Tag: folk

What the Folk?

I’m sure that pun has been done before. But I have been getting my folk on over the Merrie Month of May and it has raised thoughts and questions that I’m pondering through. Thus I need to write it out and see what you think!

Easter weekend, I danced Morris at the National Folk Festival in Canberra. A five-day folk festival, and incredibly, one that was a fifteen-minute tram ride from me house and had absolutely no mud. Hard for an English girl to get her head round – surely you’re supposed to get up at the crack of dawn and spend four tense hours in the car crawling past Stonehenge on a single track road to get to a festival in time for the first set, and woe betide anyone who forgot their wellies. Mud is such a feature of British festivals that a whole couture has sprung up in designer rubber footwear. So imagine a purpose built festival ground. Not a farmer’s field that gets churned to shit and swamped in so much rubbish that whole eco systems are destroyed annually, but one with logical paths between stages; purpose-built exhibition buildings with stages in them, bars and so much seating. It was so clean!

Unlike me who was dressed in black and sweatily capering about in what they said was 24 degrees but dammit, felt like a hell of a lot more.

So what’s Morris like down under? Well.

I must first say that at the National Folk Festival, Australia mustered up a whole five sides. My Australian Morris friends correct me here – the purpose of the folk festival is to showcase regions, so they specifically invite certain sides from certain states (yeah, and make them largely pay for their own tickets); this year was Big Fella and Little Fella, so (a) side from the enormous state of Western Australia and then Surly Griffen from little ol’ Australian Capital Territory. And of course, the sides from Brisbane, Sidney and Melbourne that won’t be discouraged from any opportunity to get their jig on. So I get that…but after festivals in tiny places like Rochester, Wimborne, Oxford, Swanage with close on a hundred sides with their varied costumes, colours and pageantry, Australia’s festival lacked that immense diversity.

But it did mean everyone knew each other. They all camped together, ate together, drank together and there was a lovely, close family atmosphere. Er, here I must say honestly that it was a family atmosphere if you were in the family; coming in as an outsider to these extremely nice and friendly people was a little harder. I think I personally mistimed me drinking. That early afternoon high of bombing a couple of pints, then the evening dip after pausing. ALWAYS carry on through! But these lovely chaps had grown up together, danced together, known each other for years, and as some of them are separated by the miles of mountains and desert between Melbourne and Brisbane, at festivals they’re very preoccupied with catching up and hanging out. Of course they would be. Ya know, next time will be better.

Now Australian Morris is really into Cotswolds. Hmm. It’s never been me favourite style. And as I often take a sort of ironical approach to any earnestness in Morris dancing, pointedly glazing over when someone starts telling me about villages in Northamptonshire (about which I frankly couldn’t give two shits and it seems particularly ludicrous ten thousand miles away), and I find Cotswolds dancers take themselves very seriously. For a bunch of chaps with bells on. But my my, can the Australians dance it. Watching the likes of Bell Swagger (freakin’ great name) and Black Joak, this must have been what it was like in England in the old days! Vigorous leaping, shouts, strength, grace, my god did it make me want to join in. The old fellas in England would be trembling their bells to hanky-needing climaxes if they had seen it. It’s exactly what they’re talking about as they heavily lean their rotund bellies over my chair in pubs to tell me all about the dance form I’ve been doing for four years.

Or is it? Because these sides have women; tall, strong, beautiful Australian women who add a uniformity to the set by their height and strength and they kick and leap about on light feet better than any man I’ve ever seen in England. Most of the sides were a rough fifty-fifty split and just dispensed with all that nonsense about women not being allowed because Morris here started after Emancipation, instead of before. And it’s a much smaller crowd, so they just include everyone who has the folky interest. And because they all know each other and because they are slaves to the Cotswolds traditions (about which they know far more than me…see above note in parenthesis), they can all join in each other’s dances, which is quite lovely indeed.

So I came away from the folk festival actually wanting to learn hanky dances which was an extraordinary turn up for the books. But only so I could dance them in Australia. But to reflect on it all, there did seem to be an almost crippling self-consciousness in the clinging to the older Cotswolds traditions. I’ve always found that to be the more sanitised side of Morris; the kind that goes to church and won’t necessarily be found in the dark brandishing flaming torches (does one ever do anything else with a flaming torch?), drinking heavily and communing with some kind of more ancient, less definite thing. Where the hell was the border Morris?

I am assured that Border exists in Australia. When I attend the Huon Valley Midwinter Festival (gleeeee!!) in July, I expect there’ll be a lot more of the burning shit and creepy costumes. Border has always seemed to be the more progressive – even the name suggests it is the pushed aside, marginalised people that have had to forge a space of harmony between things. Well look, that’s my interpretation, and yes, I know about bloody Wales and protecting frontiers. Border sides mostly always have women, do more painting and costume (if it’s about disguising yourself with paint and rags so you can hide not only your face from your employer as you beg for money, why not your gender?) and there is a more pagan, earthy feel to it. It’s also the way Morris is progressing in England; you can be a catch-all for the folkies and the goths and more young people are interested in that style of dance. It’s the style (in England) of the young, and more Border sides are started up that Cotswolds.

Cut to England and I wake up on a narrowboat with the croak of an owl at four in the morning on May the first. Into the blue light in our bells, we step off and I’m drowning in the song of blackbirds and I have forgotten how beautiful they are. Driving towards the beacon at the end of the ancient Icknield way, we encounter a large deer on the lane, then arrive on Pitstone hill amid the yellow glow of a carpet of cowslips and New Moon Morris dance and sing the glowing red ball of light up. I can feel spring.

In Rochester that weekend, a hundred sides in different colours, ribbons and feathers are celebrating the May-o and diversity and colour are the sign of English Morris. Ok, not proper diversity, Morris dancers are still resoundingly white and English, but there is a huge mix of styles and colour. The immense percussive orchestra of the Witchmen boom out across the streets and you find your legs running towards the sound to see what’s going on and you are not disappointed. But my favourite discovery this year was a brand new Morris side called Hugin and Munnin – a pair of dancers and one musician who dress as crows (after the Norse myth of Odin’s ravens, Hugin and Munnin that follow him in battle and fly out around Midgard each morning to bring him news from across the worlds) and did some crazy shit with sticks and shields, and god knows what was going on with the big black bollock balloons that came out and ate people’s heads.

But this is what Morris is about for me. Two people starting up a new side in whatever tradition they fancy, bringing in whatever ancient mythology floats their respective boats, thinking about the spectacle, and incorporating a bit of heavy metal into Morris. Fuck yes dudes, fuck yes. Folk must grow and follow the folk and their culture. Otherwise it fossilises into the elite or the useless.

And Australia seems to have not got there yet. Perhaps it’s still establishing and then when it’s secure, it will move to the next phase. You know, like after the rise of capitalism, there is the inevitable rise of the workers. Yeah, just like that. There are new sides arising in Australia – I had the privilege to witness the birth of one at the Folk Festival. But it was a side of garland dances. Sigh. I can stick a garland dance even less than a hanky dance. But bloody hell, this was amazing! Imagine in May, the frothing of hawthorn over the hedgerows and young, lithe, beautiful girls gather blossoms and weave them into garlands and into their hair and dance. What could be more beautiful? Well, when done by ancient women in a grey town centre, which is the only way I’ve ever seen it done, a hell of a lot could be more beautiful. But in Canberra on that special evening, with fire circles giving light and heat, out stepped an amalgamation of young girls and men from several sides wreathed in green and silver with gold fairy lights in their hats; they danced beautifully and I thought I was on the bankside in a cowslip’s bell where the bee sucks and all the fairies of A Midsummer Night’s Dream were dancing for Titania. It was beautiful.

Australia is reviving Morris and doing it properly. But now it needs to grow. It needs the courage to start something new.  Miles Franklin found that her niche as a writer was not regurgitating the castles and grey moors of Europe. It was ‘off her own hook,’ by making something new, embracing her landscape. So Australian Morris; that is your next step.

Beltane

He coughs oak leaves and stands up. He is taller than the forest. He is the forest and it is him. The antlers of a deer twist like branches out from his head – they run through his leaves and he is of them. He stretches towards the sun, his sapling sinews crackling and pulsing – life beats on thundering hooves and paws through the forest.

The sun rises red gold over the cowslips. The green man shakes out his yellow green coat and walks into the year.

As crocuses wither and daffodils droop, hawthorn blooms. Children from the village wearing flower crowns bring offerings to the stone circle on the hillside.

The green man stands forest vast in the centre and ribbons are tied to him, bells waved, and all the people dance. He is wreathed in tumbling badgers, cubs and singing birds. To him will come his queen, his Beltane Bride, the hawthorn queen. And they will fruit summer together.

* * * *

Maya was the loveliest girl in the village. The last winter snows cleared to reveal her body taller in the spring, her hair laburnum yellow and her bluebell eyes shone. This would be her first year to dance with the older girls for the Beltane festival.

She was ready for it. The spring had swelled in her breast over the April weeks as the weather gentled and she found she had not stopped smiling in a fortnight and went to bed with aching cheeks. Her mother would call her impatiently as she stood by the stream, gazing at the sunlight on its rushing ripples that hurt her eyes with their dazzle. On getting the sheep in, she would pause on the hillside and glut her eyes on the bluebell copse’s fragrance and the soft way hawthorn threw its white blossoms on the field edge. But most of all was that feeling in her breast, that swelling, alive feeling, of something beating that caught her throat and held her mind and made her stomach tickle. Like something was about to happen. Something incredibly beautiful and exciting.

This feeling called Maya from her bed before dawn. The silvery moonlight tapped on her eyelids and she unconsciously registered the change and woke up. She slithered out of bed and went to the window. As she struggled to lift the old sash, her sister stirred.

‘Maya, what are you doing?’

Maya winced and froze. ‘Sorry Freya. Go back to sleep love.’

Freya cleared her throat of bleariness and groggily sat up.  ‘Are you trying to get out the window?’

‘No!’ Maya laughed. ‘Maybe, I’m not sure! It’s so lovely isn’t it? Everything’s silver, it feels magic.’

Freya stumbled over to the window and leaned on her sister’s shoulder, resting her arm round Maya’s waist. She stared a while, then rubbed her eyes with the back of her wrist.

‘Beautiful,’ she confirmed, turning around. ‘Now go back to bed.’

‘I’m going out,’ announced Maya.

Freya turned again. ‘Really? What if you fall in the stream? Or knock your ankle on something you can’t see? You’ll be no good in the morning for the sheep.’

‘It’s so light Freya – it’s like day! You can see everything! I’m going now.’

Freya was crawling back into bed. ‘Fine,’ she resigned. ‘But put some shoes on’

Maya runs into the horned silver night. She stops on the slope of the hill and looks down to the lake and forest and back up the hill towards her home. Her lips part in wonder as she sees the hills reflected ivory in the lake waters and her heart beats fast. She runs down to the forest.

The green man hears her coming and turns. Squirrels swarm down his arms and the buds on his brow flower into opulent green as he sees her run. A silver, hawthorn white girl. She stops, stunned, when she sees him, high as the green canopy above her. Tall, strong as summer, green as oak and beautiful. She goes to him. She is dazzled.

* * * *

‘Maya, really, that lamb was nearly left behind!’ her mother scolded. ‘You just stood there in a daze, then tranced down without even noticing her.’

Maya hung her head and mumbled her apologies, urging the lamb down the hillside with her crook under her mother’s thunder.

‘What’s the matter with you today?’ she continued. ‘You’re normally so alert. Did you not sleep well?’

‘Maybe that’s it,’ Maya admitted, stumbling on.

* * * *

The moon was suspended full and hovered swollen as if time stood still. That night it called Maya out to her green lover again and they stretched themselves out by the lake’s stream on its moss. His bark muscled arms crooked to cradle her, and his green finger leaves cushioned her sharp bones. When they kissed, the air was the fragrance of honey and hawthorn and the deep green freshness of moistened peridot moss.

He leaned toward the stream and scooped out a palmful of water. It wreathed itself into a silver ring and its patterns were the rushing currents and soft eddies of mountain streams, bound in silver threads of droplets and the shimmer of moonbeams. Displaying it to her first on a bed of leaves, the green man then slipped it on Maya’s finger.

* * * *

‘That’s pretty!’ Freya exclaimed, her eyes widening over breakfast. ‘Where did you get it?’

Maya came to herself again and followed her sister’s eye. She fiddled the ring idly, then covered it with her other hand and put both on her lap under the table.

‘I found it,’ she said, then cleared her hoarse voice. ‘By the lake.’

Freya’s eyes narrowed and she leaned in over her bread and honey. ‘Did you go out again last night?’

Maya chanced a quick glance over at their mother whose back was busily moving to the rhythm of the mangle in front, and nodded.

‘Well tonight it’s the green gathering,’ Freya whispered. ‘So I’ll be with you. You can show me where.’

Maya smiled. Freya pushed the last of her bread into her mouth and stood up, brushing crumbs off her skirt. ‘Doesn’t matter what we find – so long as you look as lovely as possible, little May queen!’

Under the moon before dawn, the sisters easily woke themselves. They cast aside the rough, course materials of their shepherdessing and dressed in Sunday-fine muslin. Laughing together and whispering, they left the house for the forest.

At the edge, they waited still and silent. Then a set of badger cubs came running across the worn path and carried on down the hill. Freya turned to Maya, eyes shining. Every year. The girls carried on to a good spot and began collecting ivy. They worked for a solid half an hour with their hunting knives, filling their baskets. Then anemones, bluebells, clover, cow parsley and early dog rose. Running home with it all, they heaved it upon the scrubbed table in the kitchen and Freya and her mother set about crowning their May queen.

* * * *

The green man waits as dawn reddens at the edge of the forest on the hillside. His wedding day. Song thrushes sing the bridal march and he watches the village bedecking windows, door jambs and children below. All the village and all the land to celebrate his marriage.

* * * *

Smiling Maya took her place behind two long columns of girls. They all wore white and had ribbons on their dresses and flowers wreathed in their hair. Freya turned and winked at Maya. Here we go. The drums started to set the rhythm, then the fiddles joined and all the girls as one began the processional dance up the hillside towards the stone circle.

The sun is so blinding bright in Maya’s eyes and she has only the impression through the ache, of green, green; blue in the sky and the dizzying whiteness of the dresses and the stones above, the dazzling grey-white of horses. It is all sensation, the warmth of the sun on her face and arms, the squeeze of the silver ring and the fluttering breathlessness in her chest. Her head is light and there are no thoughts now – they are diffusing out like pollen and mixing with the dew in the air and the wings of bees; and the scents of flowers drift in and mingle there. She feels herself slip and become the forest, the movement of ants, the grains of earth, the colours of smells, the very May itself.

They reach the stone circle. The girls stretch their arms into an arch while others scatter petals. Maya dances down the arch and enters the circle. She sees nothing now, but green and brown and the arms of her lover open, then enfold her deep to him. She dances into the heart of the oak.

In the stone circle, the village watch a girl and a tree, then a man and blossom, then in the confusion of the brilliant light and the sound of fiddles and birdsong and petals and cheers, all lifts and slips.

Then stepping back, the revellers see an oak tree, its leaves fragily small but irrepressibly green and ready, and the wind dandles the branches so there is almost a face of a man high up that comes and goes. There is no girl, but a beautiful white hawthorn bursting with white lace frothing flowers, and the branches of both are twined sweetly.

The children step forth and tie ribbons to oak and hawthorn and sing. And bees fly out in their ponderous progress and pollinate the blossoms and the flowers. Spring is for lovers.

The yearly offering.