Introduction[edit]
The traditional singers and musicians were celebrities within their own community but the majority were unknown to the world at large until the 1950s and 60s when collectors arrived with portable tape recorders. A few of them recorded enough material for an entire album. Most are known for a couple of songs. A few scraps of biographical notes are given in booklets that accompany the discs. Every one of them led working-class lives. Volumes 9 and 19 are collections of instrumentals. In a few cases the singers used song books or ballad sheets to supplement their repertoire, but in most cases their versions are from oral tradition. This collection is the UK equivalent of Harry Smith's Anthology of American Folk Music.
Reviews[edit]
Brian Peters wrote in Roots World as "the crème de la crème of Britain's traditional singers and musicians".[3] Veteran Records said it was "the greatest set of CDs of English, Irish and Scottish singing and music ever produced."[4]
The album is listed in the accompanying book to the Topic Records 70 year anniversary boxed set Three Score and Ten as one of their classic records[5]: 83 with Creeping Jane from volume 8 as the tenth track on the first CD and The Nut Dance from volume 16 as the first track on the second CD.