tamlyn 11

2011-07-16

Roses

Canal lapping

Crossdressing in song

Crossdressing in song must date back as far as it’s been possible to express gender identity in song.

It’s quite normal for a folksong to have characters of either gender ‘speaking’. At times it can be hard to distinguish one character from another - though not in Tam Lyn.

This crossdressing is one of the things that interested me from quite early on. Especially since - in my limited experience at that time - it appeared to be much more common in folksong than in pop.

At times it appears to be absolutely intentional that men should sing women’s roles and women sing men’s roles. A subversive ‘world-turned-upside-down’ intent.

But at the same time perhaps less troubling for some - simply because there’s no requirement to dress any differently, the whole is within the artificial framework of a song, and generally the male and female singing voices keep their identity.