About six months ago I found myself in a position to renew my
life, and have mostly been gone from this forum in that time.
One of the renewals I made was in the area of music. I used
to be very fond of folk music (real folk music) and filk.
I was fortunate, in this respect, to have available to me a program
put out by Youngstown State University, called “Folk Festival”,
hosted by Charles Darling, a history professor at the university
who taught history through folk music. The very first broadcast
was a compilation of Childe Ballads.
Later I made the acquaintance of some of the members of a group
called On the Mark and immediately purchased all of their music on
cassette tape (directly from them). Members of this group were
also members of SCA in Pittsburgh, and I lived in Youngstown,
Ohio, just an hour away.
Even later I had an opportunity for a few conversations at Pagan
events to meet with Isaac Bonewits, and his music. I also
purchased all of his music, and had some discussions with him
about his music.
Still later I became acquainted with the music of Leslie Fish.
I never met her, but it is said that she published the first filk song.
Other music followed, including much of the music I heard on
Folk Festival.
Unfortunately, all of this music was on audio cassette tapes,
and they all wore out decades ago. I have begun to try to
obtain this music, and build a large collection of folk/filk, which
I enjoy very much. It speaks to my spirit in a way that is not
always comprehensible to others.
So far, I have been able to get all of On the Mark’s work
through the Internet Archive. Attempts to find Isaac Bonewits’
music have met with “link not found”, and I might have to contact
ACE (Association for Consciousness Exploration) directly.
I would also like to find the early Pagan work of Todd Alan, who
I knew personally.
One song particularly might be especially applicable to this
forum… it is called “A Pict Song”, a poem written by Rudyard
Kipling. Words at
On the Mark put it to music in “A Pict Song” on their album
To the Point, found on the Internet Archive
[Note: I tried to get the actual sound recording to play
here, with no luck. Just go to the Internet Archive and search
for the album by name, or for “On the Mark”
The words will resonate here…
We are the Little Folk—we!
Too little to love or to hate.
Leave us alone and you’ll see
How we can drag down the State!