Celtic woman on PBS

[Cynth]

you have to like shrill sopranos.

Uhhh, that pretty much tells me all I need to know.

Thanks for the further info, chas. I'm glad your wife likes her too.

[s1m0n]

One of the three great English folk/folk-rock singers of the sixties/seventies/eighties,

I think she is awful, I can't stand her singing. Even the first Steeleye Span lp, who's the nicer singer Terry Woods or Prior? And she only went downhill from there. I think.

I can't stand her folk rockage either, but I really liked the CD she made with the Carnival Band or 17th and 18th century gallery band hymns. The tunes are tried-and-true, the band plays with vigour and without early-music stuffiness, and Maddy sings without screeching or moaning.

It's called Sing Lustily & With Good Courage. Four stars, IMO.
http://www.informatik.uni-hamburg.de/~z ... stily.html

The same poutfit have made a couple of CDs of christmas carols, but I found them not as fresh.

Gallery bands were how music was made in (anglican, I presume) churches before the onset of organs. They were generally the same musicians who'd been playing for dancing the night before, so they were often fairly disreputable and unruly.

The Carnival Band are quite unruly, which is what I like about them.

[djm]

The only thing I can remember about Sandy Denny is that she sang harmony on Led Zeppelin's Battle of Evermore. Surely that alone will earn her immortality.

djm

[chas]

It's called Sing Lustily & With Good Courage. Four stars, IMO.
http://www.informatik.uni-hamburg.de/~z ... stily.html

The same poutfit have made a couple of CDs of christmas carols, but I found them not as fresh.

Gallery bands were how music was made in (anglican, I presume) churches before the onset of organs. They were generally the same musicians who'd been playing for dancing the night before, so they were often fairly disreputable and unruly.

The Carnival Band are quite unruly, which is what I like about them.

You gotta love a band that can be playing crumhorns one minute, spirituals the next, and central European dance music the next. Anyone know if the Carnival Band recorded any discs without Maddy? I've looked, not too extensively, and come up dry.

Sing lustily is wonderful -- I liked Carols and capers, too, but I think everybody's picked up on my point of view.

[Cynth]

Welll, I went and listened to some clips of Maddy Prior, I got so curious. I actually think her voice is quite nice---I wouldn't call it shrill, more like very strong. She uses no or little vibrato it seems like. They didn't have any clips from the hymn CD but I liked best a couple of songs from an English Folk Song record. I didn't listen to much of the sort of "meaningful" songs. There was one song, Wee Weaver, or something where I think she was doing that glissando thing that Peter mentioned. That was a little alarming and I wouldn't want to hear much more of that particular effect. But her real plain singing seemed quite good and real out there.

[chas]

Wee Weaver was not her greatest moment. I had wondered where the glissando remark came from (she can and still does hit any note spot on). A couple of songs, all of which have snippets on Amazon, I'd suggest you look up:

Lovely on the water, last cut on Please to see the King (also Female Drummer from the same album)
Saucy Sailor, last cut on Below the Salt (also Royal Forester on the same album)

I didn't check to see if they have the Tim Hart and Maddy Prior albums with snippets, but both of those (Folk Songs of Old England, vols. I and II) are amazing. A couple of songs on those that showcase Maddy's voice are Bruton Town and Queen Eleanor. Babes in the Wood is a wonderful a capella duet in which she sings harmony to Tim's lead. Although there are albums I like more, I think those are her best albums -- pure unadulterated folk music, so sparse that it has to be perfect.

[Cayden]

I listened to Steeleye Span quite a bit during the 70s, I enjoyed Hark the village wait, Please to see the King and Ten man Mop quite a bit actually. After that I went completely off them, Below the salt wasn't particularly nice and All around my hat was pretty much so atrocious it got me totally turned off them. The band at that time had just become a vehicle for Hart/Prior and they were never really the top musicians in the earlier band. On the later recordings Prior's singing developed in a particular direction I did not at all like. And as I said above I could hear the seeds of that in the earlier pieces, retrospectively putting me off the mas well at times.

It was interesting to read the book I mentioned above ( "Irish Folk, Trad and Blues: A Secret History" by Colin Harper (2005) ISBN: 1903464455 ), which more or less confirmed my gut feeling about the role of the couple in the band. Interesting stuff, I try to imagine the first instament of Span with Johnny Moynihan and Andy Irvine instead of Hart/Prior. Would have been quite superb i imagine.

[susnfx]

Sorry to throw in a post here that's actually on topic . But I saw approximately 30 seconds of Celtic Woman (Women? - whatever) last night and nearly gagged. It was absolutely awful. There was a fiddler who, instead of the eyes closed or eyes averted that I've come to associate with really feeling the music, looked out casually across the audience as if she was completely oblivious to the fact that she was playing a fiddle. Very odd. Then out walked, very slowly, two young women in long gowns designed by someone who hated them, singing some drippy non-Irish song (can't recall what it was).
*shudder*
Okay, back to your discussion of singers I've never heard or heard of.

Susan

[Lambchop]

, singing some drippy non-Irish song (can't recall what it was).
*shudder*
Susan

"Drippy" is the exact word I was looking for! Drippy!

Should you doubt this, go to amazon.com and see if they have a sample bit of "Danny Boy" from that album. <shudder>

[cowtime]

Since I have a whole lot of Steeleye Span Albums I've gotta chime in here. What I like about them is that they occasionally have a song that combines great lyrics with really good music. I never thought about how Maddy Prior was singing for the most part, just enjoyed the tune.



Below the Salt- I love everything on this recording, but particularly Gaudete- I just got a choral arrangement of this song for our Christmas revelry at Church in Dec.

Commoners Crown- did not like

Now We Are Six- ditch the last two(I really HATE them) and the rest I like

Sails of Silver- Marigold/Harvest Home is so good, it makes up for the rest of the junk on this one

Hark! The Village Wait- Again, I absolutely love every song on this one.
Blackleg Miner, My Johnny Was a Shoemaker and Twa Corbies are fantastic.

Parcel of Rogues- Rogues in a Nation and Cam Ye O'er Frae France are the picks on this one

Storm Force Ten- Seventeen Come Sunday

Please to See the King- love them all

Rocket Cottage- The Brown Girl and Fighting for Strangers

Ten Man Mop- When I was on Horseback, Gower Wassail and a great version of Skewball

edited to add- All Around My Hat who's only redeeming tune was Black Jack Davy

[OnTheMoor]

Hey, look at that!
http://offer.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?V ... 4754605302
5 different bids for a Celtic Women cd. You've got yourself a prize there Bloomfield.

EDIT: Wow, and there's one with 7,
http://cgi.ebay.ca/Celtic-Woman-Celtic- ... dZViewItem

[Cynth]

It's on TV here tonight. I can't wait.

[missy]

we started to watch it last night - first song was "ok". Then they started "Danny Boy". We turned it off.

[aderyn_du]

Oh dear... I happen to love Maddy Prior, have spirally tattoos and wear crystals. I probably should stay away from this thread.

Oops. Too late.

[Nanohedron]

Oh dear... I happen to love Maddy Prior, have spirally tattoos and wear crystals. I probably should stay away from this thread.

Oops. Too late.

Heehee.