As someone who regrets his few disastrous attempts at song writing it is perhaps somewhat rich to voice my opinions on this accessible but highly variable form of expression. Yet when I think more closely about why I shy away from taking my attempts at barding into the public domain (based partly on the widespread hilarity with which friends now reference them) I begin to see the crux of the matter as fairly simple- there are few subjects that have not been covered in the vast canon of folksong, and few folksongs that I think I could better.

This is not say that I should not try, or that the folk scene does not benefit from the continued contribution of new song writing in a traditional vein. Yet perhaps the highest accolade that any writer can achieve is when his or her work goes on after them, when the work takes on a greater significance than its origin. However I often worry that prevalent schools of song writing veer towards a degree of introversion and individualism that seems to disregard the true potential of the song as an art form: its communal nature.

This intrinsic quality that folk song possesses can be seen in its origins as work songs, religious songs, and protest songs, in effect situations in which the importance of asserting the prominence of the group is paramount. I would suggest that the main strength of traditional music lies in this quality, in the moments in which we transcend our identity as individuals. Perhaps I am earning myself the dreaded title of purist, or one of those extremely irritating figures with no potential for creativity (and an infinite capacity for negativity) that are forever waiting in the wings of the folk scene, ready at every turn to deride anything other than the work of one 90 year old dulcimer expert.

Another important factor in what I would describe as the ‘ego school’ of song writing is the idea that no subject is out of bounds, and that to some extent the more obscure the subject matter is to the life of the writer the better. Can a pampered bohemian from Morningside evoke the trials of the whaling industry, or the persecution of Palestinians? Personally I have my doubts. Yet I would be prepared for these doubts to be dissuaded, if the said fictional songwriter were to make a conscious effort to relate to a whaler or a Palestinian, and to look at their plight through the lens of his own experience.

No subject should be out of bounds for a song writer and they should continue to keep testing the medium's abilities. No one would have thought that the ballad idiom could be used to write about a certain model of motorbike, yet few would question '1952 Vincent Black Lightning’s' place in the canon. Both language and music offer us a set of tools that can be deployed to deliver raw emotional effects, but we can only ever enjoy their true effect if we remember how old they are, and how many times they have been used by others. Perhaps the trick is to revel in that fact rather than running from it. So many people look at the social awkwardness of Nick Drake or Bob Dylan and seem to conclude (in a very shallow connection) that the singer must exist in isolation. Yet the greatest artist is constantly quoting- and perhaps the era of recorded music has made this more obvious- and in turn made the folk medium more valid. It has also made my own song writing more than a bit extraneous.