Supplement: Elvis Costello on American Roots Music

Elvis Costello, 1970s

THIS POST IS A SUPPLEMENT! See post below, Appalachia II for this week's primary work!

The following is from A.O. Scott's interview with Elvis Costello in this week's NY Times Magazine. The question posed here is what were Costello's influences in Liverpool and in London in the early in early 1970's. Note what Costello says about Appalachian music...

What were your influences then? What were you trying to do? I was playing in public when I moved to Liverpool in 1970. In London, you would have traditional singers and contemporary singers in the same clubs. In Liverpool, you didn’t. The traditional clubs were very seriously about traditional music and Irish music. And if you tried to sing your own song, you were out; they didn’t want to know.

I quickly learned that there were only certain places I could play. I wasn’t like Richard Thompson — I never had this rich language of English or even Irish traditional music. I just had the knowledge of the few records my dad had, you know, a Clancy Brothers record and a Chieftains record. And I knew some songs. I knew some ‘‘rebel songs.’’ I just learned them all by osmosis. Later on I got really, really fascinated by Appalachian music. Of course, they are all the same songs, but somehow I heard them more clearly — Doc Watson and these people. From the ’70s through the mid-’80s, I absorbed all the American music, not just country music like Nashville country music or Bakersfield country music, but older, more traditional styles, even the Stanley Brothers and that stuff. Of course, they were all the same roots. Often you trace them back and they actually are Irish or Scottish songs.

Here's a link to the full article:  

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/11/magazine/elvis-costello-looks-back.html?emc=eta1