FolkWords Interviews

FolkWords 'Interviews' - during our journey around folk music we ask many people for their views and observations on folk. We talk to the artists that create today's folk music - musicians, bands, lyricists and singers. We also talk to publishers, studios, radio stations and event organisers - all the people that support folk.  More than individual views (and pithy observations) these are comments from the 'coal face' and statements from the 'sharp edge' - thoughts from the folk that make the music happen. Whatever their take on folk music, agree or not, they're interesting views.

To read the latest interview and all current interviews go to: Current Interviews

Sometimes we come across views we think you would like to read - those are the interviews we publish. We are always happy to consider interview opportunities with all the forces that drive folk music, both the established and the emerging. That means those people with something interesting to say about folk - not blatant advertising and self-promotion disguised as opinion.

If you've said it all before but want to say it again, if you have something new or different to say or the same but slightly different, then we would like to hear from you. So if you want to tell us about your views on folk get in touch. Alternatively, if your PR agent wants to earn their fee tell them to contact FolkWords with your views.

Want to talk to us about folk ? Want to have your say in a telephone interview with FolkWords? Believe your views will interest other folk? Then go straight to our Contact page and get in touch or send us an email: folkwords@hotmail.co.uk

Some short extracts from our interviews are shown below. To read the complete interviews and some observations and comment on 'folk' that you may find interesting, please go to: Current Interviews.

Chris Ricketts - shanty singer: Every shanty singer since the form began has put his own edge on every song. Some were inevitably more popular than others. There were changes to words, tunes, places and destinations - I really enjoy listening and singing traditional shanties but I also like to give the shanty my own edge. ‘Essequibo River’ has our own edge but it wasn’t forced, it just kind of fell together that way. You could say that ‘Port of Escape’ is a shanty album for non-shanty lovers.

Mark Evans - Red Shoes:  "For me, storytelling runs through everything. Yes, it’s a backbone of folk. A song has to mean something to the audience. The story-telling folk song answers that need where in many ways the introspective ’personal’ song does not. I also like ambiguity in songs. In a way, uncertainty in a song means it prompts different reactions in different people. I sometimes re-write a song to avoid it becoming too personal and missing a connection with an audience. I weave in ambiguities to make my songs mean something to many people. I really like Dylan’s writing – and I’m not comparing myself to him in any way - but you can listen to his music and find your own place in a song, draw whatever you want from it or put yourself in its story."

Nigel Spencer - Folk Police Recordings: "There’s a certain amount of lunacy involved in setting up an independent folk label, but this is something I’ve been planning for years. I’ve long been a fan of folk rock but I’m constantly disappointed by how crap most of it is. I loved the old Pentangle and Mr Fox albums – that sound is more interesting than the folk rock of traditional folk songs with plodding bass and drums crafted on. I wanted to include broad influences and wider tastes. That’s one of the drivers behind the Woodbine and Ivy Band, which is why we originally started the label, to release their album. And having set up the infrastructure I decided to release other recordings."

Ray Cooper - Solo Artist and Oysterband: "I don’t really categorise music in that way. Folk music today adopts a middle-class approach. However, that’s not the world the 'middle class' view thinks that 'folk' came from. It’s like the Dickensian Christmas, it never really existed. Folk music was invented if you will, as an idea maybe a couple of hundred years ago and it went hand in hand with the rise of nationalism. Walter Scott was a musicologist collecting folk music because he was into old Scottish culture. Even though there are great collections, they proscribed folk music by much of what they left out as much as what they included. Folk is like all music - it's for everyone and anyone that it touches or that are touched by it. Once again, I rarely approve of categorising music to define and exclude. Folk music is undoubtedly the music of everyday people and for all people. It simply changes as people write it - people that write history always bring a new angle to it, it’s the same with folk." 

Simon Hopper - The Simon Hopper Band: “It’s easiest to describe folk music as ‘music that culturally belongs to a people’ - it’s music that speaks of their experiences in their language. It’s by implication, the music of the common people of society. I’m not certain I write folk music – I just write what I have to write in the way that presents itself. I think it’s sometimes easier to define something by excluding what doesn’t fit rather than defining what does. One thing I’m sure of is that folk music is about truth - the truth of the lived experience.”

Damien Barber - The Demon Barbers: “For me folk is what I grew up with; the music Ilistened to and learned as a child, music that develops and grows but keeps its original roots in the words, tunes or style. If I’m searching through Walter Pardon’s songs looking for something that I can work with and a lyric catches my attention it doesn’t mean I just trot out the same old rhythm and melody. What it does mean though is I'm working with a music that connects us to our past and that's important. History books tell us what our forefathers did, folk music tells us how they felt when they did it."

Back to Home