[Left wing folk] Nancy Kerr plays a Leon Rosselson song a day

[Pingers]

Folk ledge Nancy Kerr has set herself the lockdown goal of playing a song by another left wing folk ledge, Leon Rosselson, every day for the month of May. I knew about Nancy Kerr, who has a great talent, but didn't know about Leon Rosselson, so this has been an eye opener. My favourite so far is Bringing The News From Nowhere but there are plenty more on her YouTube channel. She is an incredible fiddle player, I didn't know she played guitar as well.

[sirhenry]

Anything that brings Leon Rosselson to a wider audience is a great thing. I've loved him since I first saw him in the mid-70's when a large part of his repertoire was made up of kids' songs about freaks, misfits and outsiders. Barney's Epic Homer became my anthem, celebrating people who create things of beauty for their own sake rather than money and fame (though this confused the hell out of Mr. Rosselson when I finally met him again a few years ago - apparently he didn't see it as a positive song, but an indictment of society and our treatment of mental health problems). Which meant that the sequel is horribly depressing and fatalistic for me.

The song of his I find myself singing most often is Coats Off For Britain, but I'm assuming that Nancy Kerr is waiting until lockdown is over and Boris gives us That Speech before playing a song that rips the piss out of it (and written about 50 years ago).