Talk:Celtic music
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The term is also rather geographically inaccurate, and is often used to refer to music which originated in regions which can not really be considered to be Celtic.
I'm not averse to the point you're making, but--for example? --LMS
Is there indeed a tradition of Cornish music distinct from English music, that is sometimes considered "Celtic"? I played with a Cornish piano accordion player in Alaska one summer. :-) He mentioned something about this, but I have totally forgotten what he said. --LMS
There is alas a considerable degree of musical homogeneity in this day and age. But there are musical forms which are traditionally Cornish, not the least of which is the Cornish choral tradition. sjc
- But would that count as "Celtic" music? If not (e.g., if it's a very non-Celtic-sounding operatic tradition), you might mention it as a sort of counterexample: "here's a sort of traditional music that comes from a place that is called "Celtic," but the music does not really "fit with" (in what sense?) the traditional music of Ireland and Scotland... --LMS
You ask for examples about geographical inaccuracy. Its obviously hard to be precise since the term "Celtic" is a fairly loose one, especially when used as an ethnicity. If you take Scotland though for example "Celtic" only really applies to the highland populations. In the past Scotland was split into highland and lowland regions. These regions were divided by traditions and language (Gaelic in the highland, Scots, which is a strong dialect of English in the lowlands). And yet "Celtic" music comes from all over Scotland. And of course large parts of England (other than Northumbria and Cornwall which get an explicit mention). In some cases this is tracable to the population moves during the industrial revolution (the "navvies") in others not.
The point is I think that the music spread more widely and more rapidly than many other traditions. Certainly music seems to have had fewer barriers to transfer than language. In the case of music in Britain it has always flowed around the entirety of Britain because of the maritime tradition. The shipping trade was in the past, as now, a very "ethinically" mixed trade, and professional musicians were a normal part of the ships complement.
I guess what I am saying here is that the term "Celtic" in "Celtic music" has become a generic term which covers a certain style of music, and does not actually relate to other uses of the word "celtic", at least not directly. Its similar for instance to the use of the word "Champaign" which has a generic usage beyond what the region of France produces (at least in common usage, and despite what the lawyers say!).
Probably I have not worded it very well in the article. PL
I'm still waiting to learn about the geographic inaccuracies! :-) Meanwhile, some the above content could be transferred to the article itself! If it's good enough for the /Talk page, isn't it good enough for the main page? --LMS
In the first paragraph. You state Celtic music comes in part from Scotland. Large parts of Scotland (the lowlands) are not "Celtic". Ditto Northumbria, only more so! I am not sure about the main page though. This stuff is perhaps somewhat orthogonal. PL
I see. In other words, there are exceptions to the generalizations. --LMS
The above appears to be positively ancient, but interestingly enough, I added a quote to this page from Alan Stivell and the page I got it from (http://pobox.upenn.edu/~teachnet/Bretonjaf/bretonjaf1.html) goes into the same issue, and concludes, like PL does, that Celtic music is a description of a genre that exists independent of the ethnic designation Celtic. It is a useful distinction and some mention should be made here, but I'm not sure how right now.
The main reason I came to the talk page at all was to invite interested parties to weigh in. I made a Wikipedia:Article series about the Music of the United Kingdom, and included music of Ireland as a part of that series (because Northern Ireland is, obviously, a part of the UK yet too similar to music from RoI for an independent article). The table declaring that this article is a part of the music of the United Kingdom series looks strange since, I think, most readers will assume the article is about RoI, which is not part of the UK. I want to make a table for a Celtic music series as well (which will solve that problem, I think), but there are issues... The following articles would be a part of this series:
- Music of Brittany
- Music of Cornwall
- Music of Galicia
- Music of Ireland
- Music of the Isle of Man
- Music of Maritime Canada (including Cape Breton)
- Music of Northumbria
- Music of Scotland
- Irish-American music
- Music of Wales
The above discussion should certainly be considered. For example, the article could explain that Celtic Cornish music is extinct, moribund or only recently revived, and focus on historical music. Scottish influence on American music should maybe be included, but I dunno there's enough material for a whole article. Irish-American music redirects to music of immigrant communities in the United States (which is part of the music of the United States series) but it may be difficult to get a whole article out of Irish-American music. Even if successful, this would seem to indicate that the music of the United States series table needs to be altered so as to give the new Irish-American music article semi-top-level status as part of the "other" category (see music of the United States if you don't understand what I'm talking about -- the last item on the table is the "other" category). I don't know if that's a good idea, though. The Celtic music series could maybe be expanded with historical articles on Gaulish music or something, but I haven't a clue about that, so I'm not including it for now... What about Asturias and/or parts of Portugal -- I know those are related, at least historically.... And are the Shetlands and Hebrides distinct enough to warrant a separate article? They are sometimes mentioned as having music distinct from Scotland... I don't suppose we have any Celtic music experts/enthusiasts around, do we? (I'm only a dabbler -- probably no experts on Wikipedia or this article would be better by now) Probably just rambling to myself, Tuf-Kat 02:06, Jan 16, 2004 (UTC)
quote
I'm tempted to remove the whole quote (I'm pretty sure I added it, so that probably wouldn't be controversial) because I every time I see it, it bugs me because he makes the absurd claim that Celts view reality as liquid. I won't remove the whole thing though, just the first part, since it doesn't add much and the quote's pretty long anyway. The second part should probably just be incorporated in our own words, but I won't push it. Tuf-Kat 02:12, Oct 13, 2004 (UTC)
- Defining Celtic music is made that much more difficult by the fact that, for a Celt, reality is liquid (but the difficulty does not prove its non-existence). And for me, the nationality of a music is not made of absolute criteria, but by relative traits. Thus, even if it is rare in its pure state, the running pentatonic scale (re, fa, sol, la, do) is more "loved" by the Celts than by other European peoples. In many cases, Celtic music is in a state of instability between the pentatonic and the diatonic (do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti, do). . . .
