43 f Burland’s Back
One of the great originals of the ‘lost’ Trailer label years of the ’70s, Dave Burland still has all his laid-back skills, as Derek Schofield discovered when catching up with the great man at last year’s Sidmouth Folk Week.
P
erformances by Dave Burland at three high-profile festivals in the summer of 2013 were a timely reminder of what a very fine singer he is. As club, con-
cert and ceilidh organiser Lawrence Heath remarked, “Dave's performances at Sid- mouth were an absolute delight and begged the question: why is it that such a consummate singer and raconteur is so rarely seen on the folk club circuit nowa- days, especially in the south of England?”
Dave was one of the crop of young singers recorded by Bill Leader on his Trail- er record label in the early 1970s. Tony Rose, Robin & Barry Dransfield, Martyn Wyndham-Read, Pete & Chris Coe, Nic Jones, Dave Burland – they were the singers who could always be relied on to give great evenings of largely traditional songs at folk clubs up and down the coun- try. The title of Dave’s first album for Trail- er, The Dalesman’s Litany, appeared to tie him quite distinctly to Yorkshire (although in fact the songs on the record came from diverse sources) and the moment he opens his mouth to speak, there is no doubt that he comes from Yorkshire – Barnsley in fact.
Like many teenagers in the 1950s, Dave was attracted to skiffle and soon took up the guitar. He earned his living as a police officer and during a period of ill- ness in about 1962, heard about musicians playing guitars in a Barnsley pub. This turned out to be Barnsley Folk Club whose other residents included Derek & Dorothy Elliott who were also to record for Bill Leader in the 1970s.
He was enthused by the music: “Once you’ve been bitten by folk music, there’s absolutely no escape. You cannot get away from it,” Dave says, and he soon became one of the resident performers, expanding his repertoire and improving all the time.
B
efore long, club organisers in nearby towns such as Wakefield and Sheffield were offering him residencies and bookings. Most of the time, he was able to jug- gle his working life with his expanding popularity, though Dave does remember that on the occasions he went straight to Barnsley Folk Club from work, still in uni- form. “I used to put the fear of god into everyone in the pub.”
Gigs further afield inevitably led to late-night drives home to be ready for work the next day, and in 1968 he gave up the day job. It was about this time that Dave met Nic Jones. “He would come up to Barnsley and we’d go floor-spotting around the clubs, and then I’d go down to Chelmsford and stay with Nic and we’d dive into London. Ralph McTell
Photo: Judith Burrows
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