However, when we get to the Celtic fringes, we


have some obscure, authentic and sometimes valuable examples of traditional and modern folk. So, alongside big names like The Dubliners and The Chieftains, we also have De Dannan, The Bards and The Dublin City Ramblers. The latter look like three young lads plus someone’s Dad, who is probably in the band because he’s the only one with a driving licence and a van. Irish women are well represented and hardly any of them have beards, eg Bridie Gallagher, Dolores Keane, Maura O’Connell and the vocalist/harp-player Cathie Harrop, who although born in New Zealand, counts as honorary Irish. Also, all hail the two Marys: Coughlan and Black; Mary Black’s records in particular seem to command high prices amongst her devoted fans.


North of the border is a similar story, in the form of half a dozen LPs by Robin Hall & Jimmy MacGregor (for younger readers: imagine The Proclaimers without glasses) and for hard-core ethnic folk music, we have an Anne Lorne Gillies LP of songs sung entirely in Scottish Gaelic. Capercaillie and Clannad have also recorded songs in this Language. As only 1% of people in Scotland can speak it, making records in this lan- guage is what Sir Humphrey would describe as a ‘brave’ decision.


More generally, for many folk


musicians, authenticity is all-important: instruments should be acoustic (not electric); songs should be written by ‘Anon’; instrumenta- tion should be period etc. On the other hand, if Fairport Convention had gone down that particular road, we would never have their 11 minute masterpiece ‘A Sailor’s Life’ as featured on ‘The History of Fairport Convention’, a double gatefold album (now a mere 40 years old) complete with stapled booklet inside and ribbon seal on the front.


And so, that brings us to English folk. Sadly, we have no more Fairport albums at the moment, but we do have


the 1981


Swarbrick LP ‘Smiddyburn’, which features several of the usual FC suspects. For connoisseurs of traditional Tyneside music, we have The Rakes very rare LP ‘Northumbrian Minstrelsy’ from


1970, never released on CD, and featuring Isla Cameron, Bob Davenport and Jack Armstrong playing Northumbrian small pipes. My prize for the greatest LP title in folk goes to ‘How to make a Bakewell Tart’ by the equally wonderfully named Tufty Swift. Tufty plays Buckden Village country dance tunes on (amongst other instruments) a four-stop, one-row melodeon. This rare LP comes with its original Free Reed Music liner and leaflet.


American folk is solely represented by sixties darling Joan Baez and her famous ex, Bob Dylan. The only LP that we currently have by His Bobness is a rare mono 1st pressing of his 3rd album ‘The times they are a changin’, now almost half a century old, but in excellent condition.


I have not attempted to define ‘folk music’, except to say that you know it when you hear it; although in the case of Russian folk music this can be problematic if it was recorded during the Soviet era. We currently have 3 LPs on the EMI Melodiya label, recorded in the USSR. Mercifully they do not include any of the Stalinist ‘folk’ songs written at the height of the cold war, such as ‘Hail our heroic proletariat on the completion of the current 5 year plan’ and ‘Our glorious Marxist-Leninist tractor factories have set a new production record’ and who could ever forget ‘Death to the British imperialist capitalists and their running dogs (except for Dennis Healey - the eyebrows remind us of Brezhnev)’. Nowadays, for songs of this quality, you really have to go to North Korea or watch the Eurovision Song Contest.


If you can’t get to the TASS Books & Music Sale at the Anchorage Centre most Tuesday mornings, then leave your details on the number below or email me with your ‘wants’ in folk or any genre, and I will keep a lookout for you: fundraising@tasstavistock.org.uk


*Tavistock Area Support Services is a


registered charity that provides a range of services for the over-55s (Phone 01822 616958). Please bring your unwanted LPs or CDs etc to The Anchorage Centre (next to Tavistock Bus Station) 8.30 - 4.30, Monday-Friday.


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