I was reading a friend’s blog yesterday, in which she posted a song by Peter, Paul and Mary, and was struck by one of the comments, which said something like they were never a folk music fan but did like PP&M and had several of their albums. My first thought was that the comment was ignorant, and was compounded by their saying that they had those albums. We tend to compartmentalise music into neat little boxes, and there are certain genres I don’t much care for – jazz and rap spring to mind – but I do occasionally listen to them if a fellow blogger recommends them. Probably not rap though, come to think of it! Shutting our minds off to a musical genre as ‘something I don’t like’ is narrow minded, in my view. But this got me thinking. I commented that folk music was probably the longest known style alongside classical, and has a firm place in history as being the means by which stories and news were told in days before TV and the internet. As regular readers will know I have loved folk music in many of its styles since I first knew what music was, and this has prompted me to share a couple of songs to illustrate that. Both are fairly recent, and maybe another day I’ll play some that have been handed down through the years. It is pure coincidence that both of these have a nautical theme, but as that is at the heart of much folk music it probably isn’t surprising, really. I actually played them both in the same Tuesday Tunes post a year ago, but I think they are well worth hearing again, to make my point that you shouldn’t write something off without listening to it first. If you then don’t like it, so be it, but you should at least try!

I’m particularly fond of folk music from around here, especially English, Scottish and Irish, so of course I’m starting with something from… Canada. This one is an absolute beauty, which I’m sure many of you will know:

Gordon Lightfoot wrote The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald to commemorate the sinking of the bulk carrier SS Edmund Fitzgerald on Lake Superior on November 10, 1975. It was recorded just a month after the disaster, and was released as a single and as a track on his album Summertime Dreams in June 1976. The album made #1 in Canada and #12 in the US, but wasn’t a hit here in the UK. The single was a massive hit in North America, peaking at #1 in Canada and #2 in the US, and even managed an appearance in the UK Singles chart at #40. Gordon died in May 2023, and it made me think at the time how much we undervalued him over here: he wrote some fantastic songs and that clear, resonant voice of his was always a pleasure to hear. The video enables you to follow the story of the song through its lyrics, which are poignant, and this song is, to my mind, very much in the true folk music tradition of handing down a story through the medium of song.

Last time I played a cover of this one, but this is the original by the guy who wrote it:

Around The Wild Cape Horn was originally included on Ralph McTell’s album Somewhere Down The Road in October 2010. It is a jaunty little number, but behind it lies the story of an epic voyage around Cape Horn made by Irving Johnson in the 1920s, when he was just 20, on one of the last great sailing ships, The Peking, which is referenced in the song. There is quite a lot to learn about that voyage from a film that Irving made at the time, and to which he added a voiceover when he was in his eighties: far too much for me to include here, but if you want to know more this link to Ralph’s website fills in a lot of the background for you. It is a remarkable tale, and well worth the read.

The song was then covered by Fairport Convention for their album Festival Bell, which came out in January 2011. The band and Ralph are long time friends and there is a video of them playing the song together, but the sound quality isn’t great so, to give you a feel for their cover I’m going with this one instead:

I think that is a lovely version, and they really do justice to Ralph’s song and his lyrics. You probably noticed that Simon Nicol referred at the beginning to this being a performance for the Under The Apple Tree Sessions, which are run by the legendary UK DJ and music aficionado ‘Whispering’ Bob Harris and his son: they have given us much great music in that informal environment.

Of course I have played you these songs because I enjoy them and I hope you will too. But I’m emphasising the point I made at the outset: having a downer on folk music is, in my view, very stupid and narrow-minded. The tunes may not all be to your liking, and I guess the traditional ‘finger in the ear’ unaccompanied singing may not be to everyone’s taste, but don’t write it off without listening and learning from what you hear. If you don’t want to read history books there is another way, though that may being deprived from many, especially in certain parts of the US where narrow-mindedness seems to be the order of the day.

There is a reason why folk music and its traditions have lasted for a thousand years or more – something to be borne in mind when you hear the latest flash in the pan talentless oik making loads of money from drivel. If you enjoy that, of course it is fine and I wouldn’t want to stop you listening to it: I just prefer my music to say something to me, to tell me something, to appeal to my heart and soul and to my mind.