Don’t call it a comeback! Morris dancing has been here for years! The Guardian’s music blog talks about how a younger generation interested and influenced by Pagan traditions, folk music, and a viral campaign for the faux-documentary “Morris: A Life With Bells On” are bringing new blood to a venerable tradition.

The music plays a major part, and it is through English folk – or the English folk revival scene – that a new generation of more urbane-minded people of both sexes are finding their way to morris dancing. “1960s and 70s British folk was a cool time for music, and bands such as Steeleye Span, Fairport Convention, Jethro Tull and even Led Zeppelin took a lot of cues, sonically and visually, from British folk arts,” says music journalist and proud morris dancer Jo Kendall. As the indigenous music of England, folk has never quite been given the same respect that the traditional music of, say, the US or Jamaica is afforded. Yet morris dancing seems to be changing perceptions about the music that soundtracks it. Those songs that sing of farming, courting couples, regional folklore or other archaic topics are capable of evoking a strong sense of place. Not in a nationalistic way – blind patriotism being the last refuge of myopic idiots – but more in a “Wow, I can’t believe they still do this” kind of way.

For more on the popularity of “Morris: A Life With Bells On”, click here and here. For more on the recent resurgence of interest in folk music, check out this article on “Goth-folk”, and a great article from Zeek magazine about how the new folk and psychedelic bands encourage a pagan, immanent, spiritual outlook. You may also want to read my previous posts on the Morris, Wassailing, and folk-dancing resurgence.

The Los Angeles Daily News profiles santero Charles Guelperin and looks at the rise of Santeria in Los Angeles, which some are now calling the “capital” of the faith in the USA.

“We do not have churches, temples or synagogues,” said Guelperin, a chain cigar smoker after his morning rituals. “My home here is my temple.”Today Santeria, a blend of Afro-Caribbean voodoo and the devotion to saints among many Latino Roman Catholics, has become so big in Los Angeles that many consider the city the Santeria capital of the country. It is a phenomenon that has occurred thanks to the influx of immigrants from Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean and court rulings making it easier to sacrifice animals for religious purposes.

The article goes on to touch on the growth of botanicas (which seem to be doing quite well so-far despite the recession), the tensions created by animal sacrifices, and how the faith is becoming more affluent and cosmopolitan as it integrates with American culture.

“One of the reasons why I’m writing the book about Charlie is because his clientele is so cosmopolitan,” said [Donald J. Cosentino, a folklore professor at the University of California, Los Angeles] “He is just down the street from Paramount Studios, and he’s got a lot of people from the film industry who come to his botanica. Sports people. He’s got businessmen. Men from West L.A. Men from Beverly Hills. He’s got foreign clients. “He is a very cosmopolitan man, a very cosmopolitan priest, and that’s what makes him so interesting.”

With the rise of Santeria on the West Coast and a popular resurgence of Vodou in Florida, we may be looking at a larger trend of younger generations turning to pre and post-Christian religions and traditions to face a challenging world and find an identity. I imagine that we’ll see some interesting cross-pollinations between these syncretic faiths and the growing modern Pagan religions in the very near future.

Is a random prayer taken out of context by a killer “consistent with Wicca”? That’s the assertion made by NBC’s Dateline and Virginia police in a special aired last night on Randall Lee Smith, a delusional loner who killed two people on the Appalachian Trail back in 1981, and attempted to kill two more in 2008.

In addition to the gun, police found a treasure trove of evidence Randall Lee Smith had hidden deep in the woods: Scott Johnston’s sunglasses, more than 20 knives, meat cleavers and other items. And they found some bizarre drawings and notes, including this “prayer:” “Hail to the guardians of the watchtower of the north. By the powers of mother and earth hear me…show me thy glory…I invoke thee oh, ancient one.” Police say the notes and symbols are consistent with a religion called Wicca — a pagan group that worships nature, and considers its leading members witches.

Dateline is hardly a bastion of level-headed reporting, but this seems a bit much. If he had scraps of Biblical verse scattered around would they be “consistent with Christianity”? Ceremonial elements and notes do not the religion make, and it was irresponsible for Dateline to report the information this way. Did they think that adding a “Witch angle” would make things more exciting for their viewers? Also,” considers its leading members witches”? So only the “leading” members then? Are we all working our way to witch-hood? As for Randall Lee Smith, we can’t ask him what his actual beliefs were since he died in custody shortly after being apprehended from injuries sustained during a crash. Yet another victory for sensationalism.

While most American Pagans are already looking towards Imbolc,  Lupercalia (or Valentines Day) and the Spring holidays, England is still finishing up their Winter observances, specifically the wassailing of trees. Timed around the old Epiphany feasts, this Anglo-Saxon tradition is undergoing a revival of sorts, with participants aware and comfortable with the pagan history of this event.

It was the second Wassail held at the orchard, which is run by volunteers. Events co-ordinator Yvette Grindley told the Mail: “The ceremony has certainly worked for us in the past. “We got a bumper harvest the year of the floods, even though we lost 10 per cent of the trees, and last year we also got a great harvest because of all the rain, with apples as big as saucers. “It’s all a bit of superstition and fun, but it’s great to bring back this tradition back to the area. In parts of the south, where there are more orchards this is a big event.” Visitors were entertained by the Raving Mae morris dancers and kept warm with hot mulled cider and apple tea.

You can see a short video of the proceedings, here. Other wassailing bands are far more deliberate in their Paganism, as evidenced by the festival held at Kenninghall.

Drummers beat out a wild rhythm and the moon glistened in the night sky as scores of revellers held a Pagan wassailing festival. Led by outlandish characters the Lord of Missrule and the Green Man, villagers gathered at the community orchard at Kenninghall, near Diss, for an ancient ceremony to honour the fruit trees and bring about a bumper crop this year. Gifts and lanterns were hung on an apple tree planted by local Scouts, as parish council chairman Steve Gordon ordered out the old year – in his guise as Green Man – and urged the gathering to toast the spring when new life comes creeping in.

It seems that there is a growing acceptance and acknowledgment among non-Pagans of the “pagan” origins of seasonal festivities (whether real or imagined), and a shift towards more celebratory observances. I’m not sure if this a grass-roots shift in attitude, or if the growth of modern Paganism and the recent journalistic trend towards finding/exploring pagan origins have influenced things a bit, but as tough fiscal times continue I bet people are going to look for more excuses to party, escape their day-to-day worries, and maybe propritiate the powers that be in the process.

The Independent has a feature up on the tradition of Morris Dancing, specifically how two troupes are bringing a decidedly modern aesthetic to these venerable folk traditions.

The Hunters Moon Morris

“Morris dancing is a joke, isn’t it, with a hey nonny no? Beardy men with beer bellies prancing about in white stockings, waving hankies? Very twee. But try telling that to the men and women of Hunters Moon, here by the Sussex coast looking like the devilish spawn of Hell’s Angels and medieval mummers. They are part of a secret revolution in morris dancing, transforming the most easily lampooned of English eccentricities. Fresh rivalries are emerging, as younger men and women reinvent “the morris” in startling ways – including, as we discover during a mad dash around southern England on May Day, the world’s first Gothic morris troupe – or “side”.”


The Wolf’s Head and Vixen Morris.

The article profiles the decidedly Pagan-oriented Hunters Moon Morris, and the gothic Wolf’s Head and Vixen Morris. Journalist Cole Moreton describes Wolf’s Head and Vixen as looking like a “boozy, woozy gathering of the Sisters of Mercy fan club”, but they, like the Hunter’s Moon troupe, are trying to reclaim Morris dancing from a static and sometimes oppressive vision of English history and culture.

“One reason for the recent growth of Border morris is that it is easier to learn (while more spectacular) than other forms. Another is an increase in the number of British neo-pagans, many of whom are drawn to it. “We quite consciously work with ideas of shamanism,” says [Wolfshead founder Philip] Kane. “It’s a form of ritual theatre, a magical space embracing both dancers and audience.” There are radical politics at work too: he sees the dance, and “neo-pagan carnivals” such as the Rochester Sweeps, as a way of resisting the “complacent nostalgia” of Englishness “founded on the detritus of imperialism, Christianity, racism and xenophobia”. His England has more primitive, inclusive roots, and for him the morris is a way of expressing that.”

Of course there are still several traditional Morris “sides” (albeit aging rapidly) performing in England. Unlike the Pagan and goth troupes, they see what they are doing as safely within the bounds of their Christian faith, and downplay any esoteric aspects connected to Morris dancing by folklorists in the past.

“So, what do they think they’re up to? Norman Hopson, the 56-year-old squire, is a technical manager for BT but has the no-nonsense manner of a bluff countryman. “Some say the handkerchiefs are there to frighten away spirits, and the same for the bells,” he says. “We say they are there to accentuate the movements.” Nor is there anything mystical about his experience of dancing: “I see myself as a street entertainer.” … Hopson doesn’t see it as a symbol of fertility, or anything else, thank you. “The Long Man is a local landmark,” he says. “It’s just a carving on a hill. I don’t think it has any further significance.” The side’s bagman, Alan Vaughan, puts it more strongly: “We would go against that pagan idea,” he says. ‘Traditionally, morris dancing has been connected with the church. I personally have danced in Durham Cathedral.’”

Of course the pagan and esoteric undertones to modern Morris dancing (true or not) are irrevocably wrapped into it thanks to folklorists like Cecil Sharp, who felt that folk-traditions were cultural fossils of England’s primitive past (what Ronald Hutton calls the “geological model” of human culture). This notion of pagan survivals helped pave the way for the emergence of modern Pagan religion, and still casts a long shadow in the public mind when considering Morris dances and other folk traditions.

“The folk singers of today … are the last of a long line that stretches back into the mists of far-off days.” – Cecil Sharp, English Folk Song: Some Conclusions, 1907

Nor is England the only place where Pagans and other subcultural groups are staking their own claims to the Morris legacy. Pagans in America, most notably in California, have started up their own Morris traditions. Before long, the Victorian folklorists may turn out to be prophets, as more and more Morris troupes embrace a Pagan aesthetic.

PS – Speaking of traditions, today is Mother’s Day. Check out my post concerning the holiday from last year, I think it says all I want to say about the subject.