Verandah Music at the 2019 National Folk Festival

We’ll be back in Canberra at the National this year with a couple of shows:

Does Your Chewing Gum Lose its Flavour?

Skiffle and other homemade music, Australian style. 

With a cast of thousands (well, about ten or so), we investigate and play some of the rhythmic classics from various dodgy musical genres. We’ll need a lot of help, so come along and join in. Sunday April 21, Trocadero 3.30-4.30.

Pointed Parodies and Dreadful Ditties 

Parodies, squibs and satires from childhood to politics and everything in between. (How did Wonder Woman lose her bosom? We reveal all).

We’ve collected archives of this stuff from around the country over the years and want to share some of it with you. Bring yours along as well, for an enjoyably subversive session of sharp-toothed humour. Monday April 22, Trocadero 12.30-1.30

Teri Young in concert and conversation with Rob Willis, Friday April 19, Trocadero 11.30-12.30. 

And don’t forget the National Folklore Conference at the National Library just prior to the festival on April 18, also including Rob’s 25th (yes, that’s a quarter of a century) curated concert at the Library. This year it’s Tassie singer-songwriter Teri Young. And it’s all free! But you must register at cknow@iinet.net.au

Cigar-box uke - from Aldi!

Eaerliest image of cigar-box instrument, American Civil War

Couldn’t believe my eyes. A classic cigar-box ukulele on sale at Aldi for $29.99. True. And it has a pickup! All you do is string it up, stick the bridge into the body then wait six months for the strings to stretch (it is a uke), then play away. Everything supplied, including instructions, songs, chords and a CD. Even a bit of verandah music history on cigar-box instruments. Happy strumming on the very cheap.

Verandah music ‘Gypsy’ style

Gitano family outside their cave, Granada, c 1900-1915

The diverse peoples once widely known as ‘Gypsies’ are now known as Roma, Rom, or Sinti, depending on local, regional and international usages. ‘Gypsy’ is, generally, considered to be derogatory, not surprisingly given their history of global persecution under that name. (I use the term here because it will most readily understood by most readers).

From this maelstrom of experiences, the Rom have evolved a great number of distinctive musical genres, drawing on their own traditions and frequently adapting those of the lands and cultures in which they have travelled and settled. They are still doing so, with various ‘gypsy music’ groups having achieved commercial success and artistic recognition, often through the ‘world music’ category of the modern popular music industry. The many styles and forms of Rom traditional music continue to be played throughout Europe and beyond.

The astonishing riches and varieties of Rom and Sinta music, and its connection to the broader dance, literature, art and culture of these peoples can now be enjoyed and studied online at the RomArchive. This ambitious project is described like this:

‘The RomArchive collection contains items from ten archive sections: Visual Art, Dance, Film, Flamenco, Theatre & Drama, Literature, Music, Romani Civil Rights Movement, Politics of Photography and Voices of the Victims. Focusing on self-representation, the objects have been collected from private collections, museums, archives and libraries around the world.’

The growing archive has some amazing visual and audio resources, as well as informative and accessible articles (‘Is there such a thing as Romani music?’ is brief and excellent), film, etc.

What the folk?!

Have a look at Emily Gallagher’s article on the ill-fated National Folklife Centre at the National Museum

https://theconversation.com/what-the-folk-whatever-happened-to-australias-national-folklife-centre-108678

Also relevant on the AFN site:  https://ozfolknet.wordpress.com/fifty-years-of-folk-and-lore-1968-2018/

Read ‘Em and weep...

Verandah music American style

Songs on a Nag’s Head Porch at

https://wordpress.com/read/blogs/128277791/posts/2860

DANCING IN THE RAIN AT THE WESTPORT HORSE FAIR, IRELAND

The Westport (Ireland) Horse Fair dates back to 1741 and takes place on the last Saturday of September each year. This year (2018) Ollie and I happened to be in in Westport and stumbled across this wonderful event.

The older musicians and singers we have recorded for The National Library over many decades did not differentiate between an old song/tune and one that was contemporary.  The criteria was enjoyment, if they liked it they would perform it.

When we were involved in the collection of old dances with the late Peter Ellis we found that this sometimes was also true although there was some resistance in transition between Old Time and New Vogue on occasion. This video shows that the mob in Westport are fairly adaptable, even in pouring rain. 

Rob Willis

UKRAINIAN VERANDAH MUSIC

Here's how Ukrainians look after their musical traditions. It's an interactive project that brings high tech together with fieldwork and research to make the riches of Ukrainian folk music available to all, as they describe it:

The mission of the Polyphony Project is to explore, preserve and present the living musical folklore of Ukrainian villages. In addition to recording the intangible cultural treasures of the Ukrainian peasantry using state-of-the-art technology, our priority is to make this heritage of unparalleled value accessible to contemporary society. Having accumulated over centuries, this legacy is finally available online in an organised form.

They're on Youtube as well, of course.

Thanks Rob and Ollie Willis.

OH NO, RAIN PREDICTING CACTUS A NOXIOUS WEED!

https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2018-10-24/cactus-flowers-in-bloom-may-be-pretty-but-they-are-pests/10423794

VERANDAH MUSIC ITALIAN STYLE

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2018 National Folk Fellow Presentation

SONU

Songs from the Homeland

2018 National Folk Fellow Salvatore Rossano presents ‘Sonu’, a project that explores themes of migration using field recordings taken from the National Library’s Oral History collection. Join us as Salvatore and his band, Santa Taranta, present this research and original compositions inspired by these recordings.

In association with the National Folk Festival

Thursday 29 November | 6pm
Theatre | free
Book here or 02 6262 1111

Salvatore Rossano

MORE RAIN LORE

Further on weather lore - it seems that in Central Queensland they can tell when it's going to rain by

looking at the cactus flowers - the more there are blooming, the more it rains. Look at that sucker!