Folk Rock - Subgenres - Electric Folk

Electric Folk

Electric folk (aka British folk rock) is the name given to the form of folk rock pioneered in Britain during the late 1960s by the bands Sweeney's Men, Fairport Convention, and Pentangle. It uses traditional British music and self-penned compositions in a traditional style, and is played on a combination of traditional and rock instruments. This incorporation of traditional British folk music influences gives electric folk its distinctly British character and flavour. It evolved out of the psychedelia-influenced folk rock of British acts such as Donovan, The Incredible String Band, and Tyrannosaurus Rex, but was also heavily influenced by such American folk rock bands as The Byrds, Love, and Buffalo Springfield. Electric folk was at its most significant and popular during the late 1960s and 1970s, when, in addition to Fairport and Pentangle, it was also taken up by groups such as Steeleye Span and The Albion Band.

Steeleye Span was founded by Fairport Convention bass player, Ashley Hutchings, and was made up of traditionalist folk musicians who wished to incorporate electrical amplification, and later overt rock elements, into their music. This, in turn, spawned the conspicuously English folk rock music of The Albion Band, a group that also included Hutchings as a member. In Brittany electric folk was pioneered by Alan Stivell (who began to mix his Breton, Irish, and Scottish roots with rock music) and later by French bands like Malicorne. During this same period, electric folk was adopted and developed in the surrounding Celtic cultures of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Brittany, and Cornwall, to produce Celtic rock and its derivates. Electric folk also gave rise to the subgenre of Medieval folk rock and the fusion genres of folk punk and folk metal. By the 1980s the popularity of the electric folk was in steep decline but it has survived into the 21st century and has been revived as part of a more general folk resurgence since the 1990s. Electric folk has also been influential in those parts of the world with close cultural connections to Britain, such as the U.S. and Canada.