the "bagadoù" and the "kan-ha-diskan" before growing to world fame through
Alan Stivell's work since the mid-1960s.
[50]
In
Ireland,
The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem (although its members were all Irish-born, the group became famous while based in New York's Greenwich Village),
The Dubliners,
Clannad,
Planxty,
The Chieftains,
The Pogues,
The Corrs,
The Irish Rovers, and a variety of other folk bands have done much over the past few decades to revitalise and re-popularise
Irish traditional music.
These bands were rooted, to a greater or lesser extent, in a tradition
of Irish music and benefited from the efforts of artists such as
Seamus Ennis and
Peter Kennedy.
[50]
In
Scotland,
Capercaillie,
Runrig,
Jackie Leven,
Julie Fowlis,
Karine Polwart,
Alasdair Roberts,
Dick Gaughan,
Wolfstone,
Corries,
Boys of the Lough, and
The Silencers
have keep Scottish folk vibrant and fresh by mixing traditional Scottsh
and Gaelic folks songs with more contemporary genres. These artists
have also been commercially successful in continental Europe and North
America.
Central and Eastern Europe
During the Communist era national folk dancing in the
Eastern Block
was actively promoted by the state. Dance troupes from Russia and
Poland toured non-communist Europe from about 1937 to 1990. The
Red Army Choir recorded many albums. Eastern Europe is also the origin of the Jewish
Klezmer tradition.
The
polka is a central European
dance and also a
genre of
dance music familiar throughout Europe and the Americas. It originated in the middle of the 19th century in
Bohemia. Polka is still a popular genre of folk music in many European countries and is performed by folk artists in
Poland,
Latvia,
Lithuania,
Czech Republic,
Netherlands,
Croatia,
Slovenia,
Germany,
Hungary,
Austria,
Switzerland,
Italy,
Ukraine,
Belarus,
Russia and
Slovakia. Local varieties of this dance are also found in the
Nordic countries,
United Kingdom,
Republic of Ireland,
Latin America (especially
Mexico), and in the
United States.
German
Volkslieder perpetuated by
Liederhandschriften manuscripts like
Carmina Burana date back to medieval
Minnesang and
Meistersinger traditions. Those folk songs revived in the late 18th century period of
German Romanticism, first promoted by
Johann Gottfried Herder and other advocates of the
Enlightenment, later compiled by
Achim von Arnim and
Clemens Brentano (
Des Knaben Wunderhorn) as well as by
Ludwig Uhland.
The
Volksmusik and
folk dances genre, especially in the
Alpine regions of
Bavaria,
Austria,
Switzerland (
Kuhreihen) and
South Tyrol, up to today has clinged on rustic communities against the backdrop of
industrialisation—Low German
shanties or the
Wienerlied (
Schrammelmusik) being notable exceptions.
Slovene folk music in
Upper Carniola and
Styria also originated from the Alpine traditions. Traditional
Volksmusik is not to be confused with commercial
Volkstümliche Musik variations, strongly related to German
Schlager music.
[citation needed]
The Hungarian group
Muzsikás played numerous American tours and participated in the Hollywood movie
The English Patient while the singer
Márta Sebestyén worked with the band
Deep Forest. The Hungarian
táncház movement, started in the 1970s, involves strong cooperation between musicology experts and enthusiastic amateurs.
[citation needed]
However, traditional Hungarian folk music and folk culture barely
survived in some rural areas of Hungary, and it has also begun to
disappear among the
ethnic Hungarians in
Transylvania.
The táncház movement revived broader folk traditions of music, dance,
and costume together and created a new kind of music club. The movement
spread to ethnic Hungarian communities elsewhere in the world.
Balkan music
The Balkan folk music was influenced by the mingling of Balkan ethnic groups in the period of
Ottoman Empire. It comprises the music of
Bosnia and Herzegovina,
Croatia,
Bulgaria,
Greece,
Montenegro,
Serbia,
Romania,
Republic of Macedonia,
Albania,
Turkey, the historical states of
Yugoslavia or the
State Union of Serbia and Montenegro and geographical regions such as
Thrace. Some music is characterised by complex rhythm.
An important part of the whole Balkan folk music is the music of the local
Romani ethnic minority. A
female choir from Bulgarian State Radio recorded
Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares.
Nordic folk music
Nordic folk music includes a number of traditions in
Northern European, especially
Scandinavian, countries. The
Nordic countries are generally taken to include
Iceland,
Norway,
Finland,
Sweden and
Denmark. Sometimes it is taken to include
Greenland and historically the
Baltic countries of
Estonia,
Latvia and
Lithuania.
The many regions of the Nordic countries share certain traditions,
many of which have diverged significantly. It is possible to group
together the Baltic states (or, sometimes, only Estonia) and parts of
northwest Russia as sharing cultural similarities, contrasted with
Norway, Sweden, Denmark and the Atlantic islands of, Iceland and the
Faroe Islands. Greenland's Inuit culture has its own musical traditions,
influenced by Scandinavian culture. Finland shares many cultural
similarities with both the Baltic nations and the Scandinavian nations.
The Saami of Sweden, Norway, Finland and Russia have their own unique
culture, with ties to the neighboring cultures.
Swedish folk music is a
genre of
music based largely on
folkloric collection work that began in the early 19th century in
Sweden.
[51] The primary instrument of Swedish folk music is the
fiddle. Another common
instrument, unique to Swedish traditions, is the
nyckelharpa. Most Swedish instrumental folk music is
dance music; the signature music and dance form within Swedish folk music is the
polska. Vocal and instrumental traditions in Sweden have tended to share
tunes historically, though they have been performed separately.
[52] Beginning with the
folk music revival of the 1970s,
vocalists and
instrumentalists have also begun to perform together in folk music
ensembles.
Latin and South America
Andean music comes from the general area inhabited by
Quechuas,
Aymaras and other peoples that roughly in the area of the
Inca Empire prior to European contact. It includes folklore music of parts of
Argentina,
Bolivia,
Ecuador,
Chile,
Colombia,
Peru and
Venezuela.
Andean music is popular to different degrees across Latin America,
having its core public in rural areas and among indigenous populations.
The
Nueva Canción movement of the 70s revived the genre across Latin America and bought it to places where it was unknown or forgotten.
Nueva canción (Spanish for 'new song') is a movement and genre within
Latin American and
Iberian
music of folk music, folk-inspired music and socially committed music.
It some respects its development and role is similar to the second folk
music revival. This includes evolution of this new genre from
traditional folk music, essentially contemporary folk music except that
that English genre term is not commonly applied to it. Nueva cancion is
recognized as having played a powerful role in the social upheavals in
Portugal, Spain and Latin America during the 1970s and 1980s.
Nueva cancion first surfaced during the 1960s as "The Chilean New Song" in
Chile.
The musical style emerged shortly afterwards in Spain and other areas
of Latin America where it came to be known under similar names. Nueva
canción renewed traditional Latin American folk music, and was soon
associated with revolutionary movements, the Latin American
New Left,
Liberation Theology,
hippie and
human rights movements due to political lyrics. It would gain great popularity throughout
Latin America, and is regarded as a precursor to
Rock en español.
Cueca is a family of musical styles and associated dances from
Chile,
Bolivia,
Peru, and
Argentina.
Trova and
Son are styles of traditional
Cuban music originating in the province of Oriente that includes influences from Spanish song and dance such as
Bolero and
contradanza as well as
Afro-Cuban rhythm and percussion elements.
North America
United States
American traditional music is also called roots music. Roots music is a broad category of music including
bluegrass,
country music,
gospel,
old time music,
jug bands,
Appalachian folk,
blues,
Cajun and
Native American music. The music is considered American either because it is native to the
United States or because it developed there, out of foreign origins, to such a degree that it struck
musicologists
as something distinctly new. It is considered "roots music" because it
served as the basis of music later developed in the United States,
including
rock and roll, contemporary folk music,
rhythm and blues, and
jazz. Some of these genres are considered to be traditional folk music.
- Appalachian music is the traditional music of the region of Appalachia in the Eastern United States. It is derived from various European and African influences, including English ballads, Irish and Scottish traditional music (especially fiddle music), hymns, and African-American blues. First recorded in the 1920s, Appalachian musicians were a key influence on the early development of Old-time music, country music, and bluegrass, and were an important part of the American folk music revival. Instruments typically used to perform Appalachian music include the banjo, American fiddle, fretted dulcimer, and guitar.[53] Early recorded Appalachian musicians include Fiddlin' John Carson, Henry Whitter, Bascom Lamar Lunsford, the Carter Family, Clarence Ashley, Frank Proffitt, and Dock Boggs,
all of whom were initially recorded in the 1920s and 1930s. Several
Appalachian musicians obtained renown during the folk revival of the
1950s and 1960s, including Jean Ritchie, Roscoe Holcomb, Ola Belle Reed, Lily May Ledford, and Doc Watson. Country and bluegrass artists such as Loretta Lynn, Roy Acuff, Dolly Parton, Earl Scruggs, Chet Atkins, and Don Reno were heavily influenced by traditional Appalachian music.[53] Artists such as Bob Dylan, Jerry Garcia, and Bruce Springsteen have performed Appalachian songs or rewritten versions of Appalachian songs.
- Oklahoma and southern US plains Before recorded history
American Indians in this area used songs and instrumentation; music and
dance remain the core of ceremonial and social activities.[55]
"Stomp dance" remains at its core, a "call and response" form;
instrumentation is provided by rattles or shackles worn on the legs of
women.[55]
"Other southeastern nations have their own complexes of sacred and
social songs, including those for animal dances and friendship dances,
and songs that accompany stickball games. Central to the music of the
southern Plains Indians is the drum, which has been called the heartbeat
of Plains Indian music. Most of that genre can be traced back to
activities of hunting and warfare, upon which plains culture was based."
[55]
The drum is central to the music of the southern plains Indians. During
the reservation period, they used music to relieve boredom. Neighbors
gathered, exchanged and created songs and dances; this is a part of the
roots of the modern inter-tribal powwow. Another common instrument is
the courting flute.[55]
African American folk music in the area has roots in slavery and
emancipation. "Sacred music, both a capella and instrumentally
accompanied, is at the heart of the tradition. Early spirituals framed
Christian beliefs within native practices and were heavily influenced by
the music and rhythms of Africa." [55] Spirituals are prominent, and often use a call and response pattern.[55]
"Gospel developed after the Civil War (1861–65). It relied on biblical
text for much of its direction, and the use of metaphors and imagery was
common. Gospel is a "joyful noise," sometimes accompanied by
instrumentation and almost always punctuated by hand clapping, toe
tapping, and body movement." [55]
"Shape-note or sacred harp singing developed in the early 19th century
as a way for itinerant singing instructors to teach church songs in
rural communities. They taught using song books in which musical
notations of tones were represented by geometric shapes that were
designed to associate a shape with its pitch. Sacred harp singing became
popular in many Oklahoma rural communities, regardless of ethnicity."[55] Later the blues tradition developed, with roots in and parallels to sacred music.[55] Then jazz developed, born from a blend of "blend of ragtime, gospel, and blues" [55]
"Anglo-Scots-Irish music traditions gained a place in Oklahoma after
the Land Run of 1889. Because of its size and portability, the fiddle
was the core of early Oklahoma Anglo music, but other instruments such
as the guitar, mandolin, banjo, and steel guitar were added later.
Various Oklahoma music traditions trace their roots to the British
Isles, including cowboy ballads, western swing, and contemporary country
and western." [55]
"Mexican immigrants began to reach Oklahoma in the 1870s, bringing
beautiful canciones and corridos love songs, waltzes, and ballads along
with them. Like American Indian communities, each rite of passage in
Hispanic communities is accompanied by traditional music. The acoustic
guitar, string bass, and violin provide the basic instrumentation for
Mexican music, with maracas, flute, horns, or sometimes accordion
filling out the sound." [55]
Other Europeans (such as Bohemians and Germans) settled in the late
19th century. Their social activities centered on community halls,
"where local musicians played polkas and waltzes on the accordion,
piano, and brass instruments."[55]
Later Asians contributed to the musical mix. "Ancient music and dance
traditions from the temples and courts of China, India, and Indonesia
are preserved in Asian communities throughout the state, and popular
song genres are continually layered on to these classical music forms" [55]
Canada
Canada's traditional folk music is particularly diverse,
[56].
Even prior to liberalizing its immigration laws in the 1960s, Canada
was ethnically diverse with dozens of different Indigenous and European
groups present. In terms of music, academics do not speak of a Canadian
tradition, but rather ethnic traditions (
Acadian music,
Irish-Canadian music,
Blackfoot music,
Innu music,
Inuit music,
Métis fiddle, etc.) and later in Eastern Canada regional traditions (
Newfoundland music,
Cape Breton fiddling,
Quebecois music, etc.)
"Traditional folk music of European origin has been present in Canada
since the arrival of the first French and British settlers in the 16th
and 17th centuries."
[56]
"They fished the coastal waters and farmed the shores of what became
Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, and the
St Lawrence River valley of Quebec."
[56]
The fur trade and its
voyageurs brought this farther north and west into Canada; later lumbering operations and lumberjacks continued this process.
[56]
"Agrarian settlement in eastern and southern Ontario and western
Quebec in the early 19th century established a favorable milieu for the
survival of many Anglo-Canadian folksongs and broadside ballads from
Great Britain and the US. Despite massive industrialization, folk music
traditions have persisted in many areas until today. In the north of
Ontario, a large Franco-Ontarian population kept folk music of French
origin alive.
[56]
Populous Acadian communities in the Atlantic provinces contributed
their song variants to the huge corpus of folk music of French origin
centred in the province of Quebec. A rich source of Anglo-
Canadian folk music
can be found in the Atlantic region, especially Newfoundland.
Completing this mosaic of musical folklore is the Gaelic music of
Scottish settlements, particularly in Cape Breton, and the hundreds of
Irish songs whose presence in eastern Canada dates from the Irish famine
of the 1840s, which forced the large migrations of Irish to North
America."
[56]
"Knowledge of the history. of Canada is essential in understanding
the mosaic of Canadian folk song. Part of this mosaic is supplied by the
folk songs of Canada brought by European and Anglo-Saxon settlers to
the new land. Cartier's historical journey, in 1535, to the territory
that was to become Canada initiated the immigration of the French.
Without too much delay people came from Great Britain, Germany, and
other European countries to live in close proximity. Each brought a
wealth of folk music from his homeland and some of it has survived to
this day. Barbeau has estimated that well over ten thousand French folk
songs and their variants have been collected in Canada. Many of the
ancient ones have been forgotten in France."
[11]
Music as professionalized paid entertainment grew relatively slowly
in Canada, especialy remote rural areas, through the 19th and early 20th
centuries. While in urban music clubs
dance hall/
vaudville
and later jazz became popular, rural Canada remained mostly a land of
traditional music. Yet when the radio networks stretched into Canada in
the 1920s and 30s, Canadian traditional music progessively lost audience
to American Nashville-style country music and urban styles like jazz.
The Americanization of Canadian music led
Canadian Radio League to lobby for a national public broadcaster in the 1930s in eventually leading to the creation of the
Canadian Broadcasting Corportaion
(CBC) in 1936. The CBC promoted Canadian music, including traditional
music, on its radio and later television services, but the
mid-century craze for all things "modern" led to the decline of folk music relative to rock and pop. Though the folk revival the 1960s changed this is a large degree.
Folk music revivals
"Folk music revival" refers to either a period of renewed interest in
traditional folk music, or to an event or period which transforms it;
the latter usually includes a social activism component. The most
prominent instance of the former is the British folk revival of
approximately 1890–1920. The most prominent and influential instance of
the latter (to the extent that it is usually called "
the folk
music revival") is the folk revival of the mid 20th century, centered in
the English-speaking world which gave birth to contemporary folk music.
See the "
Contemporary folk music" section for a description of this revival.
One earlier revival influenced western
classical music. Such composers as
Percy Grainger,
Ralph Vaughan Williams and
Béla Bartók, made field recordings or transcriptions of folk singers and musicians.
In Spain,
Isaac Albéniz (1860–1909) produced piano works reflect his Spanish heritage, including the
Suite Iberia (1906–1909).
Enrique Granados (1867–1918) composed
zarzuela, Spanish light opera, and
Danzas Españolas - Spanish Dances.
Manuel de Falla (1876–1946) became interested in the
cante jondo of Andalusian
flamenco, the influence of which can be strongly felt in many of his works, which include
Nights in the Gardens of Spain and
Siete canciones populares españolas ("Seven Spanish Folksongs", for voice and piano). Composers such as
Fernando Sor and
Francisco Tarrega established the
guitar as Spain's national instrument. Modern Spanish folk artists abound (
Mil i Maria,
Russian Red, et al.) modernizing while respecting the traditions of their forebears.
Flamenco grew in popularity through the 20th century, as did northern styles such as the Celtic music of
Galicia. French classical composers, from
Bizet to
Ravel, also drew upon Spanish themes, and distinctive Spanish genres became universally recognized.
Folk music revivals or
roots revivals
also encompass a range of phenomena around the world where there is a
renewed interest in traditional music. This is often by the young, often
in the traditional music of their own country, and often included new
incorporation of social awareness, causes, and evolutions of new music
in the same style.
Nueva canción, a similar evolution of a new form of socially committed music occurred in several Spanish speaking countries.
First British folk revival
The "first"
British folk revival was a
roots revival
which occurred approximately 1890–1920 and was marked by heightened
interest in traditional music and its preservation. It arose from
earlier developments, perhaps combined with changes in the nature of
British identity, led to a much more intensive and academic attempt to
record what was seen as a vanishing tradition, and is now usually
referred to as the first English or British folk revival.
Contemporary folk music
Starting in the mid-20th century a new form of popular folk music
evolved from traditional folk music. This process and period is called
the (second) folk revival and reached a zenith in the 1960s. The most
common name for this new form of music is also "folk music", but is
often called "contemporary folk music" or "folk revival music" to make
the distinction.
[1] This type of folk music also includes fusion genres such as
folk rock,
electric folk,
and others. While contemporary folk music is a genre generally distinct
from traditional folk music, it often shares the same English name,
performers and venues as traditional folk music; even individual songs
may be a blend of the two.
Definitions of "contemporary folk music" are generally vague and
variable. Here it is taken to mean all music that is called folk that is
not traditional music, a set of genres that began with and then evolved
from the folk revival of the mid-20th century. According to Hugh
Blumenfeld, for the American folk scene, in general it is:
- "Anglo-American, embracing acoustic and/or tradition-based music from the U.K. and the United States.
- Mainly European in its musical origins and linguistically predominantly English-based.
- The few exceptions to this model are derived mainly from prevailing
political/historical conditions in the Anglo-American world and the
demographics of folk fans: Celtic music, blues, some Central and South
American music, Native American music, and Klezmer."[57]
This is the common use of the term "contemporary folk music", but is
not the only case of evolution of new forms from traditional ones. Nueva canción, a similar evolution of a new form of socially committed music, occurred in several Spanish-speaking countries, for example.
Contemporary
country music descends ultimately from a rural American folk tradition but has evolved differently.
Bluegrass music is a professional development of American
old time music, intermixed with
blues and
jazz.
Folk revival of the mid-20th century in the English-speaking countries
While the Romantic nationalism of the folk revival had its greatest
influence on art-music, the "second folk revival" of the later 20th
century brought a new genre of
popular music
with artists marketed through concerts, recordings and broadcasting.
This is the genre that remains as "contemporary folk music" even when
traditional music is considered to be a separate genre. One of the
earliest figures in this revival was Woody Guthrie.,
[58]
who sang traditional songs in the 1930s and 1940s as well as composing
his own. Among Guthrie's friends and followers as a collector,
performer, and composer was
Pete Seeger.
In the 1930s
Jimmie Rodgers, in the 1940s
Burl Ives, in the early 1950s Seeger's group
The Weavers and
Harry Belafonte, and in the late 1950s
The Kingston Trio as well as other professional, commercial groups became popular. In 1963–1964, the ABC television network aired the
Hootenanny television series devoted to this brand of folk music and also published the associated magazine
ABC-TV Hootenanny. Starting in 1950 the
Sing Out!,
Broadside, and
The Little Sandy Review magazines helped spread both traditional and composed songs, as did folk-revival-oriented record companies.
In the
United Kingdom, the folk revival fostered young artists like
The Watersons,
Martin Carthy and
Roy Bailey and a generation of singer-songwriters such as
Bert Jansch,
Ralph McTell,
Donovan and
Roy Harper; all seven achieved initial prominence in the 1960s.
Bob Dylan,
Paul Simon and
Tom Paxton
visited Britain for some time in the early 1960s, the first two
especially making later use of the traditional English material they
heard.
In 1950, prominent American folklorist and collector of traditional songs
Alan Lomax came to
Britain and met
A.L. 'Bert' Lloyd and
Ewan MacColl,
a meeting credited as inaugurating the second British folk revival. In
London the colleagues opened The Ballads and Blues Club, eventually
renamed the Singers' Club, possibly the first
folk club
in the UK; it closed in 1991. As the 1950s progressed into the 1960s,
the folk revival movement gathered momentum in both Britain and America.
In much of rural Canada, traditional and country-folk music were the
predominant styles of music until the 1950s, ahead even of the
globaly-popular jazz and swing. Traditional folk took this predominance
into early Canadian television with many country-themed shows on its
early airwaves.
All Around the Circle
(1964-1975) showcased the traditional Irish- and Enlgish- derived music
of Newfoundland, for example. But by far the most important of these
was
Don Messer's Jubilee
(1957-1973) which helped to bridge the gap between rural country-folk
and the folk revival that was emerging from urban coffee shops and folk
clubs. The show helped to launch the careers of country-folk singers
Stompin' Tom Connors and
Catherine McKinnon.
The folk revival spawned Canada's first true wave of internationally successful artists such as
Ian & Sylvia,
Gordon Lightfoot,
Leonard Cohen,
Joni Mitchell, and
Buffy Sainte-Marie. At the same time Quebec folk singer-songwriters like
Gilles Vigneault and groups such as
La Bottine Souriante
were doing the same in the French-speaking world. English-speaking
Canadian folk artists tended to move the United States to pursue larger
audiences until the introduction of so-called "
Canadian content"
rules for radio and television in the 1970s. At the same time Canadian
folk music became more formalized and commercialized with the rise of
specialized
folk festivals (beginning with the
Miramichi Folksong Festival in 1958), increased radio airplay on rock, pop, and easy listening radio stations, the indroduction of the
Juno Award for Folk Artist of the Year in 1971, and even a
academic journal the
Canadian Folk Music Journal in 1973.
The mid and late 1960s saw fusion forms of folk (such as folk rock)
achieve prominence never before seen by folk music, but the early 1960s
were perhaps the zenith of non-fusion folk music prominence in the music
scene.
According to some,
[who?] during the
Depression,
folk music reflected social realities of poverty and disempowerment of
common people through vernacularized lyrics expressing the harsh
realities of hard times and poverty. Often newly composed songs in
traditional style by writers like Guthrie also featured a humorous and
satirical tone. Most of the audience for folk music in those years were
part of the working class, and many of these songs expressed resistance
to the social order and an anger towards the government.
[59]
Major performers who emerged from the 1940s to the early 1960s
Some major folk music performers who emerged during 1940s, 1950s and early 1960s were:
- Woody Guthrie (1912 –1967) was an American singer-songwriter and folk musician, whose musical legacy includes hundreds of political, traditional and children's songs, ballads and improvised works. He frequently performed with the slogan This Machine Kills Fascists displayed on his guitar. His best-known song is "This Land Is Your Land". Many of his recorded songs are archived in the Library of Congress.[60]
In the 1930s Guthrie traveled with migrant workers from Oklahoma to
California while learning, rewriting, and performing traditional folk
and blues songs along the way. Many the songs he composed were about his
experiences in the Dust Bowl era during the Great Depression, earning him the nickname the "Dust Bowl Balladeer".[61] Throughout his life, Guthrie was associated with United States communist groups, though he was never formally joined the Party.[62] Guthrie fathered American folk musician Arlo Guthrie. During his later years Guthrie served as a figurehead in the folk movement, providing inspiration to a generation of new folk musicians, including mentor relationships with Ramblin' Jack Elliott and Bob Dylan. Such songwriters as Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Bruce Springsteen, Pete Seeger, Joe Strummer and Tom Paxton have acknowledged their debt to Guthrie as an influence.
- Burl Ives
- as a youth, Ives dropped out of college to travel around as an
itinerant singer during the early 1930s, earning his way by doing odd
jobs and playing his banjo and guitar. In 1930, he had a brief, local
radio career on WBOW radio in Terre Haute, Indiana, and in the 1940s he
had his own radio show, titled The Wayfaring Stranger, titled after one of the popular ballads he sang. The show was very popular, and in 1946 Ives was cast as a singing cowboy in the film Smoky. Ives went on to play parts in other popular film as well. His first book, The Wayfaring Stranger, was published in 1948.[63]
- Pete Seeger
had met and been influenced by many important folk musicians (and
singer-songwriters with folk roots), especially Woody Guthrie and Lead Belly. Seeger had labor movement
involvements, and he met Guthrie at a "Grapes of Wrath" migrant
workers’ concert on March 3, 1940, and the two thereafter began a
musical collaboration (which included the Almanac Singers) and then formed The Weavers. As a songwriter, Seeger authored or co-authored "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?", "If I Had a Hammer (The Hammer Song)", (composed with Lee Hays of The Weavers), and "Turn, Turn, Turn!",
all three of which have been recorded by many artists both in and
outside the folk revival movement and are still sung throughout the
world. In 1948, Seeger wrote the first version of his now-classic How to Play the Five-String Banjo,
an instructional book that many banjo players credit with starting them
off on the instrument. He has recorded, sung, and performed for more
than seventy years and has become the most powerful force in the
American folk revival after Guthrie.[64]
- The Weavers were formed in 1947 by Pete Seeger, Ronnie Gilbert, Lee Hays, and Fred Hellerman.
After they debuted at the Village Vanguard in New York in 1948, they
were then discovered by arranger Gordon Jenkins and signed with Decca Records,
releasing a series of successful but heavily orchestrated single songs.
The group's political associations in the era of the Red Scare forced
them to break up in 1952; they re-formed in 1955 with a series of
successful concerts and album recordings on Vanguard Records. A fifth
member, Erik Darling,
sometimes sat in with the group when Seeger was unavailable and
ultimately replaced Seeger in The Weavers when the latter resigned from
the quartet in a dispute about its commercialism in general and its
specific agreement to record a cigarette commercial.[65]
- Harry Belafonte,
another influential performer, started his career as a club singer in
New York to pay for his acting classes. In 1952, he signed a contract
with RCA Victor and released his first record album, Mark Twain and Other Folk Favorites. His breakthrough album Calypso
(1956) was the first LP to sell over a million copies. The album spent
31 weeks at number one, 58 weeks in the top ten, and 99 weeks on the US
charts. It introduced American audiences to Calypso music and Belafonte
was dubbed the "King of Calypso." Belafonte went on to record in many
genres, including blues, American folk, gospel, and more. In 1959, he starred in Tonight With Belafonte a nationally televised special that introduced Odetta in her debut to a prime time audience. She sang Water Boy and performed a duet with Belafonte of There's a Hole in My Bucket that hit the national charts in 1961.[66]
Odetta performing in 2006
- Odetta - In 1953 singers Odetta and Larry Mohr recorded an LP that was released in 1954 as Odetta and Larry,
an album that was partially recorded live at San Francisco's Tin Angel
bar. Odetta enjoyed a long and respected career with a repertoire of
traditional songs and blues until her death in 2009.[66]
- The Kingston Trio was formed in 1957 in the Palo Alto, California area by Bob Shane, Nick Reynolds, and Dave Guard,
who were just out of college. They were greatly influenced by the
Weavers, the calypso sounds of Belafonte, and other semi-pop folk
artists such as the Gateway Singers and The Tarriers.
The unprecedented popularity and album sales of this group from 1957 to
1963 (including fourteen top ten and five number one LPs on the Billboard charts[67])
was a significant factor in creating a commercial and mainstream
audience for folk-styled music where little had existed prior to their
emergence.[68] The Kingston Trio's success was followed by other highly successful pop-folk acts, such as The Limeliters.
- The Limeliters are an American folk music group, formed in July 1959 by Lou Gottlieb (bass), Alex Hassilev (baritone), and Glenn Yarbrough
(tenor). The group was active from 1959 until 1965, when they
disbanded. After a hiatus of sixteen years Yarbrough, Hassilev, and
Gottlieb reunited and began performing as The Limeliters again.
- Joan Baez’s
career began in 1958 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where at 17 she gave
her first coffee-house concert. She was invited to perform at the
premiere Newport Folk Festival in 1959 by pop folk star Bob Gibson, after which Baez was sometimes called "the barefoot Madonna", gaining renown for her clear voice and three-octave range. She recorded her first album for a Vanguard Records
the following year – a collection of laments and traditional folk
ballads from the British Isles, accompanying the songs with guitar. Her
second LP release went gold, as did her next (live) albums. One record
featured her rendition of a song by the then-unknown Bob Dylan. In the
early 1960s, Baez moved into the forefront of the American folk-music
revival. Increasingly, her personal convictions – peace, social justice,
anti-poverty – were reflected in the topical songs that made up a
growing portion of her repertoire, to the point that Baez became a
symbol for these particular concerns.
- The Chad Mitchell Trio
began in 1959 and emerged in the early 1960s. The group performed a mix
of creatively arranged traditional songs and contemporary numbers that
frequently included satiric and political overtones.
- Bob Dylan
often performed and sometimes toured with Joan Baez, starting when she
was a singer of mostly traditional songs. As Baez adopted some of
Dylan's songs into her repertoire and even introduced Dylan to her avid
audiences, a large following on the folk circuit, it helped the young
songwriter to gain initial recognition. By the time Dylan recorded his
first LP (1962) he had developed a style reminiscent of Woody Guthrie.
He began to write songs that captured the "progressive" mood on the
college campuses and in the coffee houses. Though by 1964 there were
many new guitar-playing singer/songwriters, it is arguable that Dylan
eventually became the most popular of these younger folk-music-revival
performers.
- Peter, Paul and Mary debuted in the early 1960s and were an American trio who ultimately became one of the biggest musical acts of the 1960s. The trio was composed of Peter Yarrow, Paul Stookey and Mary Travers.
They were one of the main folk music torchbearers of social commentary
music in the 1960s. As the decade passed, their music incorporated more
elements of pop and rock.
- The Seekers,
an Australian folk and pop music group, were formed in 1962. They moved
to the UK in 1963 and blended traditional music, contemporary folk
music and pop, an illustration of the rapid evolution and
diversification of the genre. The Seekers enjoyed great popularity in
the English-speaking world with hit songs like "I Know I'll Never Find
Another You", "A World Of Our Own," and "Georgy Girl".
- Canada's duo of Ian Tyson and Sylvia Fricker, performing as Ian & Sylvia,
released their first album in 1963. The duo featured a creative mix of
traditional American and Canadian folk songs in both English and French
as well as contemporary singer-songwriter compositions by Dylan and
Paxton, and numbers that they themselves composed like "Four Strong Winds" and "Someday Soon" by Tyson and "You Were On My Mind" by Fricker.
The mid-1960s through the early 1970s
The large musical, political, lifestyle, and counterculture changes
most associated with "the 60s" occurred during the second half of the
decade and the first year or two of the 1970s. Folk music underwent a
related rapid evolution and expansion at that same time. Major changes
occurred through the evolution of established performers such as
Bob Dylan,
Joan Baez,
Judy Collins,
The Seekers and
Peter Paul and Mary,
and also through the creation of new fusion genres with rock and pop.
Dylan's use of electric instruments helped inaugurate the genres of
folk rock and
country rock, particularly by his album
John Wesley Harding.
[73]
These changes represented a further departure from traditional folk music.
The Byrds with hits such as Seeger's "
Turn! Turn! Turn!" were emblematic of a new term
folk rock.
Barry McGuire left
The New Christy Minstrels and recorded
Eve of Destruction in 1965. Other performers such as
Simon & Garfunkel and
The Mamas & the Papas created new, hard-to-classify music that was folk-inflected and often included in discussions of folk rock.
[73]
During this period, the term "protest music" was often used to
characterize folk music with topical political themes. Folk singers and
songwriters such as
Phil Ochs,
Buffy Sainte-Marie,
Arlo Guthrie and
Tom Paxton followed in
Woody Guthrie's footsteps, writing "
protest music" and
topical songs and expressing support for various causes including the
American Civil Rights Movement and anti-war causes associated with the
Vietnam War.
A number of performers who had begun their careers singing largely
traditional material, as typified by Baez and Collins, began to write
their own material.
The Canadian performers
Gordon Lightfoot,
Leonard Cohen,
Bruce Cockburn and
Joni Mitchell represented such fusions and enjoyed great popularity in the U.S.; all four were eventually invested with the
Order of Canada. Many of the
acid rock bands of San Francisco began by playing acoustic folk and blues. The
Smothers Brothers television shows featured many folk performers, including the formerly
blacklisted Pete Seeger.
[74]
Bonnie Koloc is a Chicago-based
American folk music singer-songwriter who made her recording debut in 1971, three years after several popular recordings by
Melanie, who had released her first album in 1968 with a folk/pop blend.
The late 1960s saw the advent of
electric folk
groups. This is a form of folk rock, with a focus on indigenous
(European, and, emblematically, English) songs. A key electric folk
moment was the release of
Fairport Convention's album
Liege and Lief. Guitarist
Richard Thompson declared that the music of the band demanded a corresponding "English Electric" style, while bassist
Ashley Hutchings formed
Steeleye Span to pursue a more traditional repertoire performed in the electric folk style. Exponents of
electric folk music such as
Fairport Convention,
Pentangle,
Alan Stivell and
Mr. Fox saw electrification of traditional musical forms as a means to reach a far wider audience.
Mid-1970s through present day
Starting in the 1970s folk music was fueled by new singer-songwriters such as
Steve Goodman,
John Prine,
Emmylou Harris,
Joni Mitchell,
John Denver, and many more. In the British Isles,
The Pogues in the early 1980s and Ireland's
The Corrs in the 1990s brought traditional tunes back into the
album charts. The Corrs were active from 1990 to 2006 and performed Celtic and pop music, and created a blend of the two.
Carrie Newcomer emerged with Stone Soup in 1984 and has been performing individually since 1991.
Malicorne[who?], a French electric folk group emerged in 1973, starting with traditional music and then later blended it with pop. Canadian
Stan Rogers wrote and performed folk music with strong historical and nautical themes, emerging in 1976.
Si Kahn[who?] emerged in 1974 at the more political and topical end of the folk music spectrum.
In the 1980s, artists like
The Knitters propagated
cowpunk or
folk punk, which eventually evolved into
alt country. More recently the same spirit has been embraced and expanded on by artists such as
Dave Alvin,
Miranda Stone and
Steve Earle.
In the second half of the 1990s, once more, folk music made an impact
on the mainstream music via a younger generation of artists such as
Eliza Carthy,
Kate Rusby and
Spiers and Boden. Canada's biggest selling folk group of the 1990s and 2000s was the Celtic, rock-tinged
Great Big Sea from Newfoundland, who have had 4 albums certified platinum in Canada as of 2013, and one,
Up from 1995, that when 4 times platinum.
Hard rock and
heavy metal bands such as
Korpiklaani,
Skyclad,
Waylander and
Finntroll meld elements from a wide variety of traditions, including in many cases instruments such as
fiddles,
tin whistles,
accordions and
bagpipes.
Folk metal often favours
pagan-inspired themes.
Viking metal is defined in its folk stance, incorporating folk interludes into albums (e.g.,
Bergtatt and
Kveldssanger, the first two albums by once-folk metal, now-
experimental band
Ulver).
Specialty sub-genres
Filk music can be considered folk music stylistically and culturally (though the 'community' it arose from,
science fiction fandom, is an unusual and thoroughly modern one).
[75] Neofolk began in the 1980s, fusing traditional European folk music with
post-industrial music, historical topics, philosophical commentary, traditional songs and
paganism. The genre is largely European.
Anti folk began in New York City in the 1980s.
Folk punk,
known in its early days as rogue folk, is a fusion of folk music and
punk rock. It was pioneered by the London-based Irish band
The Pogues in the 1980s.
Industrial folk music
is a characterization of folk music normally referred to under other
genres, and covers music of or about industrial environments and topics,
including related protest music.
Other sub-genres include
Indie folk,
Techno-folk,
Freak folk and
Americana and fusion genres such as
folk metal,
progressive folk,
psychedelic folk, and
neofolk.
Notable venues
The
National Folk Festival (USA) is an itinerant folk festival in the
United States. Since 1934, it has been run by the
National Council for the Traditional Arts
(NCTA) and has been presented in 26 communities around the nation.
After leaving some of these communities, the National Folk Festival has
spun off several locally run folk festivals in its wake including the
Lowell Folk Festival, the Richmond Folk Festival, the
American Folk Festival and, most recently, the Montana Folk Festival.
The
National Folk Festival (UK) in England has been running for over thirty five years – starting off as a festival organized in
Keele University.
The
National Folk Festival is Australia’s premier folk festival event and is attended by over 50,000 people.
The four-day
Philadelphia Folk Festival
began in 1962. It is sponsored by the non-profit Philadelphia Folksong
Society. The event hosts contemporary and traditional artists in genres
including World/Fusion, Celtic, Singer/Songwriter, Folk Rock, Country,
Klezmer, and Dance. It is held annually on the third weekend in August.
The event now hosts approximately 12,000 visitors, presenting bands on 6
stages.
The
Newport Folk Festival
is an annual folk festival held near Newport, Rhode Island. It ran most
year from 1959 to 1970, and 1985 to the present, with an attendance of
approximately 10,000 persons.
It is sometimes claimed that the earliest folk festival was the
Mountain Dance and Folk Festival, 1928, in Asheville, North Carolina,
founded by
Bascom Lamar Lunsford. Sidmouth Festival began in 1954, and Cambridge Folk Festival began in 1965. The
Cambridge Folk Festival in
Cambridge,
England
is noted for having a very wide definition of who can be invited as
folk musicians. The "club tents" allow attendees to discover large
numbers of unknown artists, who, for ten or 15 minutes each, present
their work to the festival audience.
Stan Rogers is a lasting fixture of the Canadian folk festival
Summerfolk, held annually in
Owen Sound, Ontario,
where the main stage and amphitheater are dedicated as the "Stan Rogers
Memorial Canopy". The festival is firmly fixed in tradition, with
Rogers' song "
The Mary Ellen Carter" being sung by all involved, including the audience and a medley of acts at the festival.
The Canmore Folk Music Festival is Alberta's longest running folk music festival. The
Feast of the Hunters' Moon in Indiana draws approximately 60,000 visitors per year.
Folk music is popular among some audiences today, with folk music
clubs meeting to share traditional-style songs, and there are major folk
music festivals in many countries, e.g. the
Woodford Folk Festival,
National Folk Festival and
Port Fairy Folk Festival
are amongst Australia's largest major annual events, attracting top
international folk performers as well as many local artists.
Urkult Näsåker, Ångermanland held August each year
[76] is purportedly Sweden's largest world-music festival.
See also
Notes and references
- ^ a b Ruehl, Kim. "Folk Music". About.com definition. Retrieved August 18, 2011.
- ^ a b c d e f g Percy Scholes, The Oxford Companion to Music, OUP 1977, article "Folk Song".
- ^ A.L.Lloyd, Folk Song in England, Panther Arts, 1969, p. 13.
- ^ Richard Middleton, Studying Popular Music, Philadelphia: Open University Press (1990/2002). ISBN 0-335-15275-9, p. 127.
- ^ a b Ronald D. Cohen Folk music: the basics (CRC Press, 2006), pp. 1–2.
- ^ a b International Folk Music Council definition (1954/5), given in Lloyd (1969) and Scholes (1977).
- ^ Charles Seeger (1980), citing the approach of Redfield (1947) and Dundes (1965), quoted in Middleton (1990) p.127.
- ^ a b Donaldson, 2011 page 13
- ^ a b A. L. Lloyd, Folk Song in England, Panther Arts, 1969, pp. 14–5.
- ^ Middleton, Richard 1990, p. 127. Studying Popular Music. Milton Keynes; Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0-335-15276-7 (cloth), ISBN 0-335-15275-9 (pbk)
- ^ a b c Mills, Isabelle (1974). http://cjtm.icaap.org/content/2/v2art5.html The Heart of the Folk Song, Canadian Journal for Traditional Music Vol. 2
- ^ Charles Seeger (1980) quoted in Middleton (1990) p. 127.
- ^ "To Hear Your Banjo Play, Alan Lomax's 1947 Documentary narrated by Pete Seeger". Youtube.com. 2007-06-14. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ A.L.Lloyd, Folk Song in England, Panther Arts, 1969
- ^ Quoted by both Scholes (1977) and Lloyd (1969).
- ^ "Ballads Catalogue: Harding B 20(69)". Bodley24.bodley.ox.ac.uk. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ Alison Vardy, et al., About Traditional Music Page, Celtic Harp Sheet Music site. Accessed 16 February 2007.
- ^ Donaldson, 2011 p 20
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 22-23
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 24-26
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 32-37
- ^ Donaldson, 2011[page needed]
- ^ a b Donaldson, 2011, p 39-55
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 72-74
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 67-70
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 44-52
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 42-43
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 103-104
- ^ Donaldson, 2011, p 105-107
- ^ a b c Donaldson, 2011, p 87
- ^ "The Premiere of the Global Jukebox". Radio interview with Don Fleming by John Hockenberry on PRI's The Takeaway.
- ^ a b "Association for Cultural Equity's main overview and search page for Lomax's 1946-on recordings". Research.culturalequity.org. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ "Alan Lomax's Massive Archive Goes Online : The Record". NPR. 2012-03-28. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ GCSE Music – Edexcel Areas of Study, Coordination Group Publications, UK, 2006, page 34, quoting examination board syllabus.
- ^ "The Percussive Force". Serendib.btoptions.lk. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
- ^ http://www.naadro.com/#home
- ^ "Sri Lanka News". Sundayobserver.lk. 2009-11-29. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
- ^ "Montage - Cultural paradigm | Sundayobserver.lk - Sri Lanka". Sundayobserver.lk. 2009-11-15. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
- ^ "Features | Online edition of Daily News - Lakehouse Newspapers". Dailynews.lk. 2010-09-11. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
- ^ "Sri Lankan Music Instrument & sounds". Info.lk. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
- ^ "|| Daily News Online Edition - Sri lanka :: Print Page". Dailynews.lk. 2011-02-09. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
- ^ a b "Artscope | Online edition of Daily News - Lakehouse Newspapers". Dailynews.lk. 2008-02-13. Retrieved 2012-11-08.
- ^ "inner.gif". Island.lk. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ http://85.227.250.116/search?q=ravanhatta
- ^ http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P3-1681722361.html
- ^ a b Kerry O'Brien December 10, 2003 7:30 Report, abc.net.au
- ^ G. Smith, Singing Australian: A History of Folk and Country Music (Pluto Press Australia, 2005), p. 2.
- ^ Who'll come a waltzing Matilda with me?", The National Library of Australia, retrieved 14 March 2008.
- ^ Wilurarra Creative (2010). Music[dead link]
- ^ a b Sawyers, June Skinner (2000). Celtic Music: A Complete Guide. Da Capo Press. ISBN 0-306-81007-7.
- ^ Kaminsky,
David (2005) pages 33–41. "Hidden Traditions: Conceptualizing Swedish
Folk Music in the Twenty-First Century." Ph.D. Dissertation, Harvard
University.
- ^ Jersild,Margareta (1976) pages 53–66. "Om förhållandet mellan vokalt och instrumentalt i svensk folkmusik. Svensk tidskrift för musikforskning 58(2): 53-66. (Swedish)
- ^ a b Ted Olson, "Music – Introduction". Encyclopedia of Appalachia (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2006), pp. 1109–1120.
- ^ Heatley, Michael (2007). The Definitive Illustrated Encyclopedia of Rock. London, United Kingdom: Star Fire. ISBN 978-1-84451-996-5.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n "Folk Music". Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ a b c d e f Kenneth Peacock, Carmelle Bégin (2010-01-19). "Folk music". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ "www.balladtree.com/folk101/001a_def.htm Definitions of folk music by Hugh Blumenfeld". Balladtree.com. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ Traditional songs – Folk song lyrics of the world
- ^ Ellis,
Iain. "Resistance And Relief: The Wit And Woes Of Early Twentieth
Century Folk And Country Music." Humor: International Journal Of Humor
Research 23.2 (2010): 161-178. Literary Reference Center Plus. Web. 14
Sept. 2012
- ^ Library of Congress. Related Material - Woody Guthrie Sound Recordings at the American Folklife Center. Retrieved on November 27, 2007.
- ^ "''Crossroads: Woody Guthrie''". University of Virginia. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ a b Spivey, Christine A. This Land is Your land, This Land is My Land: Folk Music, Communism, and the Red Scare as a Part of the American Landscape. The Student Historical Journal 1996–1997, Loyola University New Orleans, 1996.
- ^ Cultural Equality - Alan Lomax profile Burl Ives (1909–1995) by Ellen Harold and Peter Stone
- ^ Peter Dreier, "Pete Seeger Deserves One More Honor -- the Nobel Peace Prize"The Huffington Post 5/4/09.
- ^ David King Dunaway, How Can I Keep From Singing?
- ^ a b Clarke, SP, "Odetta- American Folk Music Pioneer"
- ^ Rubeck, Shaw, Blake et al., The Kingston Trio On Record (Naperville IL: KK Inc, 1986), p. 11 ISBN 978-0-9614594-0-6
- ^ Eder, Bruce. "Biography of The Kingston Trio". AllMusic Guide. Retrieved July 17, 2009.
- ^ Murrells, Joseph (1978). The Book of Golden Discs (2nd ed.). London: Barrie and Jenkins Ltd. p. 136. ISBN 0-214-20512-6.
- ^ "The Highwaymen". Wesfiles.wesleyan.edu. Retrieved 2012-12-30.
- ^ Bogdanov, Vladimir; Woodstra, Chris; Erlewine, Stephen Thomas, All music guide: The Definitive Guide to Popular Music, Hal Leonard Corporation, 2001. Cf. p.793
- ^ Eder, Bruce. "The New Christy Minstrels". AllMusic. Retrieved 2010-07-13.
- ^ a b Unterberger, Richie. (2002). Turn! Turn! Turn!: The '60s Folk-Rock Revolution. Backbeat Books. p. 178. ISBN 0-87930-703-X.
- ^ Bianculli, David (2009). Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. New York: Touchstone (Simon & Schuster). p. 382. ISBN 978-1-4391-0116-2.
- ^ "Definition of filk by FilkOntario". Filkontario.ca. Retrieved 2012-12-29.
- ^ http://www.urkult.se/ Festival website
References
These are the references with multiple abbreviated cites with varying page numbers
Further reading
(does not include those used as references)
Traditional folk music
- Bayard, Samuel Preston (1950). "Prolegomena to a Study of the Principal Melodic Families of British-American Folksong", Journal of American Folklore pp. 1–44. Reprinted in McAllester, David Park (ed.) (1971) Readings in ethnomusicology New York: Johnson Reprint. OCLC 2780256
- Bearman, C. J. (2000). "Who Were the Folk? The Demography of Cecil Sharp's Somerset Folk Singers." The Historical Journal (September 2000) Vol. 43 No.3 pp. 751–75. JSTOR 3020977
- Bevil, Jack Marshall (1984). Centonization and Concordance in the
American Southern Uplands Folksong Melody: A Study of the Musical
Generative and Transmittive Processes of an Oral Tradition. PhD Thesis, North Texas University, Ann Arbor: University Microfilms International. OCLC 12903203
- Bevil, Jack Marshall (1986). "Scale in Southern Appalachian Folksong: a Reexamination", College Music Symposium Vol. 26, 77–91.[verification needed]
- Bevil, Jack Marshall (1987). "A Paradigm of Folktune Preservation
and Change Within the Oral Tradition of a Southern Appalachian
Community, 1916–1986." Unpublished. Read at the 1987 National Convention
of the American Musicological Society, New Orleans.
- Bronson, Bertrand Harris. The Ballad As Song (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969).
- Bronson, Bertrand Harris. The Singing Tradition of Child's Popular Ballads (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976).
- Bronson, Bertrand Harris. The Traditional Tunes of the Child Ballads, with Their Texts, According to the Extant Records of Great Britain and North America, 4 volumes (Princeton and Berkeley: Princeton University and University of California Presses, 1959, ff.).
- Cartwright, Garth (2005). Princes Amongst Men: Journeys with Gypsy Musicians. London: Serpent's Tail. ISBN 1-85242-877-5
- Carson, Ciaran (1997). Last Night's Fun: In and Out of Time with Irish Music. North Point Press. ISBN 978-0-86547-515-1
- Cowdery, James R. (1990). The Melodic Tradition of Ireland. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press. ISBN 978-0-87338-407-0
- Farsani, Mohsen (2003) Lamentations chez les nomades bakhtiari d'Iran. Paris: Université Sorbonne Nouvelle.
- Harker, David (1985). Fakesong: The Manufacture of British 'Folksong', 1700 to the Present Day. Milton Keynes [Buckinghamshire]; Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0-335-15066-7
- Jackson, George Pullen (1933). White Spirituals in the Southern Uplands: The Story of the Fasola Folk, Their Songs, Singings, and "Buckwheat Notes". Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. LCCN 33-3792 OCLC 885331 Reprinted by Kessinger Publishing (2008) ISBN 978-1-4366-9044-7
- Matthews, Scott (2008). "John Cohen in Eastern Kentucky: Documentary Expression and the Image of Roscoe Halcomb During the Folk Revival". Southern Spaces. (August 6)[page needed]
- Karpeles, Maud. An Introduction to English Folk Song. 1973. Oxford. Oxford University Press.
- Keller, Marcello Sorce (1984). "The Problem of Classification in Folksong Research: A Short History", Folklore Vol. 95, no. 1:100–104. JSTOR 1259763
- Poladian, Sirvart. "Melodic Contour in Traditional Music," Journal of the International Folk Music Council III (1951), 30-34.
- Poladian, Sirvart. "The Problem of Melodic Variation in Folksong," Journal of American Folklore (1942), 204-211.
- Rooksby, Rikky, Dr Vic Gammon et al. The Folk Handbook. (2007). Backbeat
- Sharp, Cecil. Folk Song: Some Conclusions. 1907. Charles River Books
- Sharp, Cecil English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachians. Collected by Cecil J. Sharp. Ed. Maud Karpeles. 1932. London. Oxford University Press.
- Warren-Findley, Jannelle (1980). "Journal of a Field Representative : Charles Seeger and Margaret Valiant" Ethnomusicology, Vol. 24, No. 2 (May, 1980), pp. 169–210 JSTOR 851111
Contemporary folk music
- Cantwell, Robert. When We Were Good: The Folk Revival. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1996. ISBN 0-674-95132-8
- Cohen, Ronald D., Folk music: the basics, Routledge, 2006.
- Cohen, Ronald D., A history of folk music festivals in the United States, Scarecrow Press, 2008
- Cohen, Ronald D. Rainbow Quest: The Folk Music Revival & American Society, 1940–1970. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2002. ISBN 1-55849-348-4
- Cohen, Ronald D., ed. Wasn't That a Time? Firsthand Accounts of the Folk Music Revival. American Folk Music Series no. 4. Lanham, Maryland and Folkstone, UK: The Scarecrow Press, Inc. 1995.
- Cohen, Ronald D., and Dave Samuelson. Songs for Political Action. Booklet to Bear Family Records BCD 15720 JL, 1996.
- Cray, Ed, and Studs Terkel. Ramblin Man: The Life and Times of Woody Guthrie. W.W. Norton & Co., 2006.
- Cunningham, Agnes "Sis", and Gordon Friesen. Red Dust and Broadsides: A Joint Autobiography. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999. ISBN 1-55849-210-0
- De Turk, David A.; Poulin, A., Jr., The American folk scene; dimensions of the folksong revival, New York : Dell Pub. Co., 1967
- Denisoff, R. Serge. Great Day Coming: Folk Music and the American Left. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1971.
- Denisoff, R. Serge. Sing Me a Song of Social Significance. Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1972. ISBN 0-87972-036-0
- Denning, Michael. The Cultural Front: The Laboring of American Culture in the Twentieth Century. London: Verso, 1996.
- Dunaway, David. How Can I Keep From Singing: The Ballad of Pete Seeger. [1981, 1990] Villard, 2008. ISBN 0-306-80399-2
- Eyerman, Ron, and Scott Barretta. "From the 30s to the 60s: The folk Music Revival in the United States". Theory and Society: 25 (1996): 501–43.
- Eyerman, Ron, and Andrew Jamison. Music and Social Movements. Mobilizing Traditions in the Twentieth Century. Cambridge University Press, 1998. ISBN 0-521-62966-7
- Filene, Benjamin. Romancing the Folk: Public Memory & American Roots Music. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2000. ISBN 0-8078-4862-X
- Goldsmith, Peter D. Making People's Music: Moe Asch and Folkways Records. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1998. ISBN 1-56098-812-6
- Hajdu, David. Positively 4th Street: The Lives and Times of Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Mimi Baez Fariña and Richard Fariña. New York: North Point Press, 2001. ISBN 0-86547-642-X
- Hawes, Bess Lomax. Sing It Pretty. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 2008
- Jackson, Bruce, ed. Folklore and Society. Essay in Honor of Benjamin A. Botkin. Hatboro, Pa Folklore Associates, 1966
- Lieberman, Robbie. "My Song Is My Weapon:" People's Songs, American Communism, and the Politics of Culture, 1930–50. 1989; Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995. ISBN 0-252-06525-5
- Lomax, Alan, Woody Guthrie, and Pete Seeger, eds. Hard Hit Songs for Hard Hit People. New York: Oak Publications, 1967. Reprint, Lincoln University of Nebraska Press, 1999.
- Lynch, Timothy. Strike Song of the Depression (American Made Music Series). Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2001.
- Middleton, Richard (1990). Studying Popular Music. Milton Keynes; Philadelphia: Open University Press. ISBN 0-335-15276-7 (cloth), ISBN 0-335-15275-9 (pbk).
- Reuss, Richard, with [finished posthumously by] Joanne C. Reuss. American Folk Music and Left Wing Politics. 1927–1957. American Folk Music Series no. 4. Lanham, Maryland and Folkstone, UK: The Scarecrow Press, Inc. 2000.
- Rubeck, Jack; Shaw, Allan; Blake, Ben et al. The Kingston Trio On Record. Naperville, IL: KK, Inc, 1986. ISBN 978-0-9614594-0-6
- Scully, Michael F. (2008). The Never-Ending Revival: Rounder Records and the Folk Alliance. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.
- Seeger, Pete. Where Have All the Flowers Gone: A Singer's Stories. Bethlehem, Pa.: Sing Out Publications, 1993.
- Sharp, Charles David. Waitin' On Wings, What Would Woody Guthrie Say. Riverside, Mo.: Wax Bold Records, 2012.
- Willens, Doris. Lonesome Traveler: The Life of Lee Hays. New York: Norton, 1988.
- Weissman, Dick. Which Side Are You On? An Inside History of the Folk Music Revival in America. New York: Continuum, 2005. ISBN 0-8264-1698-5
- Wolfe, Charles, and Kip Lornell. The Life and Legend of Leadbelly. New York: Da Capo [1992] 1999.
Covering both traditional music and contemporary folk music
- Cooley, Timothy J. Making Music in the Polish Tatras: Tourists, Ethnographers, and Mountain Musicians. Indiana University Press, 2005 (Hardcover with CD). ISBN 0-253-34489-1
- Czekanowska, Anna. Polish Folk Music: Slavonic Heritage – Polish Tradition – Contemporary Trends. Cambridge Studies in Ethnomusicology, Reissue 2006 (Paperback). ISBN 0-521-02797-7
- Pegg, Carole (2001). "Folk Music". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan.
- Van der Merwe, Peter (1989). Origins of the Popular Style: The Antecedents of Twentieth-Century Popular Music. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-316121-4.
