AND I TURNED AS I HAD TURNED AS A BOY

Well seriously, with a name like Dulcimer and an album cover like this one, you really should know what you’re getting into without even listening to this record. And your preformed impressions would be dead-on correct for the most part: acoustic folk, mostly languid, and full of little fantasy vignettes and a slightly bawdy tale or two. The instrumentation is stock of the trade as well with 6- and 12-string guitars and bass, but also glockenspiel, harmonica, mandolin and even a couple songs with a dulcimer. There’s even a few passages of ominous-sounding and stiff-lipped British spoken-word passages courtesy of the Richard Wood (aka Baron Holderness? Not sure. If so he is also the late Richard Wood, and a war hero to boot).

But there are enough little dalliances with humor and fantasy and the occasional charming lyrical turn or arrangement to place these guys within at least the past half-century musically. On “Ghost of the Wondering Minstrel Boy” for example, a dead lad’s spirit wanders from a Tudor manor to an Eskimo igloo in a fruitless search of someone who will trade him a spot at their warm fire in exchange for one of his tales. In the end he is seen passing through the vacuum of space past a couple of chess-playing astronauts in their ship who refuse him admittance as well. Weird stuff, delivered with soft acoustic guitar strumming and a bleating harmonica.

But much of the album is pretty much stock folk, including the staid “Gloucester City”, the mandolin- laden “Starlight”, and the lithe love ditty “Lisa’s Song”.

Most of the songs here are a scant two or three minutes, pretty much in keeping with most traditional folk music of the period. The band does manage one extended track, the eight-minute “Caravan” that features lengthy dulcimer, mandolin and glockenspiel passages and more of Sir Wood’s spoken-word baritone in the vein of Richard Burton on Jeff Wayne’s ‘War of the Worlds’ but a bit less dramatic. This is the song that gives the album its title, coming from a passage of the now aged lad in this tale of world travels who looks back from whence he came at the end of a lifelong journey. A bit corny today, but solid stuff nearly forty years ago.

I don’t know that this is much of a progressive album strictly speaking, but the band would do better on some of their subsequent recordings. This one is underdeveloped and not particularly ambitious, but then again it comes from a time when everything pretty much fit that description so accommodations have to be made for the period in which it was recorded I suppose. And extra kudos for the excellent album artwork and tastefully arranged liner notes. You don’t see that kind of attention paid to album art these days thanks to digital wizardry which can render something like this in minutes as opposed to the likely days or even weeks that were spent in creating it by hand so many years ago.

This is a solid three star album, not four but one that will likely appeal to many prog folk fans as well as those who just enjoy British folk music in general. Recommended if that describes you.

peace

Nothing changed but the time...

It is no front-page news that the generic effervescent atmosphere of folk music did not always manage to entice a considerable number of prog listeners for whom music seems to have been a mechanism ordained to nourish the intellect. A break from complex arrangements and concept lyrics is sometimes called upon simply to have one's left hemisphere rest for a change. Enter thus Dulcimer, a trio of talented English multi-instrumentalists discovered apparently whilst playing in a restaurant by actor Richard Todd, with their 1971 debut album, And I Turned as I Had Turned as a Boy.

Although 1971 is synonymous with the dark acid folk masterpieces, First Utterance and St. Radigunds, Dulcimer comes as a counterbalance with soft optimistic folk accords. As the band's name suggests, a core role in the music making is held by the usage of the homonymous string instrument, whose acoustic embellishments, along with those of mandolins and six and twelve-string acoustic guitars, give the album an almost baroque English countryside flavour. The narrated fragments provided by Richard Todd himself on Sonnet to the Fall or Caravan, as well as the delicately layered vocals and harmonies are very much in the spirit of Magna Carta. In fact, the seasonal theme on Sonnet to the Fall, makes this piece almost an epilogue to Seasons. In the same vein, Caravan comes across as the album's mini epic about the colourful and vibrant gypsy and Indian convoys in England, with a splendid instrumental mid-section that sees harmonica accompanied by glockenspiel with the playful and upbeat junction of mandolin and acoustic guitars in the foreground while the bass guitar pumps up the sound to make way for a glorious dulcimer finale. The overall light-hearted atmosphere is maintained via short and sweet tracks with catchy choruses such as Time in My Life or the string and harmonica lead, Suzanne. The famous coconut shell horse-trotting effect one can encounter on Morman's Casket, a delightful piece about a Norman's adventure journey on horseback which sees him encounter a dragon and trying to protect his precious casket filled with jewels. The story's soundtrack is the now familiar combination of acoustic guitars with a very alert mandolin which is tempered down with the use of dulcimer. The instrument benefits from a special kind of attention, with Fruit of the Musical Tree being a veritable ode dedicated to the dulcimer, sustained by the surprising use of a tenor recorder.

Overall, despite paling in comparison, progressive wise, to the likes of its fellow folkers, Comus or Spirogyra, Dulcimer has the merit of coming forth with a first album that is plainly beautiful in its simplicity. 4 stars!