Folksong.
Also developed at the OSD, Folksong leads the participants into the often ignored world of non-jazz, non-classical acoustic music, often called folk, but actually so much more. Throughout the history of early human music, through the earliest written music, through the troubadours and the Industrial Revolution, through the Celtic diaspora, two world wars and the advent of technology, folk music has stored a vast wealth of song, stories, characters, legends, lore, history and tradition.
However as folk music declined with more 'refined' social aspirations and with the rise of electronic media, it stumbled virtually to extinction. In pockets of resistance the old skills lingered, and collectors collected what they could - a mixed blessing this, as although the material was saved from disappearance, it also suffered the same fate as the butterflies equally beloved of gentleman collectors - it was preserved in glass, never to change again.
Luckily, singers and musicians nowadays are breathing new life back into those songs, (and how!), and they are once more out in the oral tradition, growing and changing a little as they pass from one person to the next.
This series of workshops leads participants through this story, to find a particular narrative song to breathe new life into, and to more fully appreciate the depth and riches of both our traditional culture and our new living traditions.