Tuesday, July 7, 2009

Covering the Popular:
On Folk Alley’s 100 Most Essential Folk Songs of All Time





First and foremost: To my immense and pleasurable surprise, as of last week, Cover Lay Down has broken into the top 100 over at leading music blog aggregator Hype Machine. Thanks, folks. It is, as always, an honor and a privilege to serve the community, and I appreciate the recognition that such list-making signifies.

It’s worth noting here that although bandwidth costs rise with each new tier in popularity, we are probably one a very few blogs to make it that high on the list without advertising. Before summer ends, I hope to have a very special announcement involving an exclusive quarterly podcast subscription give-away for those who choose to donate. In the meantime, feel free to click on that little donate tab above, or not, without pressure, in anticipation of such gift-giving. Come fund drive time, early adopters will be remembered.


In the meanwhile, our thoughts turn to another top 100: Folk Alley’s 100 Most Essential Folk Songs of all time, as voted on by their readership, reported on just a few weeks ago on NPR, and currently playing in random order over at Folk Alley, the 24/7 online stream from WKSU.

It’s an interesting list, with few surprises, and plenty of beloved covers and originals; it’s especially pleasing to run down towards the end of the list and recognize songs I hold dear, but which I had not realized were as well recognized by the community, such as Dougie MacLean’s Caledonia (#74), Cheryl Wheeler’s Arrow (#76), John Gorka’s Love is Our Cross to Bear (#92), and more.

Many of these songs are covers as we count them — which is to say, the list is peppered with both traditional songs and standards — and it is interesting to me to find, say, John Denver’s original version of Leaving on a Jet Plane (#100) chosen over the Peter Paul and Mary classic, or the Martin Carthy Scarborough Fair (#35) instead of, say, popularists Simon and Garfunkel, alongside Doc and Richard Watson’s take on tradsong House of the Rising Sun (#53) and Tom Rush’s cover of Joni Mitchell’s Urge for Going (#94). Most, though, are the “right” covers, from Seeger’s multiple entries to The Byrds’ Turn Turn Turn (#22) to Fairport Convention’s definitive versions of trad-tunes Matty Groves (#29) and Tam Lin (#89).

Still, there are a very small few in this seminal set which I have come to love through coverage — songs for which I respect in the original, but would defend to the death in the interpretation. Here’s the subjective rarities: my better versions, the internal and eternal wind of change against the canon, the tunes I hear in my head when I read their titles. After all, as much as it is about the communal, in the end, all music is deep, and personal, and private.

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Cover Lay Down is proud to be your favorite coverfolk blog.

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9 Responses to “Covering the Popular:
On Folk Alley’s 100 Most Essential Folk Songs of All Time”

  1. joski
    July 8th, 2009 at 3:25 am

    Hi

    I am (like you I guess) a HUGE fan of folk music and (in my case) pre-war blues and country.

    Nevertheless todays folkie Ms Kaplansky is one of my all time favourites and I’m very happy everytime you put the lady on

    I love your blog very much and wish you all the best

    Keep on the good work
  2. boyhowdy
    July 8th, 2009 at 6:07 am

    Thanks, Joski, and right back at you — Merlin in Rags is a great source for the good stuff.

    Lucy is one of my absolute favorites, too.
  3. Lynchie from Aberdeen
    July 8th, 2009 at 9:03 am

    Thought the Folk Alley list was way too top heavy with US and Canadian artists. As for the choices, is a song like “Leaving On A Jet Plane” really a folk song? Really?
    Janis Ian’s “At 17″? Dylan’s “Tangled Up In Blue”?!?!?!?

    I know folk music covers a wide variety of material, but only 2 songs from the pioneers of folk/rock, Fairport Convention (3 if you count the Sandy Denny track) and barely a mention of the traditional folk acts from Scotland, England and Ireland and the rest of Europe?

    And way too many Dylan songs. Ah well, it’s all a matter of taste I suppose. But I think “100 Essential ACOUSTIC Songs” would have been a better title…
  4. Berni
    July 9th, 2009 at 6:26 pm

    Congrats!
  5. Owyn
    July 11th, 2009 at 9:36 am

    You got it right with your title BH, definitely a survey of popular “folk”. Still, good listening, and when I checked I had 64 of the tracks in my own library. Working on getting that up closer to 100.

    An unanticipated benefit of checking the list was finding the Alley Cast podcast. The latest episode has a really good mini-documentary on Shelagh McDonald.

    http://www.folkalley.com/podcast/
  6. Marchbanks
    July 12th, 2009 at 11:21 pm

    BH, I can’t agree with you at all about the Eva Cassidy track. Good voice, yes, acceptable instrument track, yes . . . but she flubs the lyrics in half a dozen places, and that kills it in my books. I say, if yer gonna cover somebody’s song, the least you could do, in respect to the song itself if not to the songwriter, is to LEARN THE DAMN WORDS.
  7. birthright
    July 19th, 2009 at 10:55 am

    Dougie Maclean is the ish! One of my favs. Ruth did a good job. Nice post.
  8. bubba
    January 10th, 2010 at 2:42 pm

    Can you please fix (re-up) Grisman/Garcia’s “House of the rising sun” ?? It cuts at 5:01, it should be 8 minutes !!
  9. boyhowdy
    January 10th, 2010 at 7:46 pm

    Bubba - though the track is technically usually treated as an 8 minute track, it’s actually only a 5:38 recording - the rest is space and some randomness at the end of the original tape. But you’re right to note that my copy is missing the last few seconds - sadly, it’s all I’ve got; try here for the full effect: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QflkWyrvxgA

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