Folk Groups And Folklore Genres: An Introduction

Chapter 7. Ballads and Folksongs

.:. .:. .:. .:. .:. Chapter 7 Ballads and Folksongs Barre Toelken .:. .:. A folksong begins its life like any other song: as a musical and poetic expression of some person's feelings or ideas. A song becomes a folksong when it begins to be passed along and rephrased or used by others for whom it also functions as a way of articulating shared attitudes or feelings. Because the song's ability to trigger a group's feelings is more important than the practical matter of who the composer was, a folksong usually loses its direct connection with its maker and becomes the ward of those who sing it. It becomes a folksong not simply because a lot of people like it or because thousands have listened to it, but because some have persisted in singing it among themselves, and in their own way. It picks up the colorations, nuances, and styles of the group among whom it circulates, and gets continually rephrased to suit their responses to time, place, rhetoric, and performance. Such a song is seldom memorized word,for'word the way we were taught to memorize a literary text in school (in which we were not encouraged to improve on the poet's skiII or demonstrate our own capabilities at composition), but rather it is comprehended and continually recomposed, in much the same way we pass on jokes, rumors, or family anecdotes. As we pick up the songs of our family, of our age'mates, of our profession, we also learn by example the "knack" of how and when to sing them, how to join in on the chorus, or how to harmonize. Since the main idea of the song is often more important than specific wording or 147 Barre 'fodken particular tunes, various kinds of changes occur constantly. Variations in local custom or phrasing, personal taste, creative ability, poor memory, variations in social and historical context, all bring about continual adjustments during the normal transmission of a folksong through generations of singers. Just as some people can tell a joke well and some can't, some people remember and sing better than others. In one family only Grandma sings, in another family no one sings (except for "Happy Birthday"), and in a third family everyone sings (except that Uncle Ken sings the parodies, Cousin Martha sings the old ballads, and everyone joins in on favorite hymns). While someone in one place is forgetting a verse or phrase, someone in another place is singing it memorably (although perhaps only her family may hear it). While one culture tends to stress a hope for reunion in its songs about lovers' parting, another culture across the river savors the melancholy of the departure itself. Folksongs, like other genres of traditional expression, do not have to be ancient, or rural, or backward, or quaint in order to be called folklore; they are characterized by absorption into a group's expressive performances, by shaping of presentation and meaning brought about by the group's values, and by constant change and development. Some songs change more than others and some change very little, but the typical condition offolksong is one of flux.l Who sings folksongs, and why do some change more than others? A brief recollection of songs we commonly sing or hear may suggest a few answers. We all sing folksongs at one time or another, and usually the occasion, plus local and family custom, will determine how we sing them. In America, songs sung by people joiningin together are usually less apt to change than those sung by a single person; thus, "Happy Birthday," "Home on the Range," and "You Are My Sunshine" (often reinforced by mass media and PlOpularculture) tend to change less than solo performances of a narrative folksong (ballad) such as "Barbara Allen," which has hundreds of different versions. Children's songs and obscene songs perhaps because their effects are achieved by the use ofcertain key words - tend to remain very stable over long periods of time, whereas love 148 FOLK GROUPS AND FOLKLORE GENRES lyrics in oral tradition may vary with each singing. We may never fully account for this wide range of possible variation, but it confirms "oral tradition" as a complex, common, and ongoing phenomenon. Today, with the help of copyright laws, personality cults and fan clubs, media identification and glorification of stars and composers, royalty provisions and the like, the bulk of new songs retain their...