55 f
graininess can be absolutely wonderful and adds to the atmosphere no end.”
But the growth of the Transatlantic work meant that more and more of the photographs were taken on special photo- shoots. “I got fed up with the clubs; I’m not a beer and cigarettes sort of guy,” Brian says, “and I got tired of the visual aspect of people with their mouths open.” Amongst those Transatlantic records that Brian took photographs for and designed were the earliest albums by Ralph McTell, Bert Jansch, The Humblebums (Billy Connolly and Gerry Rafferty), The Dubliners and The Sallyangie – Sally Oldfield and her brother Mike (pre- Tubular Bells).
Looking again at Brian’s excellent pho- tographs at the first Keele Folk Festival in 1965, it is noticeable that many of them were taken informally when the singers and musicians were not performing. Speaking of his folk musician photographs as a whole, Brian modestly says, “The reason the photo - graphs are so familiar now is because no- one else was doing it!”
P
erhaps the photographs that have aroused the greatest inter- est over the years are those of Bob Dylan on his first visit to Lon- don in December 1962. Brian went to the King And Queen on 18th December because someone asked for pho- tographs of Martin Carthy who was per- forming that evening. Dylan came in and Martin asked him to sing. One of Brian’s photos of Dylan now adorns his hall wall (as well as the King And Queen pub). A few nights later, Brian was at the Singers’ Club Christmas party, and photographed him again, with Ewan MacColl and Bert Lloyd sit- ting listening. There are different accounts of the audience response that evening, but certainly Brian and Sal thought he was won- derful – but Ewan certainly didn’t!
The ’60s also saw Brian photographing various English Folk Dance And Song Society events, especially their annual Royal Albert Hall festival. The then librarian, Ruth Noyes, persuaded Brian to go out and photograph the traditional morris groups and mummers’ plays in situ. In 1963, Brian photographed morris dancers in Bampton, the Abbots Brom- ley Horn Dancers and the Marshfield Mum- mers. As Brian says, “They were much more interesting, more variety and they were more visual than the singers.” After that, Brian widened his travels to include a range of folk customs – from well dressing to street foot- ball games, fire customs to rushbearing.
Sal often accompanied Brian on these visits, and started to tape record the events, partly with a view to producing magazine articles and audio-visual presentations, but there was little interest in either in the 1960s. “We can’t find the tapes, even if we had a machine to play them on!” Brian says.
Change came in the early 1970s. Brian’s
father-in-law died, he fell out with Nat Joseph, there were changes at Topic, his wider photography business was keeping him busy and so he largely stopped photo - graphing folk singers. He gave up on the cus- toms in 1973, just after he assisted film-maker Barrie Gavin with The Passing Of The Year. Then in the early 1980s a picture researcher suggested a book of customs, and Brian was off again, at one stage photo graphing 60 cus- toms in fifteen months. The National Trust Guide To Traditional Customs Of Britain was
Above: Diz Disley and Martin Carthy jam, with Colin Wilkie behind and Redd Sullivan in front, at the Troubadour, London, 1962. Below: the Blue 'Oss on May Day in Padstow, 1964
Photos © Brian Shuel/ Collections
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