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[Martin J]

If a musician is paid to play does that payment remove him/her from 'Folk Music' in it's purest form and move them into the professional or semi professional arena and therefore by definiton also invalidate them as Folk performers ?


See http://forum.melodeon.net/index.php/topic,1214.0.html.  Thread drift has sparked my query.

[joe]

As a member of a team I have been paid to play, however the money has never ended up in my pocket (with the exception of fuel costs on occasion). The main 'event' for our team is local, and the only money involved is the collection, which funds some of the other events throuhout the year, plus costs of guest teams' accomodation etc.

I have been fed and given the odd free drink as part of a session that attracts a crowd, does that count?

I have also been asked to play proper slots at the pub (as opposed to sessions) in exchange for money. I am a bit wary of this as I feel it may take away from what the music is about. On the other hand it may justify some of the time I would have to spend rehearsing, which I feel would be necessary in order to play the said slots. I dont think I have made the issue any clearer and my mind is split.

[Stiamh]

If a musician is paid to play does that payment remove him/her from 'Folk Music' in it's purest form and move them into the professional or semi professional arena and therefore by definiton also invalidate them as Folk performers ?

"Folk performer"? If you're going to be a purist, isn't there something incongruous about this term?

[Matthew B]

I'm quite comfortable getting paid to play.  Sadly, it doesn't happen nearly often enough.  But then again, I'm not sure what distinguishes a folk musician from any other kind of musician: no tail coat, perhaps?

[Martin J]

"Folk performer"? If you're going to be a purist, isn't there something incongruous about this term?

I don't think so.  If someone performs in his local folk club for the entertainment and enjoyment of his friends and visitors he fulfils both parts of the term.

[TomB-R]

"He who pays the piper calls the tune!" Paying traditional musicians is a pretty ancient thing, I think.

Surely the essence of folk music is the transmission and learning process, not whether you get paid or not.

Having said that, I think it is quite possible for a performer to cease to be strictly a "folk musician" irrespective of where they started from, and the same for a music genre - traditional American peoples' music transforms into "Country"!

Tom

[Steve_freereeder]

If a musician is paid to play does that payment remove him/her from 'Folk Music' in it's purest form and move them into the professional or semi professional arena and therefore by definiton also invalidate them as Folk performers ?


See http://forum.melodeon.net/index.php/topic,1214.0.html.  Thread drift has sparked my query.

Interesting questions....
I have various comments:

1. I play as an orchestral clarinettist in the Sheffield Chamber Orchestra. We play classical music.
http://www.sheffield-chamber-orchestra.org.uk

[Falseknight]

If we ran our music as business many of us would be bankrupt or at best playing music we do not particularly enjoy.

I find that the odd gig fee, or sound engineering fee or ceilidh fee helps a little to defray the costs of a stupidly expensive obsession.  I am fortunate not to suffer MAD, but I have the analogous frets complaint.

I find the people who complain most about paid musicians not being true folk persons are the ones who don't perform in such a manner that people would wish to pay them.  Could be jealousy I suppose.

It is traditional that dance musicians are paid, back to the days when courtly music and peoples music were not far separated.

I also suspect that the ones who moan loudest are the egalitarian types who think that everyone should have a go (which I agree with) and that because it is folk, there is no practical difference between (say) John Kirkpatrick and young Stan who got his melodeon last week and is still trying to decide which way up to hold it.

One of the things which has done for the folk revival is the attitude of so-called pros who manage to be expensiv and second rate at the same time.  Your professional musicians, folk or not, must be significantly better than the good amateurs.  I have been to too many folk clubs over the years where the floor singers have been technically better than the pros and more committed to the music.

[Stiamh]

I find the people who complain most about paid musicians not being true folk persons...

Oh, so there are such people then? I wondered why No Strings was even bringing it up (as in, who cares?).

I'm not interested in applying labels to myself, or the music I play - prefer to let others worry about that - and I've never been to refuse money for musical activities! * I did spend a few minutes this morning pondering whether "folk" was still a valid term for most of what goes on in the field of traditional music and dance these days.  I gave up after a minute but I think it's probably not a useful term any more.

* Actually for a period a few years ago, when people asked me for fiddle or whistle lessons I did insist on not taking money. This was after a friend who taught highland pipes told me he never took money for teaching, and that this was a long-established tradition in piping, which I thought was admirable. Generally it had the effect of discouraging students who couldn't deal with the idea of not paying for lessons - which suited me anyway 



 

[Martin J]

The feedback so far seems to support the view that true folk is not profitable and the meagre fees involved barely cover the costs.  So far no feed back from pro's or semi pro's.

To answer Steve Jones as to 'who cares', my thinking was an extension of the thread "morris dancing is dying out apparently" (on the news again this evening).  Will folk clubs die if there are no paid performers ?  Will standards drop if there are no paid performers ?  Should our performers be paid as much as more commercial musicians ?  Falseknight has highlighted instances where the fees do not reflect the skill or performance level.

Steve Freereeder has highlighted an area where great skill is not financially rewarded.

I have been told that some other countries pay anyone who performs, which includes floor spots.  Perhaps our overseas members can deny or confirm.  If paying is the norm, are the standards higher or lower ?

[ACE]

I started playing at folk clubs. I was asked to play at other clubs, pubs and festivals sometime for expenses sometimes as wages.  I done it for over 30 years, not enough cash to give up the day job. I just play at pub sessions now. Am I a folk singer/musician? No. I'm a Landscape gardener who happens to like folk music.

[Falseknight]

I thought I ought to give this a more considered response:

My background (and probably most abiding love) is song, but I have cultural interests in a wide range of other music.

Our notion of folk, I believe, owes virtually everything to the middle class body of men and women who did the first great rescue at the turn of the last century (folk is dying out, we have to go and record this original part of our heritage for posterity).  This exercise  has been repeated with similar desperation every twenty years which should tell us something:  last time they collected Ewan McCall's "Freeborn Man" and "Forty Foot Trailer" as traditional songs - which should tell us a lot more.

The same types of people who attempted to preserve our heritage, also took it on themselves to look to improving the cultural development of the working man.  Hence factory and mine brass bands, BMG (Banjo, Mandolin and Guitar) Orchestras, Male voice (and mixed) choirs, Morris Sides...

By the time our particular revival came about only Bampton and Britannia Coconut Dancers had any real claim to a continuous tradition (discounting local ritual days) , so although sides may have a glorious history, they all stem from a revival getting on for 40 years ago - same as a lot of song.

What's all this to do with payment and folk?

Essentially, our attitude to money is synthetic, coloured by the grand traditions of endowed amateur music (and dance) and a revival which relied on the sources of the early 20th Century collectors.

In 1800, industrialisation had just got into stride.  There was no mass transport, no national communications and most people never moved more than the range of a horse from their place of birth.  Music was local, embedded in the community and musicians (folk or otherwise) were prized.  Songs however, were not deamed up by local poets, common consciousness or any of that - much of what we regard as "traditional" was churned out by the printing presses of 7 Dials and set by (paid) hawkers of songs.  This isone of the reasons tunes recycle round several sets of words and material is often lurid (scandal sells!).  Music crossed between theatre and tradition freely right up to the time of the demise of the music halls, which is how it should be.

I don't believe there has ever been a view, or a tradition that "folk" musicians should not be rewarded for what they bring.  I don't think there has ever been (until now) an attitude that ANYONE should and must play.  The people have always valued excellence and if you are not up to the mark, you are not welcome.  Come to think of it, I don't think our forebears would even recognise the concept of "folk" - that is a distinction made by the collectors.

What has done for us is the determination to make music a product and us passive consumers.  Possibly in this is the reason for the distrust of paying performers.  It makes us consumers rather than particpants.  You haev got to say though, that the workman is worthy of his hire and musicians and singers should be rewarded for what they do.

[press on regardless]

There's been quite a few occasions where i've been bought a pint or two to stop me playing, does that count?

[ACE]

What has done for us is the determination to make music a product and us passive consumers.  Possibly in this is the reason for the distrust of paying performers. 

I will read and digest the rest of the post when I have finished War and Peace . But distrust! I might not have been received very well, if the audience was expecting something else but never distrusted.

We had a fall out when we started using microphones back in the early seventies, as the 'finger in the ear purists' said it was not real folk. But what went in the microphone came out of the speaker the same, but louder. Yes distrust might have crept in there but only from a bigoted few. Who, when asked to do a turn were very quick to get up and perform.

When we had electric guitars, a melodeon played through guitar effect pedals and a driving rock beat from a mad drummer, I would not call it folk at all. We used traditional lyrics along with a wall of sound, had a lot of fun, even got a small fan club. I cannot remember any distrust there either.

Perhaps it is you that distrusts change, I could if it was watering down the tradition, but I could never see that happening. As bands like we had come and go in a few years. Folk music in a purer sense has been going on for centuries.

[Falseknight]

I also had long involvement with "electrics" in folk in the 80s.  and have used (and still use) PA at any gig that requires it.  I sit firmly in the camp of the modernisers and will do whatever is necessary to get clarity and understanding of the source music.  My attitude in this respect is closer to the Irish approach than the traditional English approach in that I want a living contemporary music grown from our own musical cultural heritage (similar position incidentally to Martin Carthy and Richard Thomspon),  For the record, I am a guitarist and frets played first and foremost and play melodeon primarily for fun, rather than public performance.  Most of my musical output now is actually in front of a rock band.

I think the issue over remunerating musicians is somewhat different to the issue over electrics and PA though.  It may be bad experiences colouring my views, but at grass roots level and by some of the comments on this thread there is the feeling that if it's folk, it is somehow "of the people" and therefore loses it's purity if it is paid.  "War and Peace" (yes, sorry about the length) was aimed at questionning HOW we had got to this weird position that amateur (and often amateurish) was good, and paid was bad.

[Falseknight]

Distrust of paying performers" was put badly grammatically.  I meant distrust of the concept of performers being paid, in that it steals the authenticity of the music.

[ACE]

We used to go and see the original Copper Family near Brighton, they were paid. Also very informative and entertaining. But I would also be first out of the room if Fred Jordan was on as I could not stand his style of singing. They are both folk legends.

So two examples of good and bad, but only in my opinion. These views could be totally opposite from somebody sat besides me.

So it is down to personal choice really. Those that can sit through an evening of free unaccompanied folk singing and have a great evening, might not be the same people that pay a fortune and go and see Bellowhead. But they have made their choice. So there is no good or bad really.

[Falseknight]

And that brings us back to square one:  Is "folk" a meaningful or relevant term?

[IanD]

And that brings us back to square one:  Is "folk" a meaningful or relevant term?

So what would you call it?

Incidentally, I believe the term "world music" was coined when Gordon Potts was working at the Virgin Megastore and he was in charge of "all that non-rock non-jazz non-classical non-pop non-easy-listening stuff" and they needed a shorter label to hang on it, I think he and Ian Anderson came up with it over a lunchtime beer. Now every record shop in the world uses it and everyone understands what it means (or thinks they do).

Ian

[Falseknight]

I'm inclined to call it music and let it lie.  I think that the years have been very cruel to the term and stepping away from it would do a service to all and might even level the playing field.

For example, is the late, great Cyril Tawney a folk musician?

He has an archive at Cecil Sharp House so he must be, but his songs were authored by him, recognisable as his, in copyright to him and he got paid for performing them by bodies up to and including the BBC.  By the definition of "No pay for folk musicians" that excludes him on just about every count.

Perhaps the term "Home Brewed Music" to indicate it's origins would be most appropriate?