FOLK SESSION – Howard Arms, Brampton

In spite of the sudden plunge in temperatures, we had a good evening of song and story in the Howard Arms on 19^th November, developing the tricky theme of ‘Truth, Lies and the Use of Words’ (gee, thanks, Charles!)

Does it say something about the folk ethos that we had far more lies than truth? Chris started us off with the captain of The Golden Vanity who promised the cabin boy his daughter’s hand in marriage, then let him drown. Several singers evoked the betrayals of the First World War – the promise of ‘the war to end all wars’ and the ‘land fit for heroes’. Thus, Steve sang All the Fine Young Men; Anne asked Will I See Thee More? and Chris, in Home, Lads, Home grieved for the horses as well as the soldiers called up and killed. Moving forward to the Second World War, Liz sang Dona Dona, thought to refer to the Shoah. Politicians are not renowned for their probity, so not surprisingly Les and Phil both treated us to entertaining satire in, respectively, Liars, Cheats and Crooks and The Socialist ABC. Les’s song With ‘Friends’ Like This described the peculiarly modern experience of calumny on social media.

 

We had some entertaining lies of the ‘tall tales’ variety, in the shape of drunken visions (Martin Said to His Man – John); boastfulness (The Liar’s Song – Charles); and an inventive way of getting out of trouble (The Talking Dog – Anne). Gary showed how the arch-deceiver could be deceived, in The Devil and the Feathery Wife.

 

Inevitably, this being folk music, there were a lot of songs about false lovers! In Thunder Rolls (Liz) the woman realises her lover is lying to her without a word spoken. Gerda pointed out how many lies would be revealed If Walls Could Talk. Fickle young women featured in Sally Free and Easy (Jane); Pretty Nancy from Yarmouth (John); and in Chris’s ribald story of a concrete mixer and suburban deceit, Our Bill. False young men featured still more frequently! Deceit and desertion were the order of the day in The Blackbird (Jane); in Phil’s parody A Blacksmith Followed Me on Facebook; in Awake, Awake (John) and in Just as the Tide Was Flowing (Jane). Gary did an interesting line in non-human deceivers: the raven in Crazy Man Michael and The Sea which waits to overwhelm the land.

Truth did get a look in: Steve’s own song Fiona, I Still Wonder, reflects the ‘most sobering truth of all’ – the inevitability of death. The Bleacher Lassie o’ Kelvinhaugh (Phil) assures us that ‘it’s the truth I tell you’. Steve’s Your Love Will See Me Through includes ‘the raw, naked truth’.

‘Use of words’ included an interesting range of ideas. Gerda’s Hare Spell included the actual words used in a spell, as quoted in a Scottish witch trial; Flowers in the Valley (Charles) demonstrated the importance of using sufficiently forceful words; No, Sir, No (Katy) showed how phrasing the question correctly gets you what you want; There’s a Hole in My Bucket (Charles) uses words to get out of doing work; Fog on the Tyne (Liz) is a tongue-twistery play on words.

We next meet on 17^th December at 8pm in The Howard Arms, Brampton, with the double theme of ‘Parties/Christmas’.  ALL WELCOME!