Three Score & Ten - A Voice to the People / a RootsWorld review of World Music Topic Records: Three Score & Ten - A Voice to the People 70 Years of the Oldest Independent Record Label in Great Britain Book and 7-CD Set Topic Records ( Marking Topic Recordsï¿½ seventieth anniversary, Three Score & Ten is a gorgeous and loving tribute to the history of this remarkable independent English label. David Suff, artist and Fledgï¿½ling Records founder, has worked with Topic Recordsï¿½ guiding light Tony Engle to produce a hardbound, 108 page book on heavy, glossy paper. The text is accompanied by seven themed CDs, which fit snugly into the interior of the front- and backboards of the book.

In addition, the ï¿½Topic Records Complete Catalogue 1939-2009ï¿½ is included, presenting all of the Topic Records releases chronologically on vinyl, CD, and according to associated labels such as the ï¿½Topic World Seriesï¿½ and ï¿½Special Delivery.ï¿½ "The Man Who Watered The Worker's Beer" Three Score & Ten recounts the story of the Topic Records label, and the origins of Topic are particularly fascinating. Initially, the organization from which Topic would take root was the Workersï¿½ Music Association (WMA), founded in 1936 as ï¿½an educational offshoot of the British Marxist Party.ï¿½ (p. 5) The Workersï¿½ Music Association was created to aid in the struggle against the fascism and totalitarianism that had arisen in the 1930s, and also to provide an outlet for workers to express themselves through music. From the beginning, intellectuals and artists joined together in this effort, under the organizing influence of the composer Alan Bush.

In 1939, the first record released by the Workersï¿½ Music Association was a 10ï¿½ 78rpm disc entitled ï¿½The Man Who Watered The Worker's Beerï¿½ attributed to Paddy Ryan, backed by a performance of ï¿½The Internationale.ï¿½ This record was issued under the Topic imprint as TRC1, indicating the ï¿½Topic Record Club,ï¿½ a subscription method of distribution for the music to be issued by the WMA. Both of these early recorded performances are available on Disc Six, a themed collection called ï¿½The Peopleï¿½s Flag,ï¿½ of Three Score & Ten. The message is clear: from the beginning, what would become Topic Records was a label committed to social justice, and to the sounds of indigenous folk forms. Interestingly enough, while the early Topic was also releasing licensed political and Soviet items as part of its educational project, the details as to why some of the early records were released have disappeared into time. But post-World War II, the influence of A. L. Lloyd and Ewan MacColl on the English folk song revival began to be felt.

Topic Recordsï¿½ development was also aided by the addition of Bill Leader as production manager, who recorded Jack Elliot and Dominic Behan early on for the label. The remainder of Three Score & Ten moves quickly as the folk revival gains steam, and readers are treated to a number of notable features. The photographic documentation of the book is beautifully done. There are fantastic pictures of Shirley Collins, June Tabor, Anne Briggs, The Watersons, and a whole plethora of other artists and revival luminaries throughout the text. Full-page profiles are provided for essential figures in Topicï¿½s history (e.g., A. L. Lloyd, Tony Engle), and full-page or double-page spreads are provided for essential releases on Topic Records (e.g., The Watersonsï¿½ Frost & Fire, Nic Jonesï¿½ Penguin Eggs). Gorgeous full-color images of Topic Recordsï¿½ releases adorn the pages, too, showing that there was a significant amount of artistic consistency across the LP covers, which were often two-color prints.

"A Place Called England" (June Tabor) What is absorbing to follow in the text is the ongoing development of the Topic Records recording process: as a small independent label, sometimes the recording sessions were done in recording studios, but they were also often done in homes, or out in the ï¿½field,ï¿½ or in basements converted to makeshift studios. Throughout Three Score & Ten, there is a consistent thread of the tenacious nature of the Topic label, with recordings being made in an environment of excitement and an awareness that the music was worth taping and documenting. Of course, along the way, a number of tremendous artists were brought under Topicï¿½s wing that would prove revelatory for folk song: Anne Briggs, The High Level Ranters, Dick Gaughan, Martin Simpson, The Watersons, Shirley Collins, Peter Bellamy, and Martin Carthy, to name but a few. Another interesting insight provided by Three Score & Ten is the rate at which Topic Records released music. One of the amazing facts about recorded musical history is that we only have a fraction of the total amount of music produced by people across the millennia.

As recording technology became better, and as Topic Records solidified into a stable business, Topic Records was in step with the modern world by offering a wide variety of releases. The label also provided forays into other world musics. Hence we see a number of classic albums emerge through the 1960s (e.g., The McPeake Family, Shirley Collins, Dave & Toni Arthur), but even more offerings through the 1970s as the revival continued to bear fruit (e.g., The Cheviot Ranters, Frankie Armstrong, Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick), and the 1980s (e.g., Nic Jones, Dick Gaughan, Brass Monkey), the 1990s (Eliza Carthy, The Albion Band), and into our current era (e.g., Tim Van Eyken, John Tams).

Topic Records has also continued to reissue a number of classic performances by artists who were experts at entertaining the people, such as the concertina master Scan Tester, and to package early recordings in a way so as to provide a wellspring of inspiration for the current robust revival (e.g., the epic 20-volume Voice of the People series of traditional music). The 7 CDs included in this handsome set are arranged thematically, and each could stand alone as a superb compilation. The first disc ranges through some ï¿½treasures from the Topic catalogue,ï¿½ and includes Mike Watersonï¿½s stunning 1977 ten minute solo rendition of ï¿½Tamlyn.ï¿½ Disc Two covers the English revival, and one can listen across the years to the English country dance stylings of Oak, and on to the brass arrangements of English folk song on Brass Monkeyï¿½s landmark ï¿½The Maid and the Palmer.ï¿½ Disc Three is devoted to Topicï¿½s Irish roster of artists; Scottish music is the focus of Disc Four.

Disc Five focuses on the singer-songwriters that have graced the Topic label, while Disc Six explores the political and activist songs dear to Topic Recordsï¿½ history. Disc Seven is another varied mixture of song and tunes, but includes some of the world music beyond the U.K. that has also been released by Topic Records. "The Maid and the Palmer" (Brass Monkey) "Boi Se Otvori" (Roza Tsetkova) As an introduction to the Topic labelï¿½s myriad treasures, it is hard to imagine a better compilation of documentary material that appeals to both the eyes and ears; and even if one is familiar with Topicï¿½s legendary roster of artists and albums, the connoisseur is sure to find the content of Three Score & Ten moving and informative. What this project does is celebrate the Topic label through its history, through choice tracks, and through archival photos of artists and label personnel that are positively a treat.

Three Score & Ten is not, however, a critical, modern academically-oriented assessment of the English folk revival such as one might find in Michael Brockenï¿½s The British Folk Revival 1944-2002 (Ashgate 2003), Britta Sweersï¿½ Electric Folk (OUP USA 2005), or Georgina Boyesï¿½ The Imagined Village (Manchester University Press, 1993). Boyes presented the English folk revival as rent by numerous contradictions as key figures in the revival (such as Cecil Sharp, and later, Ewan MacColl and A.L. Lloyd) sought to fight for control over defining not just the ï¿½properï¿½ performance of folksong and its collection, but also who were actually the ï¿½folkï¿½ in England.

Boyesï¿½ book, which has carried tremendous weight amongst the contemporary wave of the English folk revival, tells a tale in which womenï¿½s opinions on folksong were often pushed aside by men seeking to preserve a questionably ï¿½authenticï¿½ version of English culture; the ï¿½folkï¿½ of England became, essentially, a social construction ï¿½ an ï¿½imagined villageï¿½ -- suitable to concerns and worries over English nationalism, and of a modernizing society pushing the working classes and the rural countryside to the margins. In Topicï¿½s Three Score & Ten, the history of the label is presented in a heroic light, with little darkness shed on the pioneers and contemporaries who have worked to preserve the folksong of the U.K. and beyond. This is precisely how this beautiful and lavish production should be.

Contradictions be damned: if not for managing slender finances carefully; arranging recording sessions in basements, houses, and studios; fostering talent; establishing labels, and helping to distribute other independent roots music purveyors; and of course, the pure love of the music itself, the groundbreaking survey of Topicï¿½s legacy that is Three Score & Ten would not have been possible. It may be fashionable to speak of the constructed nature of ï¿½Englishness,ï¿½ or of the ï¿½imagined village,ï¿½ and that authenticity in folk music is as much an applied role as any rock star pose. But at the end of the day, the music speaks for itself, as traditions are passed on to avoid death through inertia. Iï¿½d say that in many ways, Topic Records is akin to a soul label, providing a reservoir of deep feelings and timeless experience. The reader and listener to Three Score & Ten cannot help but feel indebted to the tireless efforts of the Topic Records team across the years to help make this music live and grow. ï¿½ Lee Blackstone : Audio samples and book/CD set available at cdRoots cdRoots Looking for More Information?

© 2010 RootsWorld. No reproduction of any part of this page or its associated files is permitted without express written permission. Three Score & Ten: A Voice to the People: 70 Years of the Oldest Independent Record Label in Great Britain: Amazon.co.uk: Music 1. The Humpback Whale - Nic Jones 2. Angi - Davy Graham 3. The Shaskeen Reel - John Wright 4. The Lancashire Toreadors - The Oldham Tinkers 5. Sullivan's March - Pat Mitchell 6. San Francisco Bay Blues - Jesse Fuller 7. Country Gardens - William Kimber 8. Tamlyn - Mike Waterson 9. The Air for Maurice Ogg / Jumping Jack / The Air for Maurice Ogg - Alistair Anderson 10. Creeping Jane - Joseph Taylor 11. Wasps In The Woodpile - Andrew Cronshaw 12. Prince Heathen - Martin Carthy with Dave Swarbrick 13. The Bonny Labouring Boy - Harry Cox 14. Rawtenstall Annual Fair - Lee Nicholson 15. Music For A Found Harmonium - Patrick Street 16.

Bitter Withy - John Tams Disc: 2 1. The Nut Dance (excerpt) - The Britannia Coconut Dancers 2. Spencer The Rover - Bob and Ron Copper 3. All Things Are Quite Silent - Shirley Collins 4. Blackwater Side - Anne Briggs 5. The Two Magicians - A L Lloyd 6. Scan's Polkas - Oak 7. The Crafty Maid's Policy - Frankie Armstrong 8. A Place Called England - June Tabor 9. When I Die - Peter Bellamy 10. The Bold Princess Royal - Sam Larner 11. Hal-An-Tow - The Watersons 12. We Shepherds Are The Best of Men - Fred Jordan 13. The Rose Of Britain's Isle / Glorishears - John Kirkpatrick and Sue Harris 14. Riding Down To Portsmouth - Tom Willett 15. Higher Germany - Phoebe Smith 16. The Ideal Schottische - The Cheviot Ranters 17. The Methody Parson - Roy Harris 18. The Maid And The Palmer - Brass Monkey 19.

Hopping Down In Kent - Louie Fuller 20. The Devil And The Farmer's Wife - Walter Pardon Disc: 3 1. The Rising Sun / The Pope's Toe - Jackie Daly 2. The Waterford Boys - Paddy Tunney 3. The Banks Of Red Roses - Sarah Makem 4. Gillan's Apples / The Prize Jig - John Doonan & John Wright 5. Slieve Gallon Brae - The Mcpeake Family 6. Paddy Ryan's Dream / Mamma's Pet - Seamus Tansey With Reg Hall 7. My Irish Molly O - The Flanagan Brothers 8. The Blackbird - Seamus Ennis 9. The Factory Girl - Margaret Barry 10. Roaring Mary / The Old Torn Petticoat - The Irish Country Four 11. Spailpina Run - Sean Mac Donnchadha 12. The Choice Wife - Willie Clancy 13. The Tinker's Old Budget - Mary Ann Carolan 14. Padraig O'keefe's / Con Cassidy's - The Boys Of The Lough 15.

Dowd's Favourite - Hugh Gillespie 16. Wife Of The Bold Tenant Farmer - Joe Heaney 17. The Music In The Glen / The Greenfields Of America - The O'halloran Brothers 18. The Knight Templar's Dream - Len Graham 19. The Yellow Tinker / The Humours Of Scarriff - Sean O'shea & Bobby Casey 20. He Rolled Her To The Wall - Frank Harte 21. The Heather Breeze / The Traveller - The Russell Family 22. The Patriot Game - Dominic Behan 23. The Belfast Hornpipe / The Rights Of Man - John Rea 24. Bridie Morley / Duignan's Favourite - Packie Duignan & Seamus Horan Disc: 4 1. Miss Drummond Of Perth / Fiddler's Joy / Traditional Reel / The Shetland Reel - Battlefield Band 2. Come All Ye Fisher Lasses - The Fisher Family 3. Queen Among The Heather - Belle Stewart 4. Cullen Bay / Jig O'slurs / Seagull - Kentigern 5.

Wi My Roving Eye - Norman Kennedy 6. Blue Bleezin' Blind Drunk - Cilla Fisher 7. Soldier's Joy - Tom Anderson & Aly Bain 8. The Dowie Dens Of Yarrow - Gordeanna Mcculloch 9. Erin Go Bragh - Dick Gaughan 10. Young Jimmy Foyers - Sheila Stewart 11. Kempy Kaye - Jock Tamson's Bairns 12. Lady Eliza - Winnie Campbell 13. Tilley Plump / Auld Foula Reel / Oot And In Da Harbour - Curlew 14. Herd Laddie O' The Glen - Willie Scott 15. The Fireman's Not For Me - Isla Cameron 16. Dance With Me, Morag - Isabel Sutherland 17. The Wind That Blew The Bonnie Lassie's Plaidie Awa' - Jimmy Mcbeath 18. Maccrimmon's Lament - Jeannie Robertson 19. The Gallant Forty Twa - Ian Manuel 20. The Twa Corbies - Ray & Archie Fisher 21.

Boulavogue - Davie Stewart 22. The Wandering Piper - John Burgess Disc: 5 1. Unity (Raise Your Banners High) - John Tams 2. The Dominion of the Sword - Martin Carthy 3. The Sun Is Burning - The Ian Campbell Folk Group 4. Go Down Ye Murderers - Ewan Maccoll 5. Police Patrol - Bob Davenport 6. Two Tears - Eliza Carthy 7. Never Any Good - Martin Simpson 8. Both Sides of the Tweed - Dick Gaughan 9. George's Son - John Kirkpatrick with Brass Monkey 10. Reconciliation - Ron Kavana 11. Stumbling On - Lal Waterson & Oliver Knight 12. Acceptable Losses - John B Spencer 13. Ships of Shame - Steve Ashley 14. The Land of Three Rivers - Vin Garbutt 15. No Telling - Linda Thompson 16. Dust - Johnny Handle 17. Two-Fisted Heroes - Bill Caddick Disc: 6 1. The Man Who Watered the Worker's Beer - Paddy Ryan 2.

Talking Union Blues - Pete Seeger 3. Joe Hill - Paul Robeson 4. Masters of War - Martin Simpson 5. The Red Flag - Bob Smith's Ideal Band 6. The Blackleg Miners - Louis Killen 7. No Power On Earth - Billy Bennett 8. The Internationale - The Topic Singers & Band 9. To the Begging I Will Go - Ewan Maccoll 10. The Hand-Loom Weaver's Lament - Harry Boardman 11. The Rigs of the Time - Shirley Collins 12. Greedy Landlord - Stan Kelly With Leon Rosselson 13. Time to Ring Some Changes - Richard Thompson 14. Sixteen Tons - Ewan Maccoll 15. Peat Bog Soldiers - The Ian Campbell Folk Group 16. Aa'm Glad The Strike's Done - The High Level Ranters 17. Threes Score and Ten - The Watersons 18. Dirty Old Town - Ewan Maccoll 19. The Liverpool Barrow Boys - The Spinners 20. The Weaver's March - The Celebrated Working Men's Band 21.

We Poor Labouring Men - Waterson:Carthy 22. Perfumes Of Arabia - Martin Carthy & Dave Swarbrick 23. Hot Asphalt - Bob Davenport & The Rakes Disc: 7 1. Skye Crofter's / The Swallow Tail - Billy Pigg 2. While Gamekeeper's Lie Sleeping - June Tabor 3. Boi Se Otvori - Roza Tsetkova 4. Barleycorn - Tim Van Eyken 5. The Girl on the Greenbriar Shore - Tom Paley & Peggy Seeger 6. The Happy One-Step / Green Willis - The House Band 7. Clyde Water - Nic Jones 8. Baranca - Vlado & Nikola Robanovski 9. Georgie - Levi Smith 10. Jenny Lind - Scan Tester & Rabbidy Baxter 11. Worcester City - Eliza Carthy 12. Talking Dustbowl Blues - Ramblin' Jack Elliott 13. Kaba Vence - Refki Taho, Hysen Zizolli & Ahmet Metolli 14.

The Green Banks of Yarrow - Alison Mcmorland & Peta Webb 15. Johnny, Will You Marry Me? - Dan Sullivan's Shamrock Band 16. Hamburger - Polka Fra Hardanger - Vestlandsgruppa 17. Hedger And Ditcher - The Silly Sisters 18. Burren No. 1 / Chris Droney's Favourite - Chris Droney 19. Nna Hamu - The Jauharah Orchestra 20. Little Sadie - Hedy West 21. Fulmine - Andy Cutting (Blowzabella) 22. No One Stands Alone - Blue Murder Product Description Product Description Curated, researched, written and produced by David Suff, Three Score & Ten - A Voice to the People is a fitting eulogy to Topic Records – the oldest truly independent record label in the world. Seven CDs, 144 tracks, in a ten by ten inch hardback book, with dust jacket, containing 108 profusely illustrated, full colour pages with a narrative portrait of Topic Records from it’s inception in 1939 to the present day.

Also included is a complete discography listing every release in those 70 years. The 144 tracks cover all aspects of Topic’s recording history. The extensive text gives a complete recording and social history with profiles of the essential recordings, principle artists and key personages. The many illustrations are a revelation in themselves, anchoring the whole project with photos of the artists, album sleeves, advertising leaflets, snapshots and memorabilia in full colour on every page. The story of Topic Records is synonymous with the rebirth of folk and it’s growth as a musical and social movement in Britain during the last seventy years. Three Score & Ten comprehensively chronicles this incredibly dynamic and creative period in a sumptuous package of pictures, words and music. Review Topic Records is an extraordinary institution. Founded 70 years ago, it can rightly claim to be the oldest truly independent record label in the UK, and has had an enormous impact on the development of the folk music scene in Britain. With folk now back in fashion, it’s appropriate that Topic should celebrate its birthday in style, and this elaborately packaged set does just that.

The seven CDs are cleverly positioned within the hardback cover of a well-illustrated 100-page book that tells the story of the record label, from the late 30s through to the present day, with photos and features on the key figures involved. These include the singer and songwriter Ewan MacColl, whose 1952 recording of the classic Dirty Old Town is included, through to the Waterson Family and singer and guitarist Martin Carthy – and even that veteran American folk hero Pete Seeger. Topic started out as a staunchly left-wing label. It was founded by the Workers’ Music Association, an offshoot of the British Marxist Party, at a time when the growth of fascism elsewhere in the world had led to an upsurge in socialism in Britain. Members of the WMA included such distinguished composers and musicians as Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, and the aim of Topic was to promote music that “exerts an influence against the social injustices of our present society”. As the CDs here prove, the label did just that – and much more besides. It released, and continues to release, music by great folk singers, singer-songwriters and experimental musicians who have used the folk tradition as their starting point.

The first and last CDs in the set show off the label’s range, from the extraordinary guitar work of the late Davy Graham and his classic Angi (first recorded for Topic in 1963) through to the traditional singing of June Tabor and the classic American blues of Jesse Fuller. Other CDs are devoted solely to English traditional songs, with contributions from those great 60s stars Shirley Collins and Anne Briggs, or to Irish and Scottish songs, or to songwriters, with contribution here from Linda Thompson, guitarist Martin Simpson, and that adventurous contemporary singer-songwriter, Eliza Carthy. And, of course, there’s a CD of left-wing songs, including Topic’s first-ever release from back in 1939 – The Man That Waters the Workers’ Beer. Anyone who appreciates great folk music should check this out. --Robin Denselow About: Topic Records About: Topic Records An Entity of Type : company , from Named Graph : , within Data Space : dbpedia.org Topic Records is a British folk music label, which played a major role in the second British folk revival. It began as an offshoot of the Workers' Music Association in 1939, making it the oldest independent record label in the world.

Property abstract Topic Records is a British folk music label, which played a major role in the second British folk revival. It began as an offshoot of the Workers' Music Association in 1939, making it the oldest independent record label in the world. (en) Topic Records is een Engelse platenproducent waarvan de wortels teruggaan tot de Workers Music Association in 1939. In die dagen had die organisatie de gedachte dat muziek als gereedschap voor de revolutie gebruikt kon worden, zowel in cultureel als in opvoedkundig opzicht en dat vooral volksmuziek bovenal de stem van het volk zou zijn.Op dit thema verscheen als eerste in de catalogus Paddy Ryan’s The Man that Waters the Worker’s Beer. Andere vroege albums waren beïnvloed door Ewan MacColl (zanger en componist met Dirty Old Town, First Time Ever I Saw Your Face etc.) en A.L. Lloyd (zanger en historicus).

In dezelfde tijd produceerde Topic albums van Pete Seeger, icoon van de Amerikaanse folk-beweging, de acteur, zanger en politieke figuur Paul Robeson, en Woody Guthrie, de bekende zanger, muzikant en componist van This Land is Your Land. Daarmee werd het profiel van Topic bepaald. In de vijftiger jaren van de 20e eeuw nog uitgemaakt als het kleine rode label werd Topic een belangrijke producent van eigentijdse folk-music zoals albums van The Spinners, Louis Killen, Jeannie Robertson, Joe Heaney and The Stewart Family, Anne Briggs, Shirley & Dolly Collins en The Watersons. Een andere bekende was Vanessa Redgrave met Where Have All the Flowers Gone?. Ook verschenen op het Topic-label collecties van volksmuziek uit landen als Bulgarije, Albanië, Joegoslavië, Griekenland en Turkije.

Een groot aantal andere albums werd in de zeventiger jaren geproduceerd na het aantreden van de nog steeds zittend leider van Topic, Tony Engle. Hier werden albums gemaakt voor onder andere Dick Gaughan, The Battlefield Band en een van de bekendste zangers en gitaristen van Engeland, Martin Carthy. De beste albums zijn de laatste tijd overgezet op cd. Als aanvulling hierop verschijnt de 20 delen tellende anthologie van traditionele muziek van Engeland, Ierland, Schotland en Wales, getiteld The Voice of The People. (nl) Proper Music Distribution - City Hall Records - SRI Canada - Claddagh Records - Planet Distribution - Southbound Records Australasia - Office Sambinha - IRD Spa - Central Distribution (en) Folk music and World music (en) comment Topic Records is a British folk music label, which played a major role in the second British folk revival. It began as an offshoot of the Workers' Music Association in 1939, making it the oldest independent record label in the world.

(en) Topic Records is een Engelse platenproducent waarvan de wortels teruggaan tot de Workers Music Association in 1939. In die dagen had die organisatie de gedachte dat muziek als gereedschap voor de revolutie gebruikt kon worden, zowel in cultureel als in opvoedkundig opzicht en dat vooral volksmuziek bovenal de stem van het volk zou zijn.Op dit thema verscheen als eerste in de catalogus Paddy Ryan’s The Man that Waters the Worker’s Beer. Andere vroege albums waren beïnvloed door Ewan MacColl (zanger en componist met Dirty Old Town, First Time Ever I Saw Your Face etc.) en A.L. Lloyd (zanger en historicus).

In dezelfde tijd produceerde Topic albums van Pete Seeger, icoon van de Amerikaanse folk-beweging, de acteur, zanger en politieke figuur Paul Robeson, en Woody Guthrie, de bekende zanger, (nl) JSONpedia - Topic Records JSONpedia No issues detected Abstract Topic Records is a British folk music label, which played a major role in the second British folk revival. It began as an offshoot of the Workers' Music Association in 1939 in music, making it the oldest independent record label in the world.M. Brocken, The British Folk Revival 1944-2002 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003), pp. 55-65. sections_text: Content: History Content:The label began as an offshoot of the communist led Workers' Music Association in 1939, selling Soviet Union and left-wing political music by mail order. After a period of relative inactivity in the Second World War production resumed in the later 1940s, moving towards traditional music for the emerging revival market.

Up to 1949 the composer Alan Bush was involved with choral and orchestral music released on the label. Topic also produced some of the first American blues records to be commercially available in Britain.R. Freund Schwartz, How Britain Got the Blues: The Transmission and Reception of American Blues Style in the United Kingdom (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2007), p. 32. From about 1950 the two key figures of the second revival, Ewan MacColl and A. L. Lloyd, became heavily involved, producing several records of traditional music. One of the earliest albums of UK traditional music was Street Songs and Fiddle Tunes of Ireland by Margaret Barry and Michael Gorman (musician), issued in 1958. With the decline of British Communist Party membership in the late 1950s financial aid to the label began to dry up and, under director Gerry Sharp, they were forced to pursue an entrepreneurial strategy to survive. In the early 1960s Topic Records separated from the Workers' Music Association, but those involved still had socialist credentials. A new company was registered in 1963.

Financially, the company was in a precarious state until 1963 when they had substantial sales from the album The Iron Muse, a ground-breaking thematic programme of industrial folk songs. This success allowed them to produce a greater and wider range of records until tastes began to radically change again in the 1970s. After the arrival of managing director Tony Engle, Topic released a series of albums by ground breaking artists including Nic Jones, Dick Gaughan, The Battlefield Band, as well as major figures on the folk scene including Martin Carthy and Roy Harris. They also began to reissue their back catalogue on cd. In the late 1990s, with the resurgence of traditional folk, spearheaded by children of the revival like Eliza Carthy, Topic managed to gain both commercial and critical success. In the inaugural BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards in 2000 the label received the Good Tradition Award in recognition of their role in the folk music movement.Other major figures who recorded for Topic included Peggy Seeger, The Watersons, Shirley Collins, June Tabor and John Tams.

The breadth of the Topic catalogue was evident in the release of The Voice of the People (1998), a twenty-part series sampling the earliest and greatest of folk singers of the British Isles.In 2009, the label celebrated 70 years of activity with the release of a seven-CD hardback book set entitled Three Score and Ten.In 2012, this venerable old label began to re-release many of the LPs from its early catalogue in digital form. However, in a departure from the norm, it accompanied the music with a digital booklet containing all the original artwork and sleeve notes from the original album. These are downloadable free from their website. Anniversaries Content:The label's 70th anniversary was marked by the issue of a boxed set Three Score and Ten, A Voice to the People consisting of a 108-page book and 7 CDs from their back catalogue. Alexis Petridis said in The Guardian, "not bad for a Marxist party offshoot that started in a basement".The label's 75th anniversary was marked on 23 August 2014 with a special concert at the 50th Towersey Village Festival, near Thame in Oxfordshire.

Artists performed songs from the Topic catalogue, and included Norma Waterson, Eliza Carthy & the Gift Band, Lau (band), Fay Hield, Martin Carthy, Saul Rose, Blair Dunlop, Josienne Clarke and Ben Walker (musician). See also Topic records – 70 years of giving a voice to the people | Alexis Petridis | Music | The Guardian Label of love Topic records – 70 years of giving a voice to the people Topic is the oldest independent label in Britain, if not the world. Not bad for a Marxist party offshoot that was started in a basement Hody, stranger ... American folk singer and Topic recording artist Ramblin' Jack Elliott Photograph: PR Sunday 23 August 2009 16.30 EDT First published on Sunday 23 August 2009 16.30 EDT Share on Messenger Close Tony Engle is not a man much given to hyperbole, which is unusual in a record label boss.

In fact, after 36 years in the job, he's still not entirely sure that he should be running a record label at all: he worries that the whole business of recording the kind of music he does runs contrary to its very essence. "The thing about folk music is that it existed prior to microphones," he says. "The singers I really loved, when they were performing in their heyday, records had hardly been invented. The music existed to serve the community. In a way, recording almost undermines certain aspects of the music. It's a strange contradiction that exists within it." He sighs. "But if you love the music and you love records, like me, you're forced to get into this circular contradiction all the time." Even he is forced to concede that his label, Topic, is unlike any other. It's not just its advanced age, although that's certainly a factor. Topic is currently celebrating its 70th birthday.

No one seems entirely sure whether this makes it the oldest independent record label in the world, but it's certainly the oldest indie label in Britain – a fact it is now celebrating with Three Score and Ten, a beautifully packaged book containing seven CDs, biographies of its most famous artists and as many photographs of men in caps playing accordions as a human being will ever need. Nor is it Topic's bizarre stable of artists, although, again, you would be hard-pushed to find a label with a roster remotely like it. As you might expect, given Topic's venerable age, virtually every major figure in the British folk revival has recorded for them, from Ewan MacColl to Eliza Carthy, by way of Anne Briggs, June Tabor, the Watersons, Martin Simpson and Davy Graham, as well as innumerable traditional singers captured in priceless, aged "field recordings". Topic is responsible for some legendary albums ofthe genre: the Watersons' Frost and Fire, Anne Briggs's self-titled debut, Nic Jones's Penguin Eggs, Eliza Carthy's Mercury-nominated Anglicana, and the remarkable 20-volume Voice of the People series.

But, over the years, its release schedule has proved far weirder than that list suggests; it has to be the only record label in the world to have put out records by Paul Robeson, Vanessa Redgrave, the crisply named Massed Choirs of the Glasgow Socialist Singers and the Glasgow Young Communist League, and Harry H Corbett, of Steptoe and Son fame, who sang sea shanties with MacColl and AL Lloyd on an album called The Singing Sailor. (Frank Zappa, of all people, loved this record, until his copy was stolen by an equally enraptured Captain Beefheart). The eccentricity of the label's output, Engle explains, may well be a case of like attracting like. "I recognised Topic was going to be a strange environment when I first went to work there," he says, cheerfully. A folk fan from Portsmouth, he fetched up at the label in the late 60s, having heard the managers were looking for "young blood". "The thing is, if you're interested in traditional British music, you very quickly find out that you're not just the only one on your block, you're the only one in your town.

By definition, you're a strange person." Still, it's more the label's prevailing ethos, that, as Engle delicately puts it, "set us at variance with the industry". Before the arrival of two figures most closely associated with its early years, Ewan MacColl and his musical partner, folk scholar and singer AL Lloyd, Topic was the recording wing of the Workers' Music Association, an educational offshoot of the British Marxist Party: its original 1939 brief was to release "gramophone records of historical and social interest". Its first release was a recording of The Internationale sung by a surprisingly plummy-sounding choir, rather like being lectured on the need to bloodily overthrow capitalism by Penelope Keith. Its records were sold by subscription, and the organisers eschewed the commercial marketplace, seeing publication as an end in itself. The communist affiliation is now long gone; Engle, who took over the label's running after the death of his staunch trade unionist predecessor Gerry Sharp in 1973, describes himself as "never party political". But something of that original spirit of rebellion and independence seems to have survived. "You never make vast sums of money.

You're ploughing more money in and keeping things in catalogue. That's one of the big things about Topic. The idea is to make records that are, if not instant classics, then records that will be here for as long as we have the medium to make them available. The music industry, by and large, wants to make money. It's a business, and thinks relatively short term. I always think long term. Sometimes we will decline to record people because, well, I think you're great, mate, but I think you're a thing of now and I'm looking for something that has its feet in the great tradition." It is, Engle says, an attitude in keeping with that of the music itself. "Folk music doesn't set out to seduce you, or to make the performer a star, or to make money – it exists for its position within the culture." This is, nevertheless, a policy that continues to amaze even its stalwart supporters. Legendary singer and guitarist Martin Carthy began buying Topic records in the 50s. "They were like a gateway into another world then," he recalls.

"Folk was this subject I was interested in, and they had the information at a time when it was hard to come by, when Cecil Sharp House [headquarters of the English Folk Dance and Song Society] used to keep you out with cannons and rake you with machine-gun fire." Carthy started recording for Topic in the mid-70s, an association that continues to this day. "They never delete records," he says, with a hint of wonder in his voice. "Some things they put out sell two copies a year, but they stick with it. And they always survive. They even thrived during the vinyl crisis in the 70s, when other labels went under. They survived the slump in interest in the folk scene in the early 80s. They didn't make a bundle of money, but they kept on going." Is folk recession-proof? "If you're a small business and you're doing most of it yourself, you're not taking much money out of it – almost nothing will change it," says Engle. "Our commercial expectations were so low, and we had designed our business model" – he uses the phrase with a mixture of disgust and bemusement — "to fit that.

I'm not saying it was totally recession-proof, but it didn't really affect us. There's an awful lot of business naivety, but it served to get us through the hard times. A more business-oriented company would have probably decided it wasn't worth going ahead." Indeed, Topic's survival is a staggering, inspirational tale of resourcefulness and of blind, fervent belief in music surmounting any obstacle. In the label's early days, some of their albums were 8in across rather than the usual 12, because, Carthy claims: "They would get a job lot of 8in vinyl blanks and a machine that would do them for nothing." Even by the time of Engle's arrival at the label, at the height of the late 60s folk-rock boom, things were tight: "I thought a record company was a big operation with a neon sign. Topic was in the basement of someone's house." Recording sessions didn't involve a studio, he says, but "travelling around with the company Revox in the back of a Morris Traveller and setting it up in someone's house. It was a question of: this is a good thing, I want to do it, what's it cost?

Can we afford it? What's the worst-case scenario? We weren't thinking, this will sell 5,000 or 10,000 copies. We used to think, well, it'll wash its face on 2,000, but that might take five, 10 years to achieve. OK, let's do it." And so, remarkable music poured out of Topic, music that you suspect no one else would have recorded. It continues to do so: the label's next major project is another series of Voice of the People. The days of it being run, as Carthy puts it, "truly, truly on a shoestring" are some way in the past, although its north London headquarters are still resolutely devoid of a neon sign. "Am I surprised it's survived? Oh no," laughs Carthy. "It's a label that's gone out of its way to explore, and explore, and explore, and then put out what it finds". Three Score and Ten is released on 14 September. The Topic 70 festival is at the Royal Festival Hall, London SE1, from 11-18 September.

Details: southbankcentre.co.uk BBC - Music - Review of Various - Three Score & Ten – A Voice to the People Robin Denselow 2009 Topic Records is an extraordinary institution. Founded 70 years ago, it can rightly claim to be the oldest truly independent record label in the UK, and has had an enormous impact on the development of the folk music scene in Britain. With folk now back in fashion, it’s appropriate that Topic should celebrate its birthday in style, and this elaborately packaged set does just that. The seven CDs are cleverly positioned within the hardback cover of a well-illustrated 100-page book that tells the story of the record label, from the late 30s through to the present day, with photos and features on the key figures involved. These include the singer and songwriter Ewan MacColl, whose 1952 recording of the classic Dirty Old Town is included, through to the Waterson Family and singer and guitarist Martin Carthy – and even that veteran American folk hero Pete Seeger. Topic started out as a staunchly left-wing label.

It was founded by the Workers’ Music Association, an offshoot of the British Marxist Party, at a time when the growth of fascism elsewhere in the world had led to an upsurge in socialism in Britain. Members of the WMA included such distinguished composers and musicians as Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, and the aim of Topic was to promote music that “exerts an influence against the social injustices of our present society”. As the CDs here prove, the label did just that – and much more besides. It released, and continues to release, music by great folk singers, singer-songwriters and experimental musicians who have used the folk tradition as their starting point. The first and last CDs in the set show off the label’s range, from the extraordinary guitar work of the late Davy Graham and his classic Angi (first recorded for Topic in 1963) through to the traditional singing of June Tabor and the classic American blues of Jesse Fuller.

Other CDs are devoted solely to English traditional songs, with contributions from those great 60s stars Shirley Collins and Anne Briggs, or to Irish and Scottish songs, or to songwriters, with contribution here from Linda Thompson, guitarist Martin Simpson, and that adventurous contemporary singer-songwriter, Eliza Carthy. And, of course, there’s a CD of left-wing songs, including Topic’s first-ever release from back in 1939 – The Man That Waters the Workers’ Beer. Anyone who appreciates great folk music should check this out. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Licence. If you choose to use this review on your site please link back to this page. Tracks 6 San Francisco Bay Blues 7 Country Gardens 9 The Air for Maurice Ogg / Jumping Jack / The Air for Maurice Ogg 10 Creeping Jane 11 Wasps In The Woodpile 12 Prince Heathen 13 The Bonny Labouring Boy 14 Rawtenstall Annual Fair 15 Music For A Found Harmonium 16 Bitter Withy Clips taken from original discs may contain strong language.

Question: What is the oldest independent record label in Britain, founded in 1939?
Answer: Topic Records