 What's On In East Anglia Birmingham
Evening Mail
The Gwynedd Chronicle 2001 |
RALPH, ALBERT & SYDNEY Newspaper Articles Ralph
McTell, a prolific singer songwriter, whose “Streets of London” has
been taken up for recording by many other major artists, is already a
familiar face in Cambridge after a string of appearances at the Cambridge
Folk Festival. But his
first ambition in life was to be a soldier. At John Ruskin Grammar School in Surrey, he was streamed
early for University entrance. He
dropped out at 15 and went straight into the Army as an aptly categorised
“boy soldier”. It took
Ralph six days to realise his mistake and six months to purchase his
release. Still
barely 16, he registered at a local Technical College.
The next 18 months were far more enjoyable and he managed,
incidentally, to pass an ‘A’ level in Art and two or three ‘O’
levels. Of far greater
significance for his future, he also acquired his first guitar and taught
himself to play. Only
marginally better prepared than on the previous occasion, Ralph left home
for a second time. Travelling
around Europe between the cities of Paris and Istanbul, he played wherever
he could. Almost inevitably
this meant busking on street corners to cinema queues.
In Paris he met a Norwegian girl called Nanna who would collect the
money while Ralph played. Ralph and
Nanna were married in November 1966 and they now have three children.
On
Ralph’s return from Paris, he found a demand for his songs in the
growing club circuit of the West Country.
The roughest recordings of some of those club dates led to a
recording contract with Transatlantic Records.
From there on his popularity saw a rapid and consistent growth.
Over the intervening years, Ralph has made eight LPs and performed
his music before audiences in almost every major capital of the world.
Newspaper Articles Last
night the former busker returned to Cardiff’s New Theatre and the
capacity audience was testimony to his continued pulling power.
The classic ‘Streets of London’ may be his single chart entry,
but he still retains a powerful collection of songs.
Ralph successfully mixed old favourites with newer numbers. From
the past, Ralph dug out ‘Zimmerman Blues’, a number about Bob Dylan,
and used harmonica for the only time during the 75-minute show. Other
enjoyable numbers were ‘Run Johnny Run’, ‘Weather The Storm’ and
‘Harry Don’t Go’. This
is a tune about a coloured friend of his who is working in an old
people’s home and might have to leave those in his care if right wing
elements had their way. Even
though the show didn’t start until 11 p.m., McTell managed to keep his
appreciative audience fully aware during an accomplished programme of
tasteful music, which included two encores. He
was backed by two guitarists, one of whom was Fairport Convention’s
bassist, Dave Pegg. Starting
the evening’s entertainment was the Geordie duo, Bob Fox and Stu Luckley,
whose own brand of folk music went down exceptionally well in the New’s
intimate atmosphere.
Newspaper Articles Ralph
McTell now has such universal appeal, it’s hard to look back and
remember that he was once a one-man-and-a-guitar traditional folkie, with
an enthusiastic but limited following. It was only
five years ago that Warner Bros. put him on the road to commercial
success, issuing the lovely ‘Streets of London’ with all the trappings
of contemporary vocals, such as a chorus of girl singers and string
arrangements. Suddenly
everyone woke up to the fact that McTell was everyone’s idea of a great
singer and songwriter – ‘Streets of London’ reached number one to
prove it. GRIP Since then
he’s never looked back, despite a temporary “retirement” when he
went to America to write new material.
‘Slide Away The Screen’ will tighten his grip on success even
more. As a singer
or a songwriter McTell cannot be bettered. His voice
is warm, resonant, and he makes you feel as if he’s singing to you, not
just making another record. His
songs retain the simplicity of traditional folk, but they have today’s
ring to them, whether he is philosophising about life in general or
telling a story. SIMPLE This album
boasts a number of good tracks, full of his characteristic guitar trace
work, but making full use of percussion, harmonica and slide guitar. ‘One
Heart’ is a simple idea, beautifully expressed like so many of his
songs. The theme is that two
people in love become as one: even when things go wrong and there are
harsh words, the link remains – “When things go wrong it tears us both
apart. It occurs to me we
must share one heart. You and me, babe, got one heart between two.
Yours beats for mine and mine beats for you.” The use of
percussion on this track is particularly effective, a muffled drum beat
imitating a heartbeat. Never one
to sit back and let things happen around him, McTell has even included a
bit of boogie. SHUFFLE ‘Van Nuys Cruise Night’ is a foot-tapping shuffle, real single material. As is ‘Gold in California’, which in more ways than one, reminds me of Neil Young’s style.
Newspaper Articles An unenthusiastic scholar as a child,
Ralph’s only interest in his schooling came from his regular attendance
at various Sunday schools, one of his earliest influences.
He left school at 15 to become a boy soldier, based first in
Plymouth and then in Oswestry, Wales, but he left after six months feeling
very nervous and not a little confused. Half-heartedly resuming his education
at Croydon Technical College, Ralph found his trips to see the Rolling
Stones or Ray Davies of the Kinks at college dances just as important as
his studies, but did manage two ‘O’ levels and an ‘A’ level in Art
before the songs of Woody Guthrie and stories of life on the road became
more intriguing. Ralph bought
a guitar and set off across Europe. The
career that has taken him from street corners to the music capitals of the
world had begun. By the summer of 1967, Ralph could be
found playing in Newquay, having been christened ‘McTell’ by fellow
musicians, partly due to his skill at playing guitar in the style of Blind
Willie McTell and partly so that his name (formerly May) would be more
impressive on their hand-drawn posters.
Ralph had married Nanna, a Norwegian girl he had met in Paris
during the previous miserable winter, and they lived in a caravan parked
miles away from anywhere but within walking distance of a club called the
Folk Cottage, where Ralph entertained two nights a week in order to pay
for the caravan. Now well-known for his song ‘Streets
of London’ amongst many others, Ralph does live in London with Nanna and
their four children. Much of
their spare time is spent in Cornwall in a cottage not much larger than
their first caravan. The same
great sense of humour, compassion and insight that marked him out in the
early days has stayed with him. Not
only can Ralph capture his own happiness in songs and be equally truthful
in reflecting awkward moments and uncertainties, but he possesses the
unique ability to write about people and situations in a way that strikes
a chord in us all. The Lewisham concert begins at 7:30 p.m. on April 12. Tickets are £2, £2.50 and £3 and are available in advance from the Box Office or on the door. Ralph will also be appearing at Croydon’s Fairfield Halls (next door to his former college) on April 22.
Newspaper Articles And
although part of the answer lies in his songs – which are modern
folklore in the making – it lies also in the quality of truth that Ralph
McTell exudes, even on record. McTell was
in relaxed and pensive mood on Tuesday at Fairfield.
He treated the occasion as something in the nature of a homecoming
(he was brought up in the town) and the audience was not slow to welcome
one of its more famous sons. There were
few light-hearted numbers. The
overwhelming mood of the evening was nostalgia tinged with melancholy –
and occasional anger. The Croydon
connection was highlighted when McTell sang a recent composition on the
theme of the Bentley and Craig trial in the early fifties. Wherever
controversy or injustice appears to lurk, there are potential subjects for
his haunting lyrics and gentle melodies.
Unpretentious and unassuming, his simple passions as expressed in
his songs expose nerve after nerve in his audience. “This is
a new song – I’ve just written it” was the introduction to a
stunning and stark tribute to Blair Peach, Jimmy Kelly and Liddle Towers.
It may have owed a little to the convention of American folk, but the
ideology was all McTell’s. From this song come the telling lines: “If you can learn to live with the dark, you will soon learn to live with the light”. McTell has
the gift of using contemporary events as a framework and drawing from them
a more universal relevance – surely the essence of great folk music. Pain is a recurring theme throughout his music. “The pain is plain to see,” he says of Kelly. In “The Noble Savage”1 – about the damaging intrusion of the White Man among a tribe of Indians in South America – he says “There is beauty in pain”. And it is
pain and anger that come over strongest in “Michael’s Garden”2,
about a man/boy who is labelled “mentally disturbed” because his views
on life do not concur with “the norm”. McTell has
tremendous empathy for life’s rejects and cast-offs.
He comes over strongest when defending their rights – the rights
of the mentally ill, the prisoners, the drunks, the immigrants and the
nobodies. Which
brings me to The Song. Although
he must have sung “Streets of London” many, many times, there was yet
a freshness about it, instilled by the composer’s still evident love for
his creation. We liked it
too, Ralph. Mention
must be made of the two French guitarists who appeared before Ralph
McTell. Michel Haumont and
Jacques Ada were fantastique! Their
guitar duets were a joy to the ear and the audience showed their
appreciation of the talented pair by demanding an encore. Their style
was light and happy – alternating between an almost classic romanticism
and modern jazz. While not
demanding tremendous powers of concentration, their music was obviously
capable of generating a great deal of pleasure, and I’m sure this
won’t be the last we’ll hear of them. Newspaper Articles Ralph McTell must have felt quite at home at Lewisham Concert Hall on
April 12, for he was born not a million miles away in Farnborough, Kent,
and he was brought up in Croydon. He certainly seemed very relaxed and he delighted his audience with his
uncanny ability to translate everyday situations – funny or sad – into
songs that everyone can readily identify with. His is an exceptional songwriter who deserves more success and his
accomplished guitar work perfectly compliments his songs – songs like
the poignant ‘From Clare To Here’, the quietly pleading ‘Let Me Down
Easy’ and the disturbing ‘Song for Martin’, which is, Ralph
explained, about a close friend who got into trouble. He also plays the piano, though he professes to ‘use’ rather than
‘play’ it, but his brief encounter with this instrument on April 12
suggests that he is being overly modest – he ‘uses’ it very well,
especially for ‘Traces’, a song which is considered to be amongst his
best work. However, he is more at home with the guitar and he played and sang his
way through songs, old and new, to the inevitable closing performance of
‘Streets of London’ which he introduced with tongue in cheek as ‘a
medley of my hit’. It was a highly enjoyable evening, and at risk of being shot down in
flames by new wave and mod devotees, it made more than a pleasant change
from the frantic music that is so much in the forefront today. It’s about four years since Ralph McTell last played at Lewisham, but judging from the audience’s warm response he’ll be very welcome to return much sooner than that this time.
Newspaper Articles The personal touch is very important to Ralph McTell – which is why
you are likely to see him at his best on his current national tour of
smaller venues. It is something he likes to do every year – in addition to the major
concert halls he will be playing in Britain and the States this autumn. HEROIN There is only one exception to the rule in his concert today (Tuesday)
at Croydon’s Fairfield Hall. Since
he grew up in the area and still lives in South West London, the relaxed
friendliness which is his trademark as a performer should be as much in
evidence there as at Lewisham Concert Hall the other weekend. “I have to be personally involved to write a song,” Ralph admits. But getting personally involved obviously comes naturally.
As well as celebrating all four of his children – Sam (13), Leah
(9), Tom (3) and Billy (2) – his songs are not afraid of darker
subjects. Perhaps the most striking song he has written recently is “Martin”
which he describes as “about a very good friend of mine who got involved
with heroin. “I am a very private person,” says Ralph. “I shy away from too much attention – it was pretty bad
when “Streets of London” was right up there in the charts. I really did get bothered a lot.” His son Billy is named after Billy Connolly, who is a friend, but Ralph
says the out-size extrovert image of the Scottish comedian and singer is
only one side of the coin. “He can do it when he is in the public eye but I can tell you he has
got a house up near Loch Lomond where he just gets away from it all.
Billy is under more pressure than anyone I know in the whole
country.” In a strange way, Ralph seems to have distanced himself from the period
after the re-recording of “Streets of London” when he himself felt
under most pressure. “I really feel “Streets” has its own career and I have mine,” he
says. “After it first came
out the song travelled by itself. I
would get to a place I had never been to before and they would all know
it.” RECORDING Last year he was presented with an award for 126,000 sales of the sheet
music of the song. “There
have been over 50 cover versions of the song that I know about, and it has
sold over 300,000 singles in this country alone.” Ralph isn’t businesslike enough to be able to sit down and
cold-bloodedly try to write another hit – although he agrees that if he
knew how to go about it, he would lose no time in repeating the success of
“Streets”. But he has no immediate recording plans. “I don’t have to make an album – I live by playing live
and I am going to wait until I have 12 really good strong songs.”
- C.P. ...AND HIS PUBLIC APPEARANCE Now that Ralph McTell has cut his shoulder-length hair and sideburns he
looks more like the young man on the cover of his first LP in 1968 than
ever before. The most striking thing about his performance at Lewisham Concert Hall
was the consistency in his songs – the same readiness to confide his
dreams and convictions. The
musical treatment may be more sophisticated, but he still appears without
a backing group – although the French duo, Michel and Jacques, opened
the set. McTell is natural rather than casual – the blue jeans, open-neck shirt
and chunky white shoes really do seem to reflect someone who has managed
to stay human, uncorrupted by fame and fortune. CUPBOARD Typically, his is not pedantic about trying to reproduce the recorded
sound. Having taken
“Gypsy” – inspired by his Romany grandmother – at a much faster
pace than on the “Not Till Tomorrow” LP, he then pauses to remove some
dead skin from his fingers before launching into “Run Johnny Run”.
Nor is he bothered when his fingers slip twice while playing
“Pity The Boy”. There’s no time for self-indulgence.
Unlike many of today’s music makers, Ralph’s inspiration is
from without, not from within. His
subjects come from his compassionate observation of others – whether a
lonely school teacher, “Chalkdust”, or elderly relations, “Naomi”. That is why his songs are essentially happy and he’s never
short of new ideas. On record, McTell’s words can seem dreamy or illusory, but live they
are brought into focus. It’s
as though he’s confiding the secrets and lessons of the life he has
lived through – particularly the need for constant love and loyalty. At the end he is called back on stage by applause from a small but enthusiastic audience. “I’m glad you called me back on,” he says. “At my last concert I walked offstage straight into a cupboard!” - Z.T. Newspaper Articles “I’m
not a folk singer, I don’t read music and I guess I’ll never make
Vegas!” – he told an enraptured audience.
He then proceeded to weave an atmosphere of deep warmth and even a
tear or two with his unique brand of music. Maybe
that comes across a little soft – and yet for many that’s where
“folk” – sorry Ralph – is at its best.
The archetypal small cosy room, candle-light, a club in the sixties
and all those returning images of bed sitters, Australians and being on
the road. In a place the size
of Colston Hall, alone on a bare stage with just a single guitar and
piano, Ralph takes his faithful listeners on a journey through emotions
that range from sadness in love to childhood awe. He
starts out with Barges – from
an early album – a sensitive and beautiful vision of lost youth, which
set in the contrasting starkness of the hall, brings a jangling and
hypnotic mood, almost Celtic in its roots.
One Heart is a really
moving song and sums up the feeling and communication that happens between
Ralph and his hushed audience. He
seems, at this point, almost reluctant to move into anything faster or up
tempo. Martin
is a haunting account of someone trying to give up his addiction. On
piano he plays a strange version of Dylan’s I
Want You and a sentimental song called England
– not to be confused with the Wembley anthem! It’s always on his
own most intimate songs that the true brilliance of McTell is allowed to
shine. He is a shy and humble
performer, who in the words from one of his verses has really “weathered
the storm” of changing styles and music forms. His
“busker’s guide to the galaxy”, the very beautiful Streets
of London, has probably become the most sung tale this side of Woody
Guthrie, and yet when he closes after one and a half hours the crowd are
right there with him on every word. It
still is an ageless message that applies to really just about any city in
the world. There’s
nothing pretentious about Ralph McTell, and perhaps the nicest thing is
that he’s still writing good things and playing them in the way he
began, when it was rucksacks, a battered guitar, French bread and a couple
of quickly learnt chords. -
C.T.
Newspaper
Articles Newspaper Articles Focusing on his childhood growing up in post-war Croydon, his autobiography Angel Laughter, tells how his abusive father abandoned the family when Ralph was just three years-old, leaving his mother to raise two children in near poverty. "The earliest years were very difficult to write because I was sensitive to my mother, who is alive, having to read how deeply I felt the break up of our family," says the songwriter. "Also I was fully aware of the sacrifices she made and her struggle to keep the three of us together, with no state help." But there were still plenty of good times. "We were allowed to roam pretty much unsupervised and, therefore, enjoyed a fantastic sense of freedom and adventure that is denied modern children," he smiles. "This is partly because my mother had to work long hours to keep us together. Angel Laughter covers the early years of Ralph's life, from learning the harmonica aged five to national service, and can be seen as an extension of his songwriting. "I felt that by talking in more detail about growing up, that more would be revealed about me and the songs, which are mostly autobiographical." But those waiting to hear about his rise to fame as a folk singer during the '60s and '70s, the writing of the classic Streets of London, and his TV series Alphabet Zoo and Tickle On The Turn will have to wait for volume two. "It is written and I believe the publishers will wait a year before it is released," he says, adding that he continues to be surprised how Streets Of London has captured the public's imagination. "I am pleased a song, written when I was 23, still has some relevance, albeit for perhaps the wrong reasons. Ralph McTell opens the second Birmingham Book Festival on Saturday 14 October, at Waterstones, High Street, Birmingham. Admission £2, start 5pm. He will also be performing at the MAC in the evening. Angel Laughter is
published by Amber Waves, priced £15.
Newspaper Articles More than 10 years ago, he was given a biography of the poet, and as he read it he became compelled to write a poem which eventually formed the framework for a musical account of Dylan's Life, called The Boy With A Note. "I don't think I'd have liked Dylan, but I felt such an empathy with his situation," says McTell. "You're watching him self-destruct. He had a duality about money worries and responsibility - you drink in order to sin; the fact that you were drunk becomes the excuse." It was a unique and unusual project for the singer, whose long career (with the notable exception of Streets of London, which he wryly refers to as "my one hit wonder") has been rooted in the folk field. "Nobody asked me to do it, but the album organically grew," he says. "I started with no idea for the songs, just for the poem which runs through it, and every day I'd wait for my family to go to bed so that I could go to my room and beaver away at it." The finished album proved so impressive that Radio 2 commissioned it, recording a version in which the late Michael Elphick took the main spoken part. McTell's own version went on general release, and is now available from the Dylan Thomas Centre. The album is a moving, insightful response to the life of a man whose problems increased as a gap widened between the superstar persona he acquired in the US and the realities of his home life. "There was a moral crisis running right through his creative life," says McTell. "I think there's something about Britishness that we don't like someone to be too big a success. "Yet when he went to America he was like a rock'n'roll star. They'd never seen anything like him before - this little man who thundered out such wonderful sounding words in his rich voice. "Then he'd come back home and find he was just the same person he'd always been with a wife and home and money worries. "The reason I really identified with him is that as a soloist I know that it's very easy to adopt a persona when you're away, then suddenly you come home and you're back in the real world." For all his identification with Dylan, McTell has saved himself from a similar fate by maintaining a sense of perspective and honesty. "I went through my own period of self doubt and drinking too much, but I realised no-one's that important really," he says. "What matters is the truth and the integrity of your intention. "You have to make the most of what you do - don't just do fillers. The secret is to have enough doubt. I've never been that confident. Of course it's lovely when people complement you, let you stay in nice hotel rooms and show an interest in what you have to say." "But I think it's the artist's job to continue to ask questions and to seek a kind of truth in what they do." McTell will be playing songs from The Boy With a Note, as well as reading extracts from his own autobiography when he appears at the Dylan Thomas Centre on Sunday. It will be one of relatively few live performances this year. "I've done about 100 gigs a year for 37 years," he says. "Then last year I was in Ireland with my much younger manager and he told me that I needed a year off. 'Why? I'm not tired,' I said. 'No,' he replied, 'but you're getting grumpy! "Also, in the last few years I've been lucky enough to have gained seven beautiful grandchildren, and I wouldn't want to look back and realise I hadn't spent time with them. So I just did it, and we've had a wonderful summer together." Though he professes to have taken things easy, McTell has still managed to perform throughout Europe this year, and has numerous international dates lined up for 2004. Playing is, it seems, an essential part of his life. "I hate the studio. I find it a terribly nerve-wracking experience. I think my best albums are my live performance albums." McTell is delighted to have been invited to return to Swansea as part of the Dylan Thomas 50th Anniversary Festival. "To have your work acknowledged as a small contribution to that
myth is wonderful," he says.
Despite the autumn mist, so thick it prevented the sea from being seen, rarely have so many stars shone there. A celebration in words and music, staged in aid of the Surf Life Saving Association of Great Britain, notwithstanding the fact that, with all that was said and sung about Cornwall and the Cornish, no space was available for the singing of "Trelawny" which it cried out for, this was surely the county's concert of the year. Its list of show business celebrities was staggering, nothing like it had been seen before, and it's unlikely' at least for a good while, that anything like it will be seen again. Compared by Nigel Rees, host of BBC Radio 4's "Quote . . . Unquote", who first visited the Minack in 1965 as an Oxford undergraduate when he played Lewis Carroll, fittingly enough, in the second half of the show he read Carroll's very funny poem "Sea Dirge" But, before that, with obvious delight and many amusing asides, he introduced such music makers as folk singer Ralph "The Streets of London" McTell and Phil Beer, one half of the highly regarded acoustic duo "Show of Hands", the Mount Charles Band and the Four Lanes Male Voice Choir; actors Joss Ackland, Jack shepherd, and Simon Williams and his son Tam Williams, not forgetting young Ben Righton, a member of the Surf Life Saving Association who is currently studying acting at Webber Douglas Academy in London; and radio and television personalities Fern Britton and Craig Rich. The off the cuff conversation between the last two, who once worked together at Plymouth on the BBC TV programme "Spotlight", was one of the show's highlights. However, to be fair to all concerned, not least to event co-ordinator Scilla Grose, producer Caroline Righton, and co-producer and director Matt Richards, there were so many highlights in this show it sparkled from beginning to end. From the Mount Charles Band's rendering of Goff Richards' stirring composition to the Four Lanes Male Voice Choir's singing of "West of the Tamar", from the brilliant guitar duet by Ralph McTell and Phil Beer to any one of the excellent prose and poetry readings by actors, from Jack Shepherd's interpretation of an extract from William Golding's "pincher Martin" to Joss Acklands's delivery of Robert Mathan's poem "Dunkirk", it was not only a nigh to remember but one which achieved its declared aim of raising funds for and awareness of the Surf Life Saving Association.
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This man is so relaxed: despite the chasm of the concert hall he conjured an intimately friendly atmosphere just like the folk clubs must have been when he started his musical career more than 40 years ago. This was, he told us, the official launch of his autobiography As Far As I Can Tell, which relates stories of his childhood in Croydon and is linked to a CD with songs inspired by them. Although his dad left Ralph's mum to bring up him and his brother in a damp flat in The Waldrons, he remembers it fondly as "a wonderful childhood" and his songs certainly make those days seem idyllic. The gentle, warm, rosy glow of nostalgia made me feel as if I was being snuggled up in a favourite cosy cardigan. We heard tales and songs about the Sunday School teacher who taught her classes in a tin hut in Mint Walk; about Ralph's granddad who drove a steam train and was promoted to The Pretty Brighton Belle; about the long-departed Whitgift Arms pub where he first dared to play his guitar in public and about the coalman Old Puggy Mearns. This poem, which Ralph recited to a skipping rhyme beat, was one of the funniest things I've heard in ages and reduced me to tears of laughter. Google it and you'll see why. The Craig and Bentley tragedy was retold: two Croydon teenagers who, in 1952, set out to commit a robbery in Tamworth Road. It went wrong and a policeman was shot dead. Because he was old enough Bentley went to the gallows. Craig, who fired the fatal shot, was under age so escaped the death penalty. Derek Bentley's sister Iris campaigned tirelessly to win him a pardon – and succeeded, although it was not granted until after her own death. The song was dedicated "to the inspirational Iris". And of course the icing on the cake was the classic Streets of London, Croydon's own Surrey Street Market having planted the idea for a song about the dispossessed which is still so very relevant today. Long may Ralph McTell write brilliant songs and come back home to sing them to us. A simply wonderful evening. Diana Eccleston |
