Exploring Folklore Weekend

A diverse weekend for anybody who wants to explore or learn more in the field of folklore – as student, participant or exponent. From calendar customs to black dogs, rites of passage to foodways, folklore to fakelore. With collectors old and new, mummers, hobby horses, and the Folkore Society. Talks, hands-on sessions, films, exhibitions, entertainment, question sessions and discussion.

The weekend features Doc Rowe’s collection including his presentation ‘Blood, Booze and Bedlam’, the world famous Potterne Mummers, Mark Norman on Black Dogs, Tom & Barbara Brown on The Hunting of the Earl of Rone and Caroline Oates offering an introduction to The Folklore Society.

Who’s it For?

This weekend is planned as an enjoyable and instructive event for anybody who wants to explore or learn more in the field of folklore – as student, participant or exponent.

The Programme

The Team

Tom & Barbara Brown have spent a lifetime immersed in and devoted to folk song, music and tradition. Residing in North Devon, the duo are well-known performers with an enormous song repertoire, and a specialism in songs of the West Country.

Doc Rowe – Arguably the most important English collector since Kidson or Sharp, David ‘Doc’ Rowe has been documenting folklore, song, dance and cultural traditions for the last thirty years. He has amassed an archive of material on past and contemporary popular culture in Britain with a particular emphasis on annual traditional events (or ‘calendar customs’). The collection – containing a wide variety of media (video, film, photography, and audio) – has been acknowledged internationally as of major significance. Doc was awarded an honorary doctorate in music from University of Sheffield in 2002 for his research work into vernacular culture and traditional music, and in 2005 was awarded the English Folk Dance and Song Society’s Gold Badge for his documentation of traditional Song and Dance.

Mark Norman is a folklore writer and researcher based in Devon, UK, specialising in Black Dog folklore and folklore of the South West. He is a contracted author with Troy Books.

Pottern Mummers – Guardians of the traditional Potterne Mummers Play, we tour the pubs round the Devizes area in the week before Christmas, to present our version of the traditional folk play, and collect a few quid for local charities and the Wiltshire Air Ambulance.

Pat Smith & Ned Clamp – Some of the most entertaining ‘lectures’ you could wish to find. Pat took Welsh song, custom and tradition all over the world with Calennig and continues, with Ned, to perform, give talks, maintain Llantrisant Mari, and generally fascinate people with all aspects of Welsh culture.

The Folklore Society is a learned society, based in London, devoted to the study of all aspects of folklore and tradition, including: ballads, folktales, fairy tales, myths, legends, traditional song and dance, folk plays, games, seasonal events, calendar customs, childlore and children’s folklore, folk arts and crafts, popular belief, folk religion, material culture, vernacular language, sayings, proverbs and nursery rhymes, folk medicine, plantlore and weather lore.