A Few Traditional Folk Songs From The British And Irish Isles And Beyond

Introduction

These are a series of traditional folk ballads inspired by comments from members of The Ballad Tree: Traditional Folk Ballads. The group is linked below and contains a lot of great music and articles and is well worth your time to discover more about traditional folk music.

While I would like to include songs from Leon Rosselson, Eric Bogle, and even Nick Drake and Shane Magowan with The Pogues I am focusing as much as possible on real tradition. If you want to can find more of my music articles here.

Hopefully. the ten songs that I share here will introduce or reintroduce you to some incredible music.

Anne Briggs - "She Moved Through The Fair"

I only recently discovered Anne Briggs, although I was six years old when this was recorded. This is an unaccompanied version and her voice is beautiful.

Anne Briggs - "Blackwater Side"

In the notes on the previous video, I noticed that Jimmy Page and others had covered this song, and they are the versions that I was familiar with. I hadn't intended to start with two songs from the same artist, but these are both absolute beauties that I hope meet the required criteria.

A.L. Lloyd - "The Seven Gypsies"

I think I first heard a variation on this by Nic Jones on the album "Game, Set and Match". A.L. Lloyd collected and recorded a huge amount of traditional folk music, and this is a solitary but excellent example that I am sharing here.

Richard Thompson - "Sumer Is Icumen In"

Some magazine (possibly Mayfair) asked artists for a list of their music of the last millennium. Richard Thompson took the challenge literally.

Here is more about the song and its beginnings.

Lal & Mike Waterson - Fine Horseman

This sounds almost mystical from the album "Bright Phoebus", this was composed by Lal in 1972 for the album, but it sounds far older than that, thought 1972 is fifty years away from us now.

June Tabor - "Reynardine"

An unaccompanied performance from her debut album. The history of the song is in this article.

Ewan MacColl - "Dirty Old Town"

This has been covered so many times, but here it is sung by the composer. This is just one from his canon, but I could have chosen a few more.

Sheena Wellington - "A Man's A Man For A' That"

I first heard this by Five Hand Reel and I love Dick Gaughan's voice, but this unaccompanied take on the Robert Burns song is an absolute beauty.

Martin Carthy - "Scarborough Fair"

Martin Carthy is a favourite singer of mine who I have seen many times. Paul Simon lifted Martin's arrangement for the Simon and Garfunkel release. I think Martin was eventually credited but you may correct me on that.

Paul Brady - "The Lakes of Pontchartrain"

This is a beautiful song and its origins are detailed below

Eddi Reader - "Ae Fond Kiss"

Another Robert Burns song performed by Eddi Reader.

Ar Log - "Hiraeth"

Another beautiful Welsh folk song, I have tried to cover as much of our islands as possible with this. "Hiraeth" was used by my good friend Les for a Vocal Community idea that you can read about below. It has an expanded definition of what the concept is, though

it has no exact English equivalent. The nearest translation is a yearning or longing.

Conclusion

I hope I have not steeped too far outside of the remit of The Ballad Tree: Traditional Folk Ballads with this article, and I hope that this creates as much interaction as my other post in this group.

Thank you so much for reading.