Classic Folk with Mike Norris
Classic Folk is unique.
It mines a rich seam of wonderful folk and roots music and song from around 75 years of recordings.
From the great source singers to the legends of folk rock, the travellers to the protesters, the ballads to the blues, from the far north to the deep south and all around the English speaking world, the songs live again.
And, not forgetting the pick of the new releases and a few cracking tunes, it’s like having a folk festival in the comfort of your own home!
Former English Folk Dance and Song Society Chair (2006–2011) and long-standing member Mike Norris hosts our weekly folk radio programme.
Mike explores a wide range of folk and acoustic music from the UK and abroad – from rarely heard archive and field recordings to the very latest releases.
Listen now
Tuesday 01 October 2024
This week’s music:
1. The Colour of Amber / Lady Maisery
2. The Highway Robber / Cohen Braithwaite-Kilcoyne
3. Mudlark / Linda Thompson Featuring The Rails
4. Three Black Feathers / Bella Hardy
5. The Old Oak Wood Turns Green Again / Colum Sands
6. Merlin The Wolfhound / Thorpe & Morrison
7. Green Bushes / Geoffrey Ling
8. The Rigs Of The Time / Vic Harrup
9. Sweet Primroses / Linda Walker
10. The Winds Do Blow / Tony Hall
11. Orfordness Light / Bryony Quainton
12. The Larks They Sang Melodious / Alvar Smith
13. Shepherds' Song / Dr. Faustus
14. The Grey Mare / Briony Griffith & Alice Jones
15. Where The Good Ship Lands / Alastair Savage And Alice Allen
16. Deportees (Plane Wreck At Los Gatos) / Ralph McTell & Wizz Jones
17. Deportation Blues / Seckou Keita
18. Van Diemen's Land / Barbara Dickson
19. Farewell My Dearest Nancy / Chris & Steve Wilson
20. Tacoma's Song / Cohen Braithwaite-Kilcoyne
21. Ashgill Force Rant / Broom Bezzums
22. Anderson's Coast / Cockersdale
23. Shores Of America / Linda Thompson Featuring Dori Freeman
24. Wayfaring Stranger / Rhiannon Giddens & Francesco Turrisi
25. Mr. Tambourine Man / Bob Dylan 4:08
26. What You Do With What You've Got / The Magpie Arc
27. I Must And Will Be Married / Naomi Bedford and Paul Simmonds
Also available to stream:
The presenter: Mike Norris
Mike’s passion for folk music spans decades; from first learning to play the melodeon and singing shanties at school, to running folk festivals and gigs.
A teenager during the 1960s, Mike was heavily influenced by protest song and folk-rock popularity (Bob Dylan, the Copper Family, Joan Baez, Fairport Convention etc), as well as the tail end of the folk-song revival shaped by The Watersons, Ewan MacColl, Peggy Seeger, Shirley Collins, Woody Guthrie and many more.
Interesting fact: The hospital where Mike was born, in Portsmouth, grew out of the workhouse where George Gardiner collected more than 100 songs in the early 1900s.