How Goes the FolkSite Thus Far..?
Mood:  not sure
Topic: The Music Affiliate Site

Hello, all!  Sorry I haven't posted for the past week or longer.  I've been working on the companion affiliate site for quite a while, trying to make it look pretty and presentable while beginning the campaign to promote it.  I'm still puzzling over what the site's focus should be--new music, old music, favorite music, trad folk, contemporary folk?  How much knowledge and information should be packed into this thing?  Meanwhile, my Muslim and LGBTQ friends and I are busy planning tactics of resistance against the far-right takeover of the Fed.

Anyway, we'll still be taking a look at songs that we like here on this blog, one sweet song at a time.  As always, click on the text or image links below to check the songs out for yourself...

 

 Lord of the Dance by Ruth Barrett & Cyntia Smith: This is the "Pagan version" of "Lord of the Dance"--not to be confused with the "Christian version" penned by English Quaker songwriter Sydney Carter. But don't let that scare you off--this is a joyous, spirited celebration of Nature in its wild, masculine Green Man/Horned God aspect, paired and partnered with the Lady, or Goddess, or Divine Feminine--whatever you want to call Nature's Feminine Principle. This is a song about how music, drumming and dancing can be a sacred, ecstatic experience by which to celebrate life in all its guises: "To live is to dance, so I dance on and on." Just listen to this and try to stop yourself dancing. You can't; your spirits will be too lifted to resist.

 

Thomas Muir of Huntershill by Dick Gaughan (song written by Adam McNaughton): The most recent time I saw Dick Gaughan here in Seattle (at Ballard's Tractor Tavern), he performed many fine traditional and contemporary songs and instrumental pieces in his own distinctive voice and guitar style, punctuated by humorous banter about his atheism, Scottish tribal affiliations; and his notion that, if God actually exists, He must have a hell of a sense of humor to put the English and Scots together on the same island. But for some reason, of all the songs he performed that night, this is the one I was singing to myself on the way home. I've since adopted it as my "get out the vote" song in busking sets and open mic performances; and it's become very important to me as a cautionary tale about the need to stand up for one's rights, and the democratic principles that our ancestors fought and suffered to establish. And considering the pickle in which our country now finds itself, songs about Scottish political freedom fighters seem more timely than ever before.

 

Gorel by Baaba Maal: This has long been my favorite song by Senegalese powerhouse Baaba Maal, based as it is on a traditional children's game song. Of course, I can't understand a word of the Wolof lyrics; but this is another great spirit-lifter when the Seattle winter weather gets cold, wet and dreary. The album "Firin' in Fouta" came out a little over 20 years ago; and I still think it's one of Maal's best. I was delighted when he performed this song during his set at the first WOMAD USA festival in Marymoor Park (Redmond, WA) in 1998; and I hope that we can hear it again soon, if we can manage to bring him back here...if we can resist any official moves to bar Muslim musicians from working here in the near future. Sigh...  *****