"Folk music"

This article is a personal workthrough — one of those situations where I need to write something that can be read by other people in order to clarify my own thoughts to myself. It is not going to be super readable. You can give it a shot, though!

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I am a big fan of clear definitions. “Folk” is one of the fuzziest descriptors ever. I am a member of a facebook group whose energy is dominated by a passionate, erudite, and, yes, ornery guy who is always lamenting the fuzziness of the definition, so conversations around the definition come up a lot. I don’t participate in them, because I consider myself a guest to this world, and I’m still mostly in the observer phase. Still, folk music is incredibly important to me and my musical perspective, so I want to hammer out a definition that works for me, and maybe even find a more precise term. Because what I usually say is “folk/trad” music - trad being short for “traditional” - and that is just awkward. “Traditional”? What tradition?

To find correct definition and terminology, let’s eliminate that which doesn’t match.

Folk Rock

The first point of contrast is this “folk rock” thing. This is the genre of popular music that is an acoustic offshoot of the rock band, which draws its repertoire from a combination of “traditional” “folk” repertoire and original songs conceived for an acoustic-style rock band. I like this genre a lot, but when I talk about “folk,” I am never talking about this kind of music.

“Folk Rock” works for me as a name.

It’s a fusion genre. But let’s not stop there. Let’s not let the fusion be mysterious. There is further clarification to be found. So, wonder with me: What is this fusion genre, exactly? Is it rock, is it folk, or is it a mysterious mixture of the two?

Wonder no more. I have the irrefutable answer. Fundamentally, folk rock is rock that has been influenced by folk. Structurally, it is rock. It is rock which uses folk material and folk timbres. It is, indeed, a mixture, but not a mysterious one. The music is treated with rock treatment, not folk treatment.

What is rock treatment? What is folk treatment?

What is rock structure? What is folk structure?

Great questions.

Folk Music

Here is my hard and fast definition of “folk music.” There’s nothing to argue about. You can have your own definition. This is mine. Feel free to tell me about yours.

I want to clarify, however, that this is not my definition of a folk song. More on that later.

Folk music is aurally transmitted via the melodic line. This is either sung or played by a melodic instrument.

Why is this such a big deal?

Aside from literal sung melodic transmission, there are two alternative ways to learn music: reading printed musical notation, and listening to recordings. Both of these things are anomalous and remarkable, and require a hefty amount of civilization and infrastructure to sustain them. When that civilization isn’t in place, when the infrastructure isn’t there, people learn music by listening to people sing melodies. Music is a story about live communication and memory.

Melodies do not carry full realizations of the harmony. They carry seeds of it - implications - but they do not spell out chords. Harmony, chords, are realized anew in each new transmission of the melody from person to person.

The fundamental material of folk music is the melody. The accompaniment - its harmonies and timbres - is an ephemeral component.

NOTE: As I type this next paragraph, my conviction withers away, and I have to channel in a different version of myself who is more convinced of what they are saying.

In folk rock, the accompaniment is strong and fundamental like a house. The chords are defined. The ummm there’s a drum kit. …

The transmission of folk melodies is inexact and the precise notes are of secondary importance.

Oh I’m getting tired of writing this. Well, I do want to say that in rock music, the precise notes of the melodies are quite important. We get this thing called a “riff” where every note has a structural function for the emotion that flows through the song. The riff needs to be reliable and repeatable because you build this extremely powerful aqueduct with it.

Folk melodies don’t function like that. That’s another day’s writing, to flesh that out.

Anonymous versus known authorship - X

There are some definitions of folk music which say that it must emerge from “the people” as a collective rather than an individual person. If a song is written by an individual person, it must be molded by many hands over time until it belongs more to the anonymous legion than the original author. Concrete authorship renders something not “folk.”

I don’t abide with this definition. It isn’t particularly common, I don’t think. It’s not particularly defensible if you know anything about folk music.

Commercial versus amateur intention - X

Some definitions of folk music say that it is music which was not written to fit inside of a commercial structure of any kind. Pretty thought, if you hate commercialism, but, once more, not very workable. You can try to expand this definition and say, even if it was originally commercial, it must be shown to be able to survive outside of the commercial structure… or something. This is very fuzzy. It doesn’t work for me.

What a Folk Song (or tune) actually is

(Let’s use “song” as shorthand for tunes and and songs both)

I think a folk song is anything that is treated like a folk song. So, it’s not about the material, but about the treatment.

So..

Melody mainly

Transmitted aurally

If it is written down it is not portraying a “correct” version but rather a suggestion, with some reluctance to pin down something living

Distributed (not necessarily created) with the attitude that it already belongs to everyone and it is a mittel of connecting and sharing between people

Glad I wrote this. My thoughts are clearer. I have no energy to revise it unfortunately.