Talk:The Watersons

This article must adhere to the biographies of living persons (BLP) policy, even if it is not a biography, because it contains material about living persons. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately from the article and its talk page, especially if potentially libellous. If such material is repeatedly inserted, or if you have other concerns, please report the issue to this noticeboard.

If you are a subject of this article, or acting on behalf of one, and you need help, please see this help page.

Biography: Musicians

	Biography portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Biography, a collaborative effort to create, develop and organize Wikipedia's articles about people. All interested editors are invited to join the project and contribute to the discussion. For instructions on how to use this banner, please refer to the documentation.BiographyWikipedia:WikiProject BiographyTemplate:WikiProject Biographybiography articles
	This article is supported by WikiProject Musicians.

Yorkshire Low‑importance

	Yorkshire portal The Watersons is within the scope of WikiProject Yorkshire, an attempt to build a comprehensive and detailed guide to Yorkshire on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, you can visit the project page, where you can join the project, see a list of open tasks, and join in discussions on the project's talk page.YorkshireWikipedia:WikiProject YorkshireTemplate:WikiProject YorkshireYorkshire articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Untitled[edit]

Re: "Their distinctive sound comes from their closely-woven harmonies." Is this really true? My impression is that most of the time they weren't singing true harmony at all; they sang in unison with occasional harmony notes. I'll leave it as is hoping that someone who knows more about it than I can look at it for possible revision.Chris k 03:47, 14 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia provides definitions of "close harmony" and "counterpoint" which may be useful. As I understand it, close harmony is where two or more singers sing the same melody but at a different pitch, typically two tones apart, so that for every note they sing, what the listener hears is not a single note but a chord. Counterpoint is where two melodies are sung simultaneously but to the same rhythm. Most of the Watersons' songs that I've heard are close harmony, with perhaps occasional counterpoint. If two voices are singing in unison (singing exactly the same notes) the effect is quite different. An example is Rhonda Vincent and Dolly Parton dueting on the bluegrass number "Heartbreaker's Alibi", although I can't think of any examples from my limited experience of English folk music.89.242.77.161 17:57, 28 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I think Maddy Prior and June Tabor often sang in unison. Cartwright27 (talk) 13:08, 22 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I have problems with this term also. But I think the Watersons way of doing harmonies is unique in my experience in that it doesn't necessarily distinguish between harmony and melody in the normal way. What I mean is that sometimes during a particular song a singer is singing the melody and sometimes that same singer is singing the harmony and often this will change from one performance to another. Obviously there are lots of occasions where a more disciplined approach is necessary but this seems to be more of an intuitive thing rather than anything that is 'structured' to any particular degree. There's a bit in the "travelling for a living" documentary where they are rehearsing a song and practicing harmonies etc. Norma has since said that this was a complete fabrication for the purposes of the film and that in reality they never practiced harmonies - just got up there and sang. Kevin Boyd (talk) 21:28, 22 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Albion Band[edit]

I've taken out the template {{Albion Band}} - doesn't seem to fit as "The Watersons" were not a 'member' of the Albion Band, although some people have been in both. pablo_hablo. 14:20, 7 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Fully agree. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:23, 14 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Spurious link in the first paragraph[edit]

The link on John Harrison's name in the first paragraph leads to an article about a 17th century person, and not the man who used to be a member of the Watersons. The disambiguation page linked to from that article lists the relevant John Harrison but does not link to an article. The link should be removed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lucy Kemnitzer (talk • contribs) 23:13, 14 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Agreed, thanks. Martinevans123 (talk) 23:18, 14 December 2014 (UTC)[reply]

John Harrison[edit]

What happened to him after the group first broke up ? -- Beardo (talk) 06:49, 19 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]