Lyrad's Random 10

The political and cultural importance of the folk song has declined dramatically in the last full decades, eschewed for prettier, more recordable and, consequently, more marketable forms. Few places is this more true than in Gaellic folk music. A lot of this has to do with the language barrier, and that the language is dying itself, but Joe Heaney fought tooth-and-nail to keep his birthright tradition alive. Joe Heaney is the anglicized version of his real name, Seosamh Ó hÉanaí, and all his songs are in Gaellic. Many of his recorded tracks, however, are spoken lessons and, as below, advice on how to properly sing the songs. His voice was far from pretty, and was often downright harsh, but the feeling and the tradition was everpresent in his cadence, as was an overpowering skill that rendered any need for "pretty" moot. As a result of his dedication to his art, he lived as a traveller and pauper, essentially abandoning his family to perform. Eventually, after years of struggle, he immigrated to the US where he was admired in the burgeoning American folk scene and given a professorship of Irish music at Wesleyan University and, later, of ethnomusicology at the University of Washington in Seattle, where he died in 1984. Here is a fantastic group of articles and interviews on him and the greater subject.

1. Joe Heaney--Advice for Young Singers
2. Blind Willie McTell--B&O Blues
3. Clutch--Impetus
4. Prince--NPG Operator
5. Pixies--Planet of Sound
6. Dmitri Shostakovich--Quartet No.8 for Strings, Op.110; 4. Largo (Borodin String Qt)
7. Mike Post--The A-Team in New York City (from the A-Team Soundtrack)
8. D. Fanshawe Field--Himene Tavara Point Venus
9. Frank Sinatra--I Got Plenty o' Nothin'
10. Ennio Morricone--Senza consenso (from the Soundtrack to Vite Strozzate)