In 1978 I gave up teaching to become a ’folk singer’. I thought I’d never set foot in a school again!
About half of my 10 years as a
teacher had been at a school in Nottingham where I was very happy, I got on
well with the head and wasn’t restricted as to what and how I should teach. But
one day he took me aside and advised me that it was time to think about
promotion and as there was no chance of anything coming up internally in the
near future I should start looking and applying elsewhere.
I applied for a job at a school
in Luton and, although I didn’t get the job I’d applied for (I can’t remember
exactly what it was) the head created another post especially for me. On paper
it was ‘the correlation of art and drama’. But in practice it wasn’t. The
school cared nothing for art or drama or music or any of the things I was
interested in. It was also a school ruled by brutality. Corporal punishment was
still allowed then and it was used. I saw the head throw boys across the room
and at least one member of staff would stand in the corridor and whack children
with a slipper as they went by just for the fun of it!
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| Pete and Sue 1965: trainee teachers! |
I don’t know why they employed
me. Eventually I was told that I could use my arty-farty methods if I agreed to
have the remedial class. So I did. I suppose they were
already beyond harm! It was a class made up of ordinary not very academic
kids, a few with genuine learning difficulties, some naughty boys who weren’t a
bit interested in school, and a variety of children who had just arrived in
this country and couldn’t speak a word of English. There was no help and no
special facilities. But my arty-farty methods worked as well as any others
would have and for the few years I was there the same number of children were
promoted out of my class into the regular classes as they always had been. I
couldn’t live in that atmosphere though. It was absolutely the opposite of
everything I’d learned at college when I trained. So I opted out.
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| The Mansion, Bretton Hall |
I trained at Bretton Hall College
of Education in Wakefield from 1965-68. It’s now the site of the Yorkshire
Sculpture Park. All that beautiful landscape was the college grounds where we
worked and played. (Some years after I left it was decided that it was surplus
to requirements and it stood empty for a decade or so. Now the old Georgian
mansion is being transformed into a hotel and conference centre and the more
modern buildings are in the process of being demolished.)
Bretton Hall has a tremendous
reputation. Everyone who went there loved it and most of us took on the
philosophy of education we were taught. It specialised in Music, Art and Drama
and all kinds of well known names, particularly in the acting field, went there
over the years.
One of the major things I came
out with was the idea that education was for life not just something to get you
a job. I remember discussing the idea that by the end of the 20th century
working hours would be 2 or 3 days a week for most people—so they needed to
have a love of the arts, or crafts or some other creative thing to do in their
leisure time. The future then looked very rosy.
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| Bretton lake where we walked and worked... and courted! |
How wrong could we be. Working
hours are now longer than ever and education has become a box ticking, target
achieving way of getting or keeping a job. Young people’s choice of subject at
university often depends on what will earn them the most money, not which
subject they love and want to do. The 'arty-farty' has definitely gone.
So I became a wandering minstrel,
an itinerant musician going from one gig to another, mainly folk clubs in pub
rooms but the occasional weekend festival.
And then one day one of those
serendipitous things happened. I played at a folk club near Brighton and the
organiser happened to be the head of a local primary school. He put me up for
the night and asked whether I had to rush off in the morning and, if not,
whether I fancied going in and singing some songs to the kids at his school. He
would pay me. It would more or less double my club fee. So, of course I did and
I really enjoyed it. Going in as a singer was much different to being a
teacher.
From then on it was something I
did regularly.
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| Pete and Bing Lyle 1995 |
If I was going to be in an area
for a few days I’d contact several schools and see whether they’d like to have
me. When I confirmed bookings with clubs I’d ask whether any of their regulars
could organise me a school gig as well. I was able to get a lot of work in that
way and built up a repertoire of songs, and later stories as well, which went
down well. I didn’t set out to teach anything particular, just to give them a
memorable experience. Live music, particularly folk music, was something most
wouldn’t experience normally. Over the years I built on this and did several
long term residencies, and regular visits to particular schools. As well as
singing I taught country dances, produced mummers plays, got the children
writing songs… all kinds of things. As well as solo work I worked for many
years as a duo with Bing Lyle and later with Keith Kendrick. There was a time,
around 1990 I guess, when there was so much schools work going that I
deliberately downplayed it because I didn’t want to become known as ‘a
children’s entertainer’.
And then it stopped.
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| Yorkshire Sculpture Park. Creativity |
The government suddenly
interfered in education and laid down rules. The National Curriculum was
introduced. Before you could present something to a class of children you had
to write down what Attainment Targets would be met; what the children would learn;
what your aims were… It was the exact opposite of how we worked at college.
Freedom of thought and creativity was definitely out, a child could not be
allowed to make a mental leap and connect a song I sang with something they’d
heard about in another lesson, no, they had to learn something I said they were
going to learn and nothing else. Plans could not be open-ended.
It’s got steadily worse because
funding is now so tight that a school often can’t find the money to pay a
visiting artist unless s/he comes with a ready made funding package from some
outside source, so work in schools has almost dried up. I could definitely not
just phone around as I did in 1978 and arrange to drop in for a morning or an
hour.
And who suffers?
The kids, of course.
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