(This site is not run or managed by Shirley Collins directly, but run by a fan. All songs (c) their respective owners. I encourage anyone who enjoys the music on this page to go out and buy the records. In fact, you can now buy them right here.)
Shirley Collins News:
March 2008:
There was an article about Shirley in The Guardian... read it here. She was also interviewed in this months Mojo.
Feb 2008:
Shirley received a Good Tradition Award at this year’s BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards on Monday February 4th at The Brewery in London. It was presented to her by Graham Coxon of Blur. Along with John McCusker on fiddle, Graham sang Shirley’s version of
Just As The Tide Was A-Flowin’ in tribute. Congratulations Shirley! (More info here)
Shirley is to curate, present and perform in a series of events on London’s South Bank between March 25th and March 30th. All the events look good, so if you live in London, check them out here!
Sussex Tales (This brilliant biography is by/copyright of David Suff of the Bees Knees website.)
Shirley and Dolly Collins have long been regarded as pivotal figures in the English folk song revival of the 1960’s and ’70’s. Shirley’s beautiful singing style, apparently lacking any affectation, has earned her accolades such as "the first lady of folk". Dolly’s contributions to their recordings were by comparison often overlooked. Her sensitive accompaniment on piano and portative organ and marvellous arrangements have rarely been equalled in the past three decades. Alongside her work with Shirley, Dolly was the arranger on the late Peter Bellamy’s masterful ’The Transports’, as well as his unrecorded ’We Have Fed Our Seas’. She also worked on albums by the Incredible String Band, Ian Matthews, Mark Ellington, Chris Darrow and Tony Rose.
Shirley and Dolly grew up in the Hastings area of East Sussex. Their Mother’s family kept alive a great love of traditional song. Songs learnt from Grandfather and Aunt Grace were to be important in the Sister’s repertoire through-out their career. Their uncle, F C Ball - the author of ’A Breath Of Fresh Air’ - encouraged the sisters to listen to a wide variety of music, especially the work of Monteverdi and Purcell.
Through a remarkable series of influential recordings, Shirley and Dolly helped to introduce many innovations into the English folk revival. In 1964, Shirley recorded the landmark jazz-folk fusion of ’Folk Roots, New Routes’, with Davy Graham. 1967 saw the essentially southern English song collection, ’Sweet Primeroses’, on which she was accompanied by Dolly’s vocals and portative organ; and an exuberant collaboration with Mike Heron and Robin Williamson - of the Incredible String Band - resulted in ’The Power Of The True Love Knot’ in 1968.
’Anthems In Eden’, 1969, featured a suite of songs centred around the changes in rural England brought about by the First World War, had a terrific impact upon recorded folk music. The glorious and unusual ensemble of early music instruments - rebecs, sackbuts, crumhorns and all - proved once and for all that the guitar was not the only appropriate accompaniment for folk song. Several critics have suggested that it is impossible to imagine that electric accompaniment for traditional song, as successfully purveyed by Fairport Convention and Steeleye Span, could have developed quite as it did without the pioneering ’Anthems In Eden’. All these recordings strove to marry a deep love and understanding of the English folk music heritage with a more contemporary attitude to musical settings. ’Anthems In Eden’ was followed by the starkly beautiful ’Love, Death & The Lady’, and ’No Roses’ recorded in 1971 with the 25 musicians of the Albion Country Band was a further experiment that grew into a triumph. A bench mark of British folk-rock.
During the mid-1970’s, Shirley and Ashley Hutchings led the all acoustic Etchingham Steam Band with Terry Potter, Ian Holder and Vic Gammon, around the folk club and festival circuit. The Etchingham’s repertoire was drawn from the traditional music of Shirley’s beloved Sussex. With The Albion Dance Band - a crusading, brave dance band performing traditional material on a curious mixture of modern (electric) and mediaeval instruments, Shirley recorded ’The Prospect Before Us’.
1978’s ’For As Many As Will’ was the last album recorded by Shirley and Dolly Collins. Shirley soon retired from public performance. Dolly continued with her composition including a full-scale secular mass.
Few singers of the English folk revival have attempted as much on record as Shirley Collins - an extraordinary combination of fragility and power. "I like music to be fairly straightforward, simply embellished, - the performance without histrionics allowing you to think about the song rather than telling you what to think."
Shirley was awarded an MBE in the 2007 New Year’s Honours List for Services to Music. The award was presented by HRH The Prince of Wales at Buckingham Palace on May 8th 2007.She was also awarded the Honorary Degree Master of the University by the Open University for Notable Contribution to Education and Culture
Shirley is patron of South East Folk Arts Network and Folk South West.
If there are any songs in particular that you would like me to put on this page, please leave a comment.
TOM PALEY’S OLD TIME MOONSHINE MEDICINE SHOW Featuring-TOM PALEY & his friends-ROBIN GILLAN,DAVE STACEY & THE LOST MARBLE STRING BAND,with support from top London country singer songwriter-ALAN TYLER & BRIGID POWER –RYCE.
thank you for the add/request ... .. “Lust and Carnal desire “ ..more truthful terms to describe “Love” .. .. Défilé des âmes ... www. defiledesames. com
Hope you can make it along to our 1st Birthday party... Free champagne...FOR THE EARLY BIRDS! Bonanza Presents: 'TRIPPING IN THE COUNTRY' Thursday 15th May 2008 @ Bardens Boudoir,
'Cosmic Ladies Night' Featuring:Mary Epworth & The Jubilee Band Gemma Ray Brigid Power-Ryce +Guest DJ: 'Spooky Lady's Sideshow'
Come Down and Meet the Folks Old Time Moonshine Medicine Show Featuring Tom Paley and Friends
Hypothesis: Imagine finding out that a legendary & influential Blues singer, say Bukka White or Lightnin’ Hopkins was alive and well - and living just down the road from you, right here in North West London – and none of your friends knew about him? Imagine further still that you and your friends were part of a thriving local Blues scene on which you’d recently been dj-ing rather a lot, and that you were in a position to offer said singer a gig? You’d do something about it – right? A romantic notion I hear you say? Not so!!
The man in question is not Lightnin’ or Bukka, and he’s not strictly a Blues singer (although Blues is certainly a part of his repertoire). He’s Tom Paley – a singer and player of traditional American folk songs who played with Woody Guthrie as a duo at several small gigs and union meetings and at the famous Leadbelly memorial concert in 1950. Tom was a formative influence on the young Bob Dylan (the Martin Scorcese documentary ‘No Direction Home’ features extensive footage of Tom withThe New Lost City Ramblers).
The scene in question is not strictly a Blues scene either (although Blues is certainly one of the main ingredients in the Gumbo), but the hub of London’s burgeoning Americana/Alt Country movement. It’s ‘Come Down and Meet the Folks’ – a twice monthly, free Sunday affair – hosted by much loved and respected Country singer songwriter Alan Tyler - at a wonderful old pub called The Apple Tree on Mount Pleasant, just off Rosebury Avenue.
Tom, who turned 80 last week, was born and raised in New York City where, in 1945 he learned to play banjo and guitar. Although he first recorded in 1953 (a 10” LP of mountain songs for the Electra label), he gained wider recognition on forming the New Lost City Ramblers in 1958 with Mike Seeger (Pete’s half brother) and John Cohen. They Recorded extensively for the folkways label
and played on the same bill as such legends of Old Time music as Clarence Ashley, Doc Watson and Roscoe Holcomb. After a couple of years living in Sweden, Tom moved to London at the end of 1965 and in the 1970s took up the fiddle, adding Swedish fiddle tunes to his eclectic repertoire. Tom still plays regularly and hosts a weekly Old Timey session at a small pub not a stone’s throw from ‘Come Down and Meet the Folks’, where he’ll be playing with varied accompaniment from his friends on Sunday 13th April…Y’all come!
yo how things going? your page is looking slick! anyway, i just grabbed some tight new ringers from www.tonetomyphone.info for FREE! they have the coolest selection!
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Once drove an old sedan, up north, From a place in Sydney to Cairns; Then to Kuranda I went forth, By train, to look without set plans.
I browsed through the trendy market, With fresh fruits of tropical kind; Walked to the creek through lush thicket - Nature’s hand giving peace of mind.
I dined in a scenic cafe; Then, outside, as I wrote for yen, Some passing Kooris called-out: “Hey, You go walkabout with your pen.”
Request or question, I don’t know - Assured voices, elderly men. That’s now several years ago, And I’ve seen the world - with my pen.
