The Voice of the People

The Voice Of The People: The Traditional Music Of England, Ireland, Scotland & Wales

A Twenty Volume Series, compiled by Reg Hall.

Topic Records TSCD651-670

Description of the series, from the Topic Records website:

This series makes available nearly 500 recordings of English, Irish, Scottish and Welsh traditional music drawn from the archives of Topic Records and from private collections. Compiled as thematic anthologies, each volume stands on its own, but the series as a whole presents an extensive and varied picture of traditional singing, instrumental music-making and dancing throughout the course of the 20th century. Many of the singers and musicians and their recorded performances presented here are classic, but the inclusion of some less well-known performers and genres broadens the horizon by offering glimpses at some little-known nooks and crannies of traditional music-making. This is the home-spun art and entertainment that enriched the lives of working people in pubs and cottages, in social clubs and village halls and on the street, and was made, in the words of one of the musicians in the series, "by people with dirt under their finger nails."

The 20 CDs in the series are:

• Volume 1 Come Let Us Buy the Licence
• Volume 2 My Ship Shall Sail the Ocean
• Volume 3 O'er His Grave the Grass Grew Green
• Volume 4 Farewell My Own Dear Native Land
• Volume 5 Come All my Lads that Follow the Plough
• Volume 6 Tonight I'll Make You my Bride
• Volume 7 First I'm Going to Sing You a Ditty
• Volume 8 A Story I'm Just About to Tell
• Volume 9 Rig-a-Jig-Jig
• Volume 10 Who's That at my Bed Window?
• Volume 11 My Father's the King of the Gypsies
• Volume 12 We've Received Orders to Sail
• Volume 13 They Ordered Their Pints of Beer and Bottles of Sherry
• Volume 14 Troubles They Are But Few
• Volume 15 As Me and My Love Sat Courting
• Volume 16 You Lazy Lot of Bone-Shakers
• Volume 17 It Fell on a Day, a Bonny Summer Day
• Volume 18 To Catch a Fine Buck was my Delight
• Volume 19 Ranting and Reeling
• Volume 20 There is a Man upon the Farm

Voice of the People Performer Index

Musical Traditions Voice of the People pages: reviews, notes, indexes.