“TO experience the tremendous power of genuine, unaffected folk songs, you must sing them yourself, sing them often, and sing them well. You cannot possibly experience the beauty of folk music if you simply hear the songs performed by a choir in picturesque costume. In folk singing, the goal is to sing, and this fact distinguishes the folk song from all other types of song. In the concert hall, in the cabaret, on the radio, the singing is a means to excite emotion in a passive audience who sit quietly and listen. The art song and the modern popular song are founded entirely on an appeal to the ear. But the folk song is founded on the joy of active singing, the joy of rhythmic movement of the entire voice organism. The frequent repetitions of a refrain which are so characteristic of the folk song are evidence that folk music is basically kinesthetic in its appeal. These refrains are a pure delight to the active singer, he does not tire (as a silent listener would) of repeating the same chorus many times. Folk singing is active in goal and method. It is essential to join in the singing to experience the deep beauty hidden in the music.
“If you begin to sing folk songs and to make them a part of your life, you will soon discover that they have the power to form your taste and to cultivate your artistic judgment. You will become aware of the pretension and insincerity in works of art which perhaps you admired before. You will find that you have come to prefer simplicity to sophistication, genuine feeling to empty sentimentality, real joy to superficial amusement.”
— Dr. Jop Pollmann, Laughing Meadows Songbook, Grailville Publications, 1947
Thanks for visiting!
