Folk music

I love folk music!  When I was young I used to watch the Irish Rovers on TV.  Will Millar used to sign off with the blessing, "May you be half an hour in heaven before the Devil knows you're dead!" I also watched a show with Ryan's Fancy and Tommy Makem, who'd sign off with blessings like "May your cat have a long tail!" and "May all your duck eggs have double yolks!" I also saw some concerts with the Celtic music of John Allen Cameron.

Pete Seeger was a folk singer I admire both as a musician and as a person. He'd been a communist when he was young and got blacklisted in the 1950s, but he never gave up!  He also led a movement to clean up the Hudson River.

I like some of those Newfoundland songs like "She's Like the Swallow" and "I's the B'y That Builds the Boat." Back in the 1960s my mother wrote to the TV show The Friendly Giant and asked them to sing "I's the B'y That Builds the Boat," and they did!

The Carter Family sang some great folk songs, like "Will the Circle Be Unbroken?" It's about finding joy in grief.

The folk song "Red River Valley" was the original country song!  That's what they call "hurtin' music"!