For the third year running, Cambridge had a Mercury nominee playing. This year that honour went to Kate Rusby, following on the heels of both Eliza Carthy and Norma Waterson.
Like Eliza and Norma, Kate Rusby draws a lot of her material from an English folk tradition. The songs are given contemporary overtones, guitars, bands and amplification add new dimensions, but the song and the lyric essentially remain the same. Perhaps, tellingly, all three have distinctive voices that add to the heart of the song, be it traditional or recently penned and maybe this is what sets them apart. Undisputedly all three have produced excellent albums that are worthy of wider public attention.
But then so have the likes of the Oysterband, The Battlefield Band and Edward II. Folk in this country is a very broad church and yet all three nominations have been pulled out of a relatively narrow band. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that Kate, Eliza and Norma are interchangeable, their patently not, all have their own style and delivery. What is true is that all three are immersed in the rich tradition of English folk.
What do the nominations say to the wider music audience
? Does it try to define ‘folk’ as a single vein? Do
they try to tell a wider audience that all folk is the same ?
Do the nominations tell us more about the qualities of the Mercury
judges than it does about the richness of folk music?