Thanks! Just played Entre dous mares with much pleasure on this cold foggy day.
We just spent most of a day at the Cygnet Folk Festival. A chap called Ernest Aines was jolly good, but the high point was an extended session of Georgian folk music - some purist cuts of songs apparently sung in churches for over 900 (!) years plus a remarkable version of Jolene.
I am no good on the geeky technicalities but the complex polyphonics, plus (I am told) lots of minor thirds and minor sevenths, make for a compelling sound.
Try music by Tsinkaro, Giya Kancheli or Basiani - or just play this.
Has anyone else taken any notice of this stuff? Is it old hat to everyone but me?
Bonny Light Horseman, Keep me on your Mind/ See you Free featured in the forum Album of the Year thread. There’s a version of Sally Gardens and other trad songs. The name of the band is of course an echo of a song made famous by Planxty.
I don’t know any of the artists you’ve mentioned Nick, so thank you. In the 1980s many literary scholars studied the work of the Russian philosopher of language Mikhail Bakhtin who argued that the novel as a genre was a polyphonic (many voiced) form. His examples are Dostoevsky and Dickens. So I do have some Russian polyphonic music and some Georgian mostly classical composers.
Thanks!
For many, the last person to lose the distinction between Russians and Georgian was Iosif Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili, i.e. Stalin. I am no expert, but the current efforts by Georgia Dream and its allies to move in that direction are a tad contentious, if I understand correctly.
I know literally nothing about Bakhtin, despite getting an O-level in Russian in the 80s and going there in happier times. It looks as if I have some reading to do, because that’s an interesting statement.
@NickofWimbledon Bakhtin is a fascinating, if difficult repetitious thinker. He was exiled to Soviet Central Asia which saved him from the GULAG. His book on Doestevsky is Problems in Doestevsky’s Poetics. I see there’s now a body of work on Bakhtin and music. He was also deeply interested in carnival, writing a thesis on Rabelais. He can be a subversive thinker.
Shovel Dance Collective, The Shovel Dance
It has taken a little while for this to win me over but I now really like it. Looking forward to seeing them live in February
Jim Causley, Forgotten Kingdom. 2016. A fine baritone voice, we have seen him in festivals and on tour. He’s from Devon and was part of Mawkin:Causley.
The title refers to the ancient Celtic kingdom of Dumnonia. Many well known musicians play on this collection of Causley’s songs. https://www.jimcausley.co.uk/product/forgotten-kingdom/
Music Planet R3 link
Music Planet on BBC Radio 3 has plenty of folk from across the world. Kathryn Tickell at Celtic Connections on 1 Feb. This will be available on Sounds after broadcast.
http://saltfishforty.co.uk/video/
Saltfishforty are from Orkney. New to me, but on Qobuz and just played at the end of Cerys Matthews this afternoon.
