120-575: World Party was a musical group, predominantly the solo project of its sole consistent member, the songwriter, producer and multi-instrumentalist Karl Wallinger . Wallinger started the band in 1986 in London after leaving the Waterboys . At various times, World Party also featured Guy Chambers , David Catlin-Birch , future Oasis drummer Chris Sharrock , Jeff Trott , Amanda Kramer and John Turnbull . World Party produced several hit singles during
240-491: A brain aneurysm in February 2001. After several months of writing for the band, he felt unwell, and asked his friends to call an ambulance to take him to a hospital, where he was diagnosed with a brain aneurysm. He subsequently required surgery wherein the doctors had to block fibers near the optic nerve . Despite what would appear to be a full recovery, he lost his peripheral vision on the right side of both eyes. Although
360-482: A chuigushou . Ensembles consisting of mouth organs ( sheng ), shawms ( suona ), flutes ( dizi ) and percussion instruments (especially yunluo gongs ) are popular in northern villages; their music is descended from the imperial temple music of Beijing, Xi'an , Wutai shan and Tianjin . Xi'an drum music, consisting of wind and percussive instruments, is popular around Xi'an, and has received some commercial popularity outside of China. Another important instrument
480-619: A pipa , as well as other traditional instruments. The music is generally sorrowful and typically deals with love-stricken people. Further south, in Shantou , Hakka and Chaozhou , zheng ensembles are popular. Sizhu ensembles use flutes and bowed or plucked string instruments to make harmonious and melodious music that has become popular in the West among some listeners. These are popular in Nanjing and Hangzhou , as well as elsewhere along
600-474: A tune is a short instrumental piece , a melody , often with repeating sections , and usually played a number of times. A collection of tunes with structural similarities is known as a tune-family . America's Musical Landscape says "the most common form for tunes in folk music is AABB, also known as binary form ." In some traditions, tunes may be strung together in medleys or " sets ." Throughout most of human history, listening to recorded music
720-512: A "Traditional music" category that subsequently evolved into others. The term "folk", by the start of the 21st century, could cover singer-songwriters, such as Donovan from Scotland and American Bob Dylan , who emerged in the 1960s and much more. This completed a process to where "folk music" no longer meant only traditional folk music. Traditional folk music often includes sung words , although folk instrumental music occurs commonly in dance music traditions. Narrative verse looms large in
840-481: A child at both Eton College and Charterhouse School , before switching his allegiance fully to pop and rock music. Following initial stints in Prestatyn with the short-lived bands Pax and Quasimodo, he moved to London in the late 1970s and entered a five-year "lost period" during which he worked in music publishing, had a stint as musical director of a West End production of The Rocky Horror Show , and played in
960-401: A class dynamic to popular understandings of American folk music. This was the final element of the foundation upon which the early folk music revivalists constructed their own view of Americanism. Sandburg's working-class Americans joined with the ethnically , racially , and regionally diverse citizens that other scholars, public intellectuals, and folklorists celebrated their own definitions of
1080-412: A contributing artist on "The Four Ages of Man". In 2008, Real World Records released the album Big Blue Ball – the culmination of work begun by Wallinger and Peter Gabriel during the summers of 1991, 1992, and 1995, in which they coordinated recordings by dozens of international artists at Real World Studios . When Gabriel learned of Wallinger's death in 2024, he referred to the 2008 project in
1200-500: A dilapidated former rectory in which to work on solo material (which would eventually emerge as World Party). During this time, Wallinger also worked on Sinéad O'Connor 's 1987 debut album The Lion and the Cobra . World Party began as a solo studio project with Wallinger as a one-man-band (plus guests) exploring rock, pop, folk and funk ideas plus elements of other genres. In 2024, The Guardian' s Graeme Thomson would summarise
1320-632: A distribution deal was agreed (via his own Seaview label) with Universal, and he played his first live show in a decade at the South by Southwest festival in Texas, US. He played additional US dates in 2006 including the Bonnaroo Festival in Tennessee. Big Blue Ball , a joint project with Peter Gabriel with production work by Stephen Hague was also released. Subsequent World Party activity
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#17327733186451440-473: A final tumbling backing vocal (influenced by David Bowie), as well as bringing in drummer Chris Whitten . Musical rivalry and desire for control over creative credit made the relationship between Scott and Wallinger increasingly difficult and fractious, and in subsequent years the two would occasionally bicker publicly about who was responsible for the success of the music they created together. However, in 2012, Scott would remember, more generously, that "Karl
1560-413: A funk band called The Out. By the end of this period, he'd also mastered all of the instruments needed for him to become a one-man rock band, as well as the arts of record production and synthesizer programming. In 1983, Wallinger joined his first notable band, the Waterboys , initially as a keyboard player. Having contributed one organ part to the band's debut album, and many more piano and organ parts to
1680-587: A great body of English rural traditional song, music and dance, under the aegis of what became and remains the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS). Sharp campaigned with some success to have English traditional songs (in his own heavily edited and expurgated versions) to be taught to school children in hopes of reviving and prolonging the popularity of those songs. Throughout the 1960s and early to mid-1970s, American scholar Bertrand Harris Bronson published an exhaustive four-volume collection of
1800-419: A hit single, " Ship of Fools ". The second album, 1990's Goodbye Jumbo , has been hailed as Wallinger's masterpiece and as "a restoration of ’60s pop values", consolidating Wallinger's pop interests into a more organic live-band sound while maintaining his diversity of approach. It was voted "album of the year" by Q magazine, was nominated for a Grammy Award for "best alternative music performance" in
1920-451: A keyboard player with Pax, before forming the short-lived band Quasimodo with Dave Sharp and Nigel Twist (who both went on to be in the Alarm ). Having moved to London, he then had a job in music publishing working for Northern Songs . He played keyboards for Peter Straker and was featured on the album Changeling , on which he received a writing credit for the song "Believer". In
2040-478: A low profile. An interview with Mojo in 2021 revealed that he still hoped that "a 63-year-old Welshman can say something relevant, post-apocalypse. Who knows how close it is to a parting shot?" but also warned "it's useless to try to find out what I'm up to... (I'm) just a guy who makes noises in a room and plays them to as few people as possible." In November 2022, Wallinger released an expanded edition of Egyptology . In an interview with The Big Takeover during
2160-549: A much better time than me, popping off to the Brits while I was at home eating crackers dipped in water". In 2012, he recalled "at the time it seemed horribly clandestine and then Robbie stole my band and I was like, "What are you doing, guys?"..." With Catlin-Birch still on board, Wallinger released a fifth World Party album, Dumbing Up , in 2000 (which peaked at No. 64 on the UK Albums Chart ). A lone single, "Here Comes
2280-432: A new form of popular folk music evolved from traditional folk music. This process and period is called the (second) folk revival and reached a zenith in the 1960s. This form of music is sometimes called contemporary folk music or folk revival music to distinguish it from earlier folk forms. Smaller, similar revivals have occurred elsewhere in the world at other times, but the term folk music has typically not been applied to
2400-404: A particular interest in folklore. Carl Sandburg often traveled the U.S. as a writer and a poet. He also collected songs in his travels and, in 1927, published them in the book The American Songbag . Rachel Donaldson, a historian who worked for Vanderbilt, later stated this about The American Songbird in her analysis of the folk music revival. "In his collections of folk songs, Sandburg added
2520-474: A planned tour support slot with Neil Young in favour of further recording. Looking back on the events twenty-two years later, Wallinger reflected "nowadays you would tour the fuck out of the Q Award thing, but (Grainge) was like, "No, you can’t go and support Neil Young in America – get back in the studio," and for me that meant three more years out of sight." He would consider this to be the decisive moment in
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#17327733186452640-695: A possible better system, through the lens of the Great Depression. Woody Guthrie exemplifies songwriters and artists with such an outlook. Folk music festivals proliferated during the 1930s. President Franklin Roosevelt was a fan of folk music, hosted folk concerts at the White House , and often patronized folk festivals. One prominent festival was Sarah Gertrude Knott 's National Folk Festival , established in St. Louis, Missouri in 1934. Under
2760-621: A reference to beautiful women, while in the past they were notorious for their erotic content. The village "mountain songs" ( shan'ge ) of Jiangsu province were also well known for their amorous themes. Other regional song traditions include the "strummed lyrics" ( tanci ) of the Lower Yangtze Delta, the Cantonese Wooden Fish tradition ( muyu or muk-yu ) and the Drum Songs ( guci ) of north China. In
2880-553: A revolutionary tool to preserve vanishing musical forms. The earliest American folk music scholars were with the American Folklore Society (AFS), which emerged in the late 1800s. Their studies expanded to include Native American music , but still treated folk music as a historical item preserved in isolated societies as well. In North America, during the 1930s and 1940s, the Library of Congress worked through
3000-479: A simple distinction of economic class yet for him, true folk music was, in Charles Seeger 's words, "associated with a lower class" in culturally and socially stratified societies. In these terms, folk music may be seen as part of a "schema comprising four musical types: 'primitive' or 'tribal'; 'elite' or 'art'; 'folk'; and 'popular'." Music in this genre is also often called traditional music. Although
3120-401: A social media post: "I had admired his work from afar but it was when we did a Real World Recording Week together that I had the most creative and fun week I have ever had in the studio. Karl was overflowing with wonderful musical ideas that blew us all away, all delivered with terrible jokes that had us laughing uncontrollably all day and night. He was such a gifted, natural writer and player, it
3240-415: A three-year break. Wallinger's discouragement with being shuffled from label to label (Ensign to Charisma to EMI) due to corporate takeovers had a lot to do with the break and his desire for practical independence. In 2012, he explained "basically my last fax or whatever it was to EMI was literally just like "fuck off"... At that point I just said "tell them we don’t want any more money, just say give me back
3360-418: A time when this was unfashionable. This eventually extended to the no-frills, no-waste, communitarian-based packaging for Arkaeology , assembled by Wallinger and his own family and friends at home. Wallinger's perspective on these matters has been labelled "prescient and heartfelt, a fervent post-script to ’80s consumerism," and "well ahead of the times." Wallinger himself has commented "I wanted to personify
3480-567: A traditional song would undergo a process of improvement akin to biological natural selection : only those new variants that were the most appealing to ordinary singers would be picked up by others and transmitted onward in time. Thus, over time we would expect each traditional song to become more aesthetically appealing, due to incremental community improvement. Literary interest in the popular ballad form dates back at least to Thomas Percy and William Wordsworth . English Elizabethan and Stuart composers had often evolved their music from folk themes,
3600-434: A tragic or regretful nature, prominently figures in many folk traditions. Nursery rhymes , children's songs and nonsense verse used to amuse or quiet children also are frequent subjects of traditional songs. Music transmitted by word of mouth through a community, in time, develops many variants, since this transmission cannot produce word-for-word and note-for-note accuracy. In addition, folk singers may choose to modify
3720-408: Is an ancient folk song from India, a country of Asia, of Meiteis of Manipur , that is an example of Asian folk music, and how they put it into its own genre. Archaeological discoveries date Chinese folk music back 7000 years; it is largely based on the pentatonic scale . Han traditional weddings and funerals usually include a form of oboe called a suona , and apercussive ensembles called
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3840-530: Is generally no "authoritative" version of song. Researchers in traditional songs have encountered countless versions of the Barbara Allen ballad throughout the English-speaking world, and these versions often differ greatly from each other. The original is not known; many versions can lay an equal claim to authenticity. Influential folklorist Cecil Sharp felt that these competing variants of
3960-417: Is played on traditional instruments, music about cultural or national identity, music that changes between generations (folk process), music associated with a people's folklore , or music performed by custom over a long period of time. It has been contrasted with commercial and classical styles . The term originated in the 19th century, but folk music extends beyond that. Starting in the mid-20th century,
4080-486: Is simply "Folk music is what the people sing." For Scholes, as well as for Cecil Sharp and Béla Bartók , there was a sense of the music of the country as distinct from that of the town. Folk music was already, "...seen as the authentic expression of a way of life now past or about to disappear (or in some cases, to be preserved or somehow revived)," particularly in "a community uninfluenced by art music" and by commercial and printed song. Lloyd rejected this in favor of
4200-402: Is the sheng , a type of Chinese pipe , an ancient instrument that is ancestor of all Western free reed instruments, such as the accordion . Parades led by Western-type brass bands are common, often competing in volume with a shawm/chuigushou band. In southern Fujian and Taiwan , Nanyin or Nanguan is a genre of traditional ballads. They are sung by a woman accompanied by a xiao and
4320-672: Is the provenance of the American Folklife Center" at the library of Congress. Africa is a vast continent and its regions and nations have distinct musical traditions. The music of North Africa for the most part has a different history from Sub-Saharan African music traditions . The music and dance forms of the African diaspora , including African American music and many Caribbean genres like soca , calypso and Zouk ; and Latin American music genres like
4440-475: Is understood that folk music is the music of the people, observers find a more precise definition to be elusive. Some do not even agree that the term folk music should be used. Folk music may tend to have certain characteristics but it cannot clearly be differentiated in purely musical terms. One meaning often given is that of "old songs, with no known composers," another is that of music that has been submitted to an evolutionary "process of oral transmission ...
4560-548: The Reality Bites soundtrack , influenced by David Bowie 's 1975 song " Young Americans ". Written following the death of Wallinger's mother, World Party's fourth album, Egyptology , was released in 1997. A single, "Beautiful Dream", only reached No. 36 in the British charts; and the album itself was commercially unsuccessful. Wallinger severed ties with his record label, regained his back catalogue in 1998, and began
4680-474: The Great Depression . Regionalism and cultural pluralism grew as influences and themes. During this time folk music began to become enmeshed with political and social activism themes and movements. Two related developments were the U.S. Communist Party's interest in folk music as a way to reach and influence Americans, and politically active prominent folk musicians and scholars seeing communism as
4800-752: The PRC . Folk songs have been recorded since ancient times in China. The term Yuefu was used for a broad range of songs such as ballads, laments, folk songs, love songs, and songs performed at court. China is a vast country, with a multiplicity of linguistic and geographic regions. Folk songs are categorized by geographic region, language type, ethnicity, social function (e.g. work song, ritual song, courting song) and musical type. Modern anthologies collected by Chinese folklorists distinguish between traditional songs, revolutionary songs, and newly invented songs. The songs of northwest China are known as "flower songs" ( hua'er ),
4920-481: The Traditional 18 Dances display the dancing of birds and animals. For example: Musical types include: The classical Sinhalese orchestra consists of five categories of instruments, but among the percussion instruments, the drum is essential for dance. The vibrant beat of the rhythm of the drums form the basic of the dance. The dancers' feet bounce off the floor and they leap and swirl in patterns that reflect
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5040-750: The UK Albums Chart , A single, "Is It Like Today?" (described by Wallinger as "a précis of Bertrand Russell 's A History of Western Philosophy in four verses"), reached No. 19 on the UK Singles Chart as well as becoming a moderately successful single in Europe. Following the success of Bang! , World Party appeared at the Glastonbury Festival in 1994, at which they had previously played in 1987 and 1990. The album generated two further singles, "'Give It All Away" and "All I Gave". In 1994, World Party recorded "When You Come Back to Me" for
5160-439: The samba , Cuban rumba , salsa ; and other clave (rhythm) -based genres, were founded to varying degrees on the music of enslaved Africans , which has in turn influenced African popular music . Many Asian civilizations distinguish between art /court/classical styles and "folk" music. For example, the late Alam Lohar is an example of a South Asian singer who was classified as a folk singer. Khunung Eshei/Khuland Eshei
5280-432: The American folk, definitions that the folk revivalists used in constructing their own understanding of American folk music, and an overarching American identity". Prior to the 1930s, the study of folk music was primarily the province of scholars and collectors. The 1930s saw the beginnings of larger scale themes, commonalities, and linkages in folk music developing in the populace and practitioners as well, often related to
5400-575: The Association for Cultural Equity, is "distinct from the thousands of earlier recordings on acetate and aluminum discs he made from 1933 to 1942 under the auspices of the Library of Congress. This earlier collection—which includes the famous Jelly Roll Morton, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, and Muddy Waters sessions, as well as Lomax's prodigious collections made in Haiti and Eastern Kentucky (1937) —
5520-498: The Cobra , and she in turn sang backing vocals on the song "Hawaiian Island World" as well as appearing in the promotional video for the album's title track. Wallinger's efforts rapidly drew further music business attention. "They'd heard there was a dumb kid in Woburn writing hits," Wallinger recalled in 2021. "There was this beauty-parade of visiting managers." Wallinger signed a management deal with Prince's manager Steve Fargnoli: "I
5640-459: The Cobra ). In practise, however, Wallinger wrote nearly all of the songs alone as well as playing most of the instruments on the studio albums. The first release under the World Party banner, 1986's Private Revolution , was strongly keyboard-based, diverse in stylistic focus and Prince-influenced (coinciding with Wallinger signing a deal with Prince manager Steve Fargnoli), and spawned
5760-636: The Future", was released the same year, pointedly featuring the original version of "She's the One" as a B-side. Plans were made for touring in spring 2001, only to be cut short by Wallinger sufferering a brain aneurysm in February 2001 while cycling with his son on a Center Parcs holiday in Suffolk. He was left with damaged eyesight plus a prolonged (if temporary) inability to speak, play instruments or carry out any other musical activities. All World Party activity
5880-661: The Message in the Box" (the latter going on to be covered by Brian Kennedy on his 1996 album A Better Man , and becoming a top 40 hit in the UK and a top 20 hit in Ireland). After the 1991 EP Thank You World , World Party recruited former Bootleg Beatles member David Catlin-Birch as guitarist and ex-Icicle Works member Chris Sharrock on drums, with intentions to play more live dates. Instead, Ensign label boss Nigel Grainge cancelled
6000-468: The One " (originally released by World Party) was a hit for Robbie Williams . Wallinger also acted as a member of Bob Geldof 's backing band. Two tracks by Wallinger are included on the 1997 compilation album Now and in Time to Be , a musical celebration of the works of Irish poet W. B. Yeats . The poem "Politics" was credited as having been interpreted by Wallinger, while World Party is acknowledged as
6120-460: The One " (which had won Wallinger an Ivor Novello Award in 1997), and releasing it as a single in November 1999. The Williams version reached No. 1 in the UK charts. Chris Sharrock, plus World Party's touring bassist of the time, performed on the new version, which was very similar to the World Party original apart from the addition of string orchestra parts. Wallinger was not informed about either
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#17327733186456240-459: The US, in the process becoming the act's only major international hit. "Private Revolution" was also issued as a single, but only charted in the UK (at No. 107). "I'm not retro. I'm writing songs about now – in fact, the songs I wrote back then are even more relevant now than they were when I wrote them. I wasn't trying to be ahead of the curve, I was just writing about things that seemed obvious to me at
6360-558: The US. and produced two hit singles, " Way Down Now " and "Put the Message in the Box". Three further well-received World Party studio albums were released over the following decade - Bang! (1993), Egyptology (1997) and Dumbing Up (2000). The band also scored one more hit single - "Is It Like Today?" - and released two compilation albums (the greatest hits set Best in Show and the Arkeology box set ), as well as premiering
6480-604: The Waterboys in late 1985 towards the end of their 'This is the Sea' tour. He was replaced as Waterboys keyboard player by Guy Chambers . Many years later, Mike Scott commented that "from the day I met (Karl) he was always writing his own songs... The label I was with, Ensign , gave him a record deal and he deserved it, of course, but it wasn't the smartest move if they'd wanted to keep him in The Waterboys." Leaving London, Wallinger relocated to Woburn and took up residence in
6600-614: The aforementioned Sinead O'Connor while he also featured on the Bob Geldof album The Happy Club released in 1992. He was musical director on the 1994 film Reality Bites , composing an instrumental score and contributing the end title song "When You Come Back to Me" to the hit soundtrack album . He also contributed a cover of David Bowie 's " All the Young Dudes " to the Clueless soundtrack in 1995. His song " She's
6720-637: The aneurysm meant that he had to suspend all work for nearly five years, he eventually resumed touring in 2006. Wallinger died from a stroke at his home in Hastings on 10 March 2024, at the age of 66. Folk music Folk music is a music genre that includes traditional folk music and the contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival . Some types of folk music may be called world music . Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted orally, music with unknown composers, music that
6840-643: The arrangement and recording of their hit single "The Whole of the Moon"). Wallinger's songwriting credits include the World Party songs " Ship of Fools ", which was a Top 40 hit in the United States, " Way Down Now ", which reached number one on the Billboard Modern Rock chart, and " She's the One ", which was later covered by Robbie Williams and became a hit single. Wallinger was a multi-instrumentalist, which enabled him to demo and record
6960-420: The band's best work as "sound(ing) like a man trying to cram all the love and joy of his own fandom into four minutes, to distil the essence of Bob Dylan , Prince, The Rolling Stones , Sly Stone , Van Morrison , The Beach Boys , perhaps above all The Beatles , into one bubbling, funky, heartfelt and slightly ramshackle homebrew." Thompson also noted that "the big hitters in the World Party canon... sound like
7080-411: The band's career which damaged its long-term chances. ("That was it. There was a moment there: door open, door closes.") With touring plans shelved, World Party began work on a third album, Bang! . During the lengthy recording process, Chambers set up his own band The Lemon Trees in 1992, continuing with them in parallel to his World Party work until 1995. Released in 1993, Bang! reached No. 2 on
7200-565: The best kind of pop music: ageless, beyond genre. Turn to them at any time and they will brighten any room." Despite its solo origins, World Party would later become a successful live band, albeit with Wallinger as the lone consistent member. Other significant World Party contributors over the years included Guy Chambers , Jeff Trott and Dave Catlin-Birch (with guest appearances including Waterboys saxophonist Anthony Thistlethwaite , violinist Steve Wickham , and vocalist Sinéad O'Connor returning favours owed for Wallinger's work on The Lion and
7320-595: The bulk of World Party material as a one-man band. Although he was right-handed, he played a right-handed guitar upside-down and left-handed. Wallinger was born on 19 October 1957, in Prestatyn , Wales, to Julian and Phyllis Wallinger, and was one of six children. His father was an architect. He showed musical promise from an early age, immersing himself in the music of the Beatles (notably studying Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band and attempting not only to sing
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#17327733186457440-452: The catalogue and I'll walk and we'll call it a day". Just to demonstrate how little it mattered to them, they said yes. It ended up on the front cover of Music Week ... It was great to get my music back because otherwise they can do anything with it, they can just put it on a shelf, anything. Getting control of that back was the essence of being able to survive really, because since then I've had tracks in films and in television programmes and
7560-465: The classical suite was based upon stylised folk-dances, and Joseph Haydn 's use of folk melodies is noted. But the emergence of the term "folk" coincided with an "outburst of national feeling all over Europe" that was particularly strong at the edges of Europe, where national identity was most asserted. Nationalist composers emerged in Central Europe, Russia, Scandinavia, Spain and Britain:
7680-546: The elements of nature, and have been enjoyed and developed in the Buddhist environment. The music is of several types and uses only a few types of instruments. The folk songs and poems were used in social gatherings to work together. The Indian influenced classical music has grown to be unique. The traditional drama, music and songs of Sinhala Light Music are typically Sri Lankan. The temple paintings and carvings feature birds, elephants, wild animals, flowers, and trees, and
7800-481: The end of the 1930s these and others had turned American folk music into a social movement. Sometimes folk musicians became scholars and advocates themselves. For example, Jean Ritchie (1922–2015) was the youngest child of a large family from Viper, Kentucky that had preserved many of the old Appalachian traditional songs. Ritchie, living in a time when the Appalachians had opened up to outside influence,
7920-505: The fashioning and re-fashioning of the music by the community that give it its folk character." Such definitions depend upon "(cultural) processes rather than abstract musical types...", upon " continuity and oral transmission ...seen as characterizing one side of a cultural dichotomy , the other side of which is found not only in the lower layers of feudal, capitalist and some oriental societies but also in 'primitive' societies and in parts of 'popular cultures'". One widely used definition
8040-557: The first time in twelve years, ending with an appearance in November 2012 in London at the Royal Albert Hall. Live dates and tours followed through 2015, and a 2013 UK show was issued as a 2-CD set called World Party – Live! . Following the end of their 2015 North American tour World Party no longer toured, released new material, or updated their website. Wallinger moved to Hastings and continued working on music while keeping
8160-444: The instruments himself, using multi-tracking to create the studio sound. Lyrically, many of his songs featured thoughtful and occasionally political sentiments. Karl Wallinger Karl Edmond De Vere Wallinger (19 October 1957 – 10 March 2024) was a Welsh musician, songwriter and record producer. He was best known for leading the band World Party and for his mid-1980s membership of the Waterboys (contributing in particular to
8280-399: The laborers who sing them to coordinate their efforts in accordance with the rhythms of the songs. They are frequently, but not invariably, composed. In the American armed forces , a lively oral tradition preserves jody calls ("Duckworth chants") which are sung while soldiers are on the march. Professional sailors made similar use of a large body of sea shanties . Love poetry , often of
8400-563: The last 20 years of his life working on an Interactive Multimedia educational computer project he called the Global Jukebox , which included 5,000 hours of sound recordings, 400,000 feet of film, 3,000 videotapes , and 5,000 photographs. As of March 2012, this has been accomplished. Approximately 17,400 of Lomax's recordings from 1946 and later have been made available free online. This material from Alan Lomax's independent archive, begun in 1946, which has been digitized and offered by
8520-455: The late 1980s and early 1990s including " Ship of Fools ", " Way Down Now ", "Put the Message in the Box" and "Is It Like Today?". The band also released the original version of " She's the One ", written (like virtually all World Party material) by Karl Wallinger but best known due to the 1999 cover version by Robbie Williams , a UK number one hit single. Wallinger was born in Prestatyn . He received classical music training in piano and oboe as
8640-408: The loss of traditional music is slowed in nations or regions where traditional folk music is a badge of cultural or national identity. Much of what is known about folk music prior to the development of audio recording technology in the 19th century comes from fieldwork and writings of scholars, collectors and proponents. Starting in the 19th century, academics and amateur scholars, taking note of
8760-585: The majority of the instruments (guitars, bass, keyboards, drums, samplers) by himself, as well as singing lead vocals and handling programming and production. There were guest appearances on the record by two Waterboys members, saxophonist Anthony Thistlethwaite and fiddle player Steve Wickham . To create the illusion of a full band, Wallinger credited his own instrumental parts to a variety of imaginary players with whimsical names, including "Millennium Mills", "Rufus Dove" and "Will Towyn". During this time, he also worked on Sinéad O'Connor 's debut album The Lion and
8880-567: The material with a variety of synthesised orchestrations, synth bass and percussion instruments. Wallinger also wrote the original music for " Don't Bang the Drum " (the opening track for This Is the Sea ). Wallinger was particularly key to the final form of the best-known Waterboys song, " The Whole of the Moon ", having taken Scott's original voice/piano/guitar structure and introduced polyphonic synthesizer parts, synth bass, upbeat and off-beat cymbal accents (all of these influenced by Prince ) and
9000-409: The modern movie Songcatcher . One strong theme amongst folk scholars in the early decades of the 20th century was regionalism , the analysis of the diversity of folk music (and related cultures) based on regions of the US rather than based on a given song's historical roots. Later, a dynamic of class and circumstances was added to this. The most prominent regionalists were literary figures with
9120-466: The money's come to me instead of a black hole as it was with EMI. And also when you're doing your own thing, it's much nicer because you can surround yourself with people you want to be surrounded with." Meanwhile, in January 1997, Chambers had departed the band in order to accept the role of musical director for Robbie Williams . This, in turn, led to Williams re-recording an Egyptology track, " She's
9240-567: The music of Dvořák , Smetana , Grieg , Rimsky-Korsakov , Brahms , Liszt , de Falla , Wagner , Sibelius , Vaughan Williams , Bartók , and many others drew upon folk melodies. While the loss of traditional folk music in the face of the rise of popular music is a worldwide phenomenon, it is not one occurring at a uniform rate throughout the world. The process is most advanced "where industrialization and commercialisation of culture are most advanced" but also occurs more gradually even in settings of lower technological advancement. However,
9360-646: The musical traditions being lost, initiated various efforts to preserve the music of the people. One such effort was the collection by Francis James Child in the late 19th century of the texts of over three hundred ballads in the English and Scots traditions (called the Child Ballads ), some of which predated the 16th century. Contemporaneously with Child, the Reverend Sabine Baring-Gould and later Cecil Sharp worked to preserve
9480-472: The new music created during those revivals. This type of folk music also includes fusion genres such as folk rock , folk metal , and others. While contemporary folk music is a genre generally distinct from traditional folk music, in U.S. English it shares the same name, and it often shares the same performers and venues as traditional folk music. The terms folk music , folk song , and folk dance are comparatively recent expressions. They are extensions of
9600-408: The offices of traditional music collectors Robert Winslow Gordon , Alan Lomax and others to capture as much North American field material as possible. John Lomax (the father of Alan Lomax) was the first prominent scholar to study distinctly American folk music such as that of cowboys and southern blacks. His first major published work was in 1911, Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads . and
9720-404: The original music for the opening track, "Don't Bang the Drum". Despite the productivity of the sessions for This is the Sea , growing rivalry between Scott and Wallinger led to tensions between the two on the subsequent tour, exacerbated by the fact that Wallinger had been writing his own songs from an early age and saw no opportunity to be able to play and sing them while in The Waterboys, which
9840-422: The original version of " She's the One " (a song written by Wallinger but later a Number One hit single for Robbie Williams ). Shortly before his death, Wallinger had been working on a long-delayed sixth World Party album, although this has yet to be confirmed as being complete or ready for release. World Party records were notable for their persistent commitment to green and environmentalist issues, initially at
9960-650: The other. In the proliferation of popular music genres, some traditional folk music became also referred to as " World music " or "Roots music". The English term " folklore ", to describe traditional folk music and dance, entered the vocabulary of many continental European nations, each of which had its folk-song collectors and revivalists. The distinction between "authentic" folk and national and popular song in general has always been loose, particularly in America and Germany – for example, popular songwriters such as Stephen Foster could be termed "folk" in America. The International Folk Music Council definition allows that
10080-805: The outcomes of battles or lament tragedies or natural disasters . Sometimes, as in the triumphant Song of Deborah found in the Biblical Book of Judges , these songs celebrate victory. Laments for lost battles and wars, and the lives lost in them, are equally prominent in many traditions; these laments keep alive the cause for which the battle was fought. The narratives of traditional songs often also remember folk heroes such as John Henry or Robin Hood . Some traditional song narratives recall supernatural events or mysterious deaths. Hymns and other forms of religious music are often of traditional and unknown origin. Western musical notation
10200-449: The pace of many activities such as planting , weeding , reaping , threshing , weaving , and milling . In leisure time , singing and playing musical instruments were common forms of entertainment and history-telling—even more common than today when electrically enabled technologies and widespread literacy make other forms of entertainment and information-sharing competitive. Some believe that folk music originated as art music that
10320-400: The preservation of songs as artifacts of deceased cultures. "Functional" folklorists (e.g. Botkin and Alan Lomax) maintained that songs only retain relevance when used by those cultures which retain the traditions which birthed those songs. "Left-wing" folk revivalists (e.g. Charles Seeger and Lawrence Gellert) emphasized music's role "in 'people's' struggles for social and political rights". By
10440-437: The project in 1986 for live and studio work. Sessions were lengthy, carried out during the night and fuelled by copious amounts of marijuana , with Chambers later remembering "if you worked with Karl you had to get into his headspace. Everything was very slow and you had to be extremely patient. I was one of Karl’s principal cheerleaders at that point. We laughed a lot and I learned a lot from him, particularly about lyrics, but he
10560-680: The recording of the cover version or the involvement of members of his own band, later commenting "it was very strange. Nobody phoned me to say they were doing it, and they used the band I’d just been on the road with to record it. It also annoyed me that Robbie didn’t sing the right words. It was a weird one: you lose your friends but you make loads of money." Wallinger was further annoyed when Sharrock subsequently quit World Party to join Chambers in Williams' live band. He would later admit to having experienced "ongoing bitterness" and that "the song had
10680-468: The same month, Wallinger claimed to be close to finishing a new album, aiming to release it in early 2023. He claimed "I’ve got twenty-odd years of material... What I’m trying to do is make everything the most contemporary version of things, rather than go back and just say, "How can I finish these songs off and put them out?" I want everything to be from around now, so that's what I'm heading toward... I'm really looking forward to it. It'll be just like rolling
10800-401: The same period he became musical director of The Rocky Horror Show . Answering a "guitarist wanted" advertisement for Mike Scott 's band the Waterboys , Wallinger instead persuaded Scott that the band needed a keyboard player . Joining in 1983, Wallinger played in the live band touring the first Waterboys album and contributed to the second album, A Pagan Place . Though Wallinger
10920-428: The second ( A Pagan Place ) as well as playing on tour, his additional skills made him the perfect ally for Waterboys leader Mike Scott when Scott wished to expand the sound of the band for their third album, 1985's This Is the Sea . Wallinger co-produced many of the album tracks, adding assorted synthesizer and sampler arrangements as well as backing vocals, synth bass, percussion, and piano and organ. He also wrote
11040-471: The songs they hear. For example, around 1970 the song Mullā Mohammed Jān spread from Herat to the rest of Afghanistan , and Iran where it was recorded. Due to its repetitive refrain and the predictability of the second half of each verse, it allowed for both its popularization, and for each singer to create their own version of the song without being overly-concerned for a melody or restrictive poetic rhythm. Because variants proliferate naturally, there
11160-497: The southern Yangtze area. Jiangnan Sizhu (silk and bamboo music from Jiangnan ) is a style of instrumental music, often played by amateur musicians in tea houses in Shanghai. Guangdong Music or Cantonese Music is instrumental music from Guangzhou and surrounding areas. The music from this region influenced Yueju (Cantonese Opera) music, which would later grow popular during the self-described "Golden Age" of China under
11280-643: The sponsorship of the Washington Post , the festival was held in Washington, DC at Constitution Hall from 1937 to 1942. The folk music movement, festivals, and the wartime effort were seen as forces for social goods such as democracy, cultural pluralism, and the removal of culture and race-based barriers. The American folk music revivalists of the 1930s approached folk music in different ways. Three primary schools of thought emerged: "Traditionalists" (e.g. Sarah Gertrude Knott and John Lomax ) emphasized
11400-463: The stone away from the front of the cave and coming out again into the sunlight. I'll be so happy to have an album out." To date, this album has not been released. Wallinger's death on 10 March 2024 ended any hopes of further World Party activity. Wallinger cited influences such as the Beatles , Bob Dylan , the Beach Boys , Junior Walker , Neil Young and Prince . He sang and played most of
11520-536: The term folklore , which was coined in 1846 by the English antiquarian William Thoms to describe "the traditions, customs, and superstitions of the uncultured classes". The term further derives from the German expression Volk , in the sense of "the people as a whole" as applied to popular and national music by Johann Gottfried Herder and the German Romantics over half a century earlier. Though it
11640-565: The term "folk music": newly composed songs, fixed in form and by known authors, which imitated some form of traditional music. The popularity of "contemporary folk" recordings caused the appearance of the category "Folk" in the Grammy Awards of 1959; in 1970 the term was dropped in favor of "Best Ethnic or Traditional Recording (including Traditional Blues)", while 1987 brought a distinction between "Best Traditional Folk Recording" and "Best Contemporary Folk Recording". After that, they had
11760-490: The term can also apply to music that, "...has originated with an individual composer and has subsequently been absorbed into the unwritten, living tradition of a community. But the term does not cover a song, dance, or tune that has been taken over ready-made and remains unchanged." The post– World War II folk revival in America and in Britain started a new genre, Contemporary Folk Music , and brought an additional meaning to
11880-526: The term is usually only descriptive, in some cases people use it as the name of a genre. For example, the Grammy Award previously used the terms "traditional music" and "traditional folk" for folk music that is not contemporary folk music. Folk music may include most indigenous music . From a historical perspective, traditional folk music had these characteristics: As a side-effect, the following characteristics are sometimes present: In folk music,
12000-947: The texts of 217,996 Latvian folk songs, the Latvju dainas . In Norway the work of collectors such as Ludvig Mathias Lindeman was extensively used by Edvard Grieg in his Lyric Pieces for piano and in other works, which became immensely popular. Around this time, composers of classical music developed a strong interest in collecting traditional songs, and a number of composers carried out their own field work on traditional music. These included Percy Grainger and Ralph Vaughan Williams in England and Béla Bartók in Hungary. These composers, like many of their predecessors, both made arrangements of folk songs and incorporated traditional material into original classical compositions. The advent of audio recording technology provided folklorists with
12120-530: The then-known variations of both the texts and tunes associated with what came to be known as the Child Canon. He also advanced some significant theories concerning the workings of oral-aural tradition. Similar activity was also under way in other countries. One of the most extensive was perhaps the work done in Riga by Krisjanis Barons , who between the years 1894 and 1915 published six volumes that included
12240-403: The time, and we still haven't done anything about it." Karl Wallinger, 2012 Relocating to a 32-track studio in London (which he called "Seaview"), Wallinger began work on the second World Party album, Goodbye Jumbo . As with Private Revolution , he played almost all of the instruments himself. In 2000, recalling his songwriting aims at the time, Wallinger explained "I wanted to personify
12360-478: The traditional folk music of many cultures. This encompasses such forms as traditional epic poetry , much of which was meant originally for oral performance, sometimes accompanied by instruments. Many epic poems of various cultures were pieced together from shorter pieces of traditional narrative verse, which explains their episodic structure, repetitive elements, and their frequent in medias res plot developments. Other forms of traditional narrative verse relate
12480-658: The twenty-first century many cherished Chinese folk songs have been inscribed in the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity . In the process, songs once seen as vulgar are now being reconstructed as romantic courtship songs. Regional song competitions, popular in many communities, have promoted professional folk singing as a career, with some individual folk singers having gained national prominence. The art, music and dance of Sri Lanka derive from
12600-638: The words but to vocally recreate all of the sounds on the record), the Beach Boys , Bob Dylan , the Kinks , Buddy Holly and the Motown label. This was followed by classical training in piano (from the age of nine) and oboe (from the age of ten). Having spent time at choir school at Eton College , his musical skills then won him a music scholarship to another public school , Charterhouse in Surrey. Wallinger's musical career began in Prestatyn in 1977 as
12720-514: The world and sing about her. I always thought it would have been great if Otis Redding 's " Try a Little Tenderness " had been about the planet. Plus, if I stand on top of a mountain Julie Andrews -style, the hills do seem to be alive with the sound of music. You can say whatever you like about eco whatever, but if you fuck up the environment you're going to die." Throughout his career Wallinger continued to collaborate with others, including
12840-504: The world and sing about her. I always thought it would have been great if Otis Redding 's " Try a Little Tenderness " had been about the planet. Plus, if I stand on top of a mountain Julie Andrews -style, the hills do seem to be alive with the sound of music. You can say whatever you like about eco whatever, but if you fuck up the environment you’re going to die." On some of the tracks, Wallinger collaborated with fellow former Waterboy and songwriter Guy Chambers , who had originally joined
12960-522: Was a sucker for Prince. I was like, "Take me to Minneapolis. Take me to your leader." Private Revolution was released in 1986 and displayed Wallinger's eclectic mastery of rock, pop, folk , and funk . The album's first single " Ship of Fools ", reached a modest number 42 in the British charts but did much better outside the UK – it reached No. 4 in Australia, No. 21 in New Zealand, and No. 27 in
13080-570: Was a tap that he could turn on at will, effortlessly." Wallinger was married to sculptor Suzie Zamit , who survives him. The two lived in Crouch End , north London, for many years before relocating to Hastings in 2017. Wallinger and Zamit had two children, Louis Wallinger and Nancy Zamit, and two grandchildren. Their daughter Nancy is a founding member of the comedy troupe Mischief Theatre . In an interview with Chicago Tribune freelancer Jay Hedblade, Wallinger revealed that he suffered
13200-447: Was a terrible procrastinator and still is now." For his part, Wallinger would credit Chambers as being "the pushy guy who would cue me into the corner pocket. I’ve got to thank him for that." Released on 24 April 1990, Goodbye Jumbo was voted "album of the year" by Q magazine and was nominated for a Grammy Award for "best alternative music performance" in the US. The album contained the minor UK hit singles " Way Down Now " and "Put
13320-519: Was always there for me. He was a great engineer, got great sounds, [and] was very patient while I would play nine different guitars. Reefers may have been involved, and some all-nights. We had a lot of laughs and philosophical discussions." This is The Sea producer Mick Glossop also spoke approvingly of Wallinger's contributions: "Karl's a very giving person. He gave a lot to the Waterboys, certainly." Aware that his own musical ambitions were bringing him into conflict with Scott, Wallinger opted to leave
13440-538: Was arguably the most prominent US folk music scholar of his time, notably during the beginnings of the folk music revival in the 1930s and early 1940s. Cecil Sharp also worked in America, recording the traditional songs of the Appalachian Mountains in 1916–1918 in collaboration with Maud Karpeles and Olive Dame Campbell and is considered the first major scholar covering American folk music. Campbell and Sharp are represented under other names by actors in
13560-424: Was changed and probably debased by oral transmission while reflecting the character of the society that produced it. In many societies, especially preliterate ones, the cultural transmission of folk music requires learning by ear , although notation has evolved in some cultures. Different cultures may have different notions concerning a division between "folk" music on the one hand and of "art" and "court" music on
13680-538: Was entirely dominated by Scott's artistic vision. Now armed with his own record contract with the Waterboys' record label, Ensign, Wallinger left the band at the end of the This is the Sea tour in 1985. The first World Party album, Private Revolution , was recorded in a dilapidated former rectory in Woburn , which Wallinger had moved into after quitting both London and The Waterboys. Inspired by Prince , Wallinger recorded
13800-434: Was initially hired to play piano and organ (and to sing occasional backing vocals), his multi-instrumental and production skills impressed Scott and ensured that he played a far greater role on the third Waterboys album, This Is the Sea , significantly contributing to the band's 'Big Music' sound. While Scott concentrated on Steve Reichian orchestrations of the songs using multitracked pianos and guitar, Wallinger fleshed out
13920-628: Was intermittent. In September 2007, World Party supported Steely Dan in their first tour of Australia. The Best in Show compilation was released to celebrate the Australian tour. In 2009, World Party toured the west coast of the US, and appeared at Seattle's Bumbershoot Festival and San Francisco's Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. In 2012, World Party released a new five-CD/70-song collection of new songs, live recordings and cover versions titled Arkeology to critical acclaim. The band toured extensively in America in 2012, and toured England for
14040-405: Was not possible. Music was made by common people during both their work and leisure, as well as during religious activities. The work of economic production was often manual and communal. Manual labor often included singing by the workers, which served several practical purposes. It reduced the boredom of repetitive tasks, it kept the rhythm during synchronized pushes and pulls, and it set
14160-411: Was originally created to preserve the lines of Gregorian chant , which before its invention was taught as an oral tradition in monastic communities. Traditional songs such as Green grow the rushes, O present religious lore in a mnemonic form, as do Western Christmas carols and similar traditional songs. Work songs frequently feature call and response structures and are designed to enable
14280-418: Was put on hold for five years while Wallinger recuperated and painstakingly learned how to play music again. During this time, he was sustained by royalties from the Williams cover of "She's the One". In 2012, he admitted "thank God they did record it. It kept me and the family in spaghetti when I was ill and couldn’t work." In 2006 Wallinger re-emerged onto the scene. With his back catalogue reclaimed from EMI,
14400-499: Was university educated and ultimately moved to New York City, where she made a number of classic recordings of the family repertoire and published an important compilation of these songs. In January 2012, the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress , with the Association for Cultural Equity, announced that they would release Lomax's vast archive of 1946 and later recording in digital form. Lomax spent
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