The History of Filk Music by Gary Mcgath

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The History of Filk Music by Gary Mcgath Tomorrow’s Songs Today The History of Filk Music by Gary McGath Copyright 2015 by Gary McGath. This is a free e-book. Edition 1.01, January 29, 2015 Editor: Terri Wells Cover illustration: Matt Leger For updates and information see: http://www.mcgath.com/tst Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) license. (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) You are free to: Share — copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format Under the following terms: Attribution — You must give appropriate credit, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. You may do so in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests the licensor endorses you or your use. NonCommercial — You may not use the material for commercial purposes. NoDerivatives — If you remix, transform, or build upon the material, you may not distribute the modifed material. No additional restrictions — You may not apply legal terms or technological measures that legally restrict others from doing anything the license permits. Notices: You do not have to comply with the license for elements of the material in the public domain or where your use is permitted by an applicable exception or limitation. No warranties are given. The license may not give you all of the permissions necessary for your intended use. For example, other rights such as publicity, privacy, or moral rights may limit how you use the material. 3 Table of Contents Supporters..................................................................................................................................................5 Acknowledgements....................................................................................................................................6 Introduction................................................................................................................................................7 1. “Filker up!”............................................................................................................................................8 What is filk?..........................................................................................................................................8 Organization out of chaos....................................................................................................................11 Filk conventions..................................................................................................................................12 Relatives of filk...................................................................................................................................13 The filk family.....................................................................................................................................14 2. Varieties of filk....................................................................................................................................16 Musical styles......................................................................................................................................18 3. The beginnings of filk (1940-1965).....................................................................................................20 4. The period of growth (1965-1978).......................................................................................................26 The Dorsai and the SCA......................................................................................................................29 5. Cons and recordings (1979-1988)........................................................................................................36 California and Ohio.............................................................................................................................38 Meanwhile, elsewhere in America......................................................................................................43 The crash of ’87...................................................................................................................................45 Filk in print..........................................................................................................................................47 6. The start of a golden age (1989-2000).................................................................................................50 The Dandelion Conspiracy..................................................................................................................54 Interfilk................................................................................................................................................57 Reaching out........................................................................................................................................58 7. A new century (2001-present)..............................................................................................................62 Reaching for the stars..........................................................................................................................67 8. Filk in the UK......................................................................................................................................70 9. Filk in Canada......................................................................................................................................76 The Filk Hall of Fame.........................................................................................................................78 Canadian songwriters and performers.................................................................................................80 10. Filk in Germany.................................................................................................................................83 11. Filk around the world.........................................................................................................................89 12. Filk, pros, and prose...........................................................................................................................92 13. Filk’s periphery..................................................................................................................................97 14. The future of filk..............................................................................................................................100 Appendix A: The Filk Hall of Fame......................................................................................................105 Appendix B: The Pegasus Awards.........................................................................................................107 Appendix C: (Nearly?) all the filk conventions ever held.....................................................................115 4 Supporters This book, with real editing and cover art, was made possible by the people who supported my IndieGoGo campaign. Without their help, this would have been a much less readable work, if it happened at all. The following people sponsored the campaign for this book with $10 or more: Marty and Jerrie Adkins Bill Laubenheimer and Carole Parker Kate and Andrew Barton Lastalda Dawn Benton Bob Leigh Moss Bliss Bob Lidral Morva Bowman and Alan Pollard Kari Maaren Margaret Bumby Sibylle Machat Jeremy Brett Mark Mandel Steve Brinich Phil Mills Rich Brown Eyal Mozes Terence Chua Ron Oakes Paul Ciszek Rick’s Café Terrestrienne Janet Coburn Alison and Mike Richards Lizzie and Eric Coleman Gray Rinehart John and Mary Creasey Bill Roper Morgan Dawn Robert Rosenfeld Katy Dröge Tim Ryan Allison Durno Steve Savitzky Errol Elumir Kay Shapero Barney and Kate Evans Lauren Schiller and Ada Palmer Michael Feldman and Marli Kennedy Hillary Sherwood Ricci Finn Kathleen Sloan Barry Gold Harold Stein Judith and David Hayman Gary L. Swaty Merav Hoffman, Jon Lenox, and Terry Karney Alan Thiesen W. Randy Hoffman Ken and Peggi Warner-Lalonde Alexa Klettner Julia West Silke Kovàr Dave Weingart Jodi Krangle Steve “Wheels” Wheeler Ellen Kranzer Jason Youngberg 5 Acknowledgements A vast number of people contributed information for this book. Special thanks go to Harold Stein and Lee and Barry Gold, who have repeatedly turned up information I never thought I could fnd. Harold provided a huge number of scans, some of which are included in this book. Thanks to Robin Holly for helping me to make the video for the IndieGoGo campaign. Several websites have been hugely valuable. The Internet Archive let me fnd old versions of websites that otherwise would have been long gone. Kay Shapero’s Filk FAQ and Debbie Ohi’s Filk FAQ provided pointers to lots of information. The Filk Hall of Fame maintains biographical information on key flkers which I’ve gladly used. SF-Fantasy.de features valuable and informative recorded interviews with flkers. Fancyclopedia 3 contains lots of information on fannish history, including flk. The NESFA library has been a great place to fnd books relating to fannish history. The Filkindex, created by Sourdough Jackson and published by Roberta Rogow, was a valuable resource. Terri Wells did a great job as the editor of this book, fnding inconsistencies, typos, stylistic gaffes, and boring paragraphs, and pushing me to fx them. Without her help, this book would have been painful reading in many places. Help with researching flk history and reviewing my early drafts has come from Lissa
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