In The Roud - A Folk Song Podcast

06/05/2024

Out on 8th May!!

S1/E1: Roud 1 - The Raggle Taggle Gypsies

Historical guest: Steve Roud
Singer guest: Jon Boden

Steve Roud is the founder of the Roud Folk Song Index and the author of a number of major works on English folkways and customs including The English Year, The New Penguin Book of English Folk Songs (with Julia Bishop) and Folk Song In England.

Jon Boden is best known as lead singer and main arranger of the award winning folk big-band Bellowhead, who are touring nationally in November '24 to venues such as the London Palladium and Birmingham Symphony Hall. He has performed extensively in the field of traditional English folk song and music for over twenty years working as one half of Spiers & Boden, with his own band The Remnant Kings, solo and most recently in a new duo with Eliza Carthy. He is primarily a vocalist and fiddler but also plays guitar and duet concertina. Archers fans may also be familiar with his arrangement of the theme tune "Barwick Green" which is used for the Sunday omnibus edition on Radio 4.

Available from Apple Podcasts, Spotify etc

04/05/2024

We've hit 100 downloads!!! This is amazing. Genuinely wasn't expecting that! Hope you all enjoyed the introduction episode.

Let me take this opportunity to recommend Steve Roud's book Folk Song in England. A very important book on the history of our country's folk songs, the collectors etc.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough.

I'm away for a bit for some of the weekend so there'll be a post about the next episode on Tuesday before it airs on Wednesday.
Have a great bank holiday weekend everyone!

01/05/2024

Happy 1st of May!

And we're live!!! The introduction episode is out there.

A chat with Steve Roud about the Roud Index, and a chat with Karl Sinfield about the Sing Yonder book series.

Currently available on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, Boomplay and some others I think.

Not quite there on Youtube and Google Podcasts yet, still working on the technical side of that. Soon though.

Links in the comments below. Subscribe on whichever one you normally use so that you always get the next episode as soon as it airs.

30/04/2024

FIRST EPISODE!!!

Introduction episode coming on 1st May!!
In this introductory episode, I spoke with two key figures in the creation of this podcast, Steve Roud and Karl Sinfield.

Steve Roud is the founder of the Roud Folk Song Index and the author of a number of major works on English folkways and customs including The English Year, The New Penguin Book of English Folk Songs (with Julia Bishop) and Folk Song In England.
Karl Sinfield is the writer, editor, publisher and warehouse operative for the Sing Yonder series of practical guides to traditional song, and their associated range of spin-off merchandise. He can also be found performing with his band The Gally Canters, or hanging about on the periphery of a folk gig or session somewhere in or around the Peak District.

Podcast availabe from Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts etc. If it's not available from your usual podcast provider, get in touch and I'll see what I can do.

22/04/2024

It would be remiss of In The Roud not to acknowledge what has come before. This podcast couldn’t happen without doffing our cap to the sterling work done by Jon Wilks and The Old Songs Podcast. Over 22 episodes, Jon and TOSP covered 21 traditional songs and 1 traditional tune with different guests per episode. Each of those episodes is an excellent listen and should not be forgotten in a hurry.

There will inevitably be some crossover in terms of songs covered. But with the very nature of In The Roud (i.e. we’ll be going through the Roud Index in numerical order), there won’t be that many, at least in the immediate future. In fact there’ll be 7 songs that TOSP covered which In The Roud won’t even reach if we ran 3 seasons a year for the next 40 years. Such is the size of the Roud Index.

Nevertheless, if ITR continues in the way I hope, then there’ll be 6 episode over the next 3 years which will feature songs previously covered on TOSP. Naturally, ITR will feature different guests for those songs, the folk scene is big enough.

We commend Jon Wilks for his work running The Old Songs Podcast and everything else he does on his TradFolk website. He will most certainly be a guest on In The Roud in the near future, both to talk about a particular song, but also to chat about his work on The Old Songs Podcast.

The Old Songs Podcast is due a return, and we have a new series planned. In the meantime, here's where you'll find the first series.

17/04/2024

This is ‘In The Roud – A Folk Song Podcast’. We’ll be deep diving into one folk song in each episode, working our way through the Roud Index in order*. Each episode will feature a guest who will provide an historical look at the song, and another guest, a singer from the folk scene to provide a modern perspective on the song and to chat about a version that they sing.

*The Roud Index currently goes up to approx. 40,000. I realize that this is an unattainable goal, but it’s about the journey, not the end.

There’ll be an introduction episode released on Weds 1st May. Then Season 1 will begin properly on Weds 8th May for 10 weeks.

Podcast produced in association with Sing Yonder. https://singyonder.co.uk