Music made with love, care and joy...
I bought three absolutely cracking CDs last week that have put me in a very good mood ever since.
All three CDs are what Irish musicians would call 'the pure drop'.
Unadorned, rootsy and full of life they are what folk music is all about.
We have become so used to hearing traditional songs with guitars, fiddles and percussion (and no harm in that) that we often forget that they were originally heard raw and unadorned.
The CDs are by Vic Legg, Katie Howson and Jeannie Harris and Will Noble and John Cocking.
The Vic Legg CD 'I've Come To Sing A Song' is a good example of a traditional singer in great form. The songs are all unaccompanied and are songs that Vic learned from his family who were well-known Cornish singers. The CD is full of life and Vic's love for his songs and the people he learned them from comes through every one.
Kate Howson and Jeannie Harris play single-row melodeons in the old English 'push and draw' style and do it beautifully. Their CD 'Unbuttoned' is a great collection of tunes and songs, mostly from East Anglia. I particularly love Jeannie's way with a song, raw and emotional, it reminds me very much of the singers I used to hear in the pubs around Strangeways Prison, Manchester when great numbers of Irish Travellers were living in their vans on the empty bomb sites. Great stuff.
Will Noble and John Cocking are North Country singers and their CD 'Yon Green Banks' is a lovely collection of songs from the South Pennine area, some are duos and some solos, but all of them are the kind of songs you used to hear sung around Saddleworth and Holmfirth in years gone by.
These CDs are not bland easy listening, they ask you to open your ears and your mind and re-connect with music made with love, care and joy.
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