Well, I’ve started (and then stopped) to put short videos on Tiktok. I’ve had to use my old phone so far, but at least it’s a simple process. However, I’m looking at other cameras so that I can make the sound and video a bit better. Why do this? Partly it’s a self-serving thing, a showcase for getting some more bookings, especially for dances. It’s also, of course, a way to show off a bit of (mostly) English folk/traditional music.
I play dance music that has developed over the last 400 hundred years or so in England. It is closely related to the traditional dance music in Scotland, Wales and Ireland. Sometimes indistinguishable, sometimes in the more “English” versions of this shared tradition. The core of the music I play is “Country Dance” music; a dance music that has it’s origins somewhere in and before the 15th century. It has gone through its ups and downs over the centuries, from working class and peasant communities, to the royal court and a dance craze across Europe.