The_Pentangle, during their first and
short period of activity (1968 - 1972) was among
the first band to explore the opportunity to merge different genres, English
and Scottish tradition, jazz, blues, country, rock echoes, playing acoustical
instruments only. Their sound is therefore still very valid.
The group has initiated the activity on 1967 starting from the nucleus formed by two well known guitarists, and friends, the Scottish Bert Jansch and the Englishman John Renbourn. They had already issued an album together (the remarkable Bert and John, 1966) and several solo albums.
To complete the group it was necessary a
female voice (Jansch was already an excellent singer) and a rhythmic section. The
vocalist was Jacqui McShee,
that already has been in collaboration with Jansch; she has a powerful and extended
voice, remarkably clear and tuned, and became soon one of the key elements
of the Pentangle, maybe the principal one.
To form the
rhythmic section two very much appreciated jazz players joined the
Pentangle, they were the double bass player Danny Thompson
and the drummer and percussionist Terry Cox.
Even if their first albums were clearly different from the other production of that time, the market answer was quite good. It must be noticed that the rhythmic section played with different times, as usual in jazz music, creating a sound unusual for ears used to listen the metronome rhythm of the rock bands, and the sound was acoustic, in an era totally dominated by the electric guitar.
Hence
the Pentangle gathered a good success in UK in the early 70s, mainly with
the album Basket Of Light
(1969), containing their single Light Flight
(used as the theme in a popular English TV program called Take 3
girls) that was alto an hit (#5 in UK charts).
After the remarkable album Solomon's Seal
(1972) anyway the five musicians decided to close this experience; probably they were between two
opposite ways: they were a group with some
chance in the market but still not enough known, and simultaneously five
purist musicians interested in their personal research, with the disadvantages
of both the options. They decided so to continue their musical research
separately.
During the 80s, anyway, four of the original Pentangle members (without Renbourn) started again their way in the musical world, proposing the same interesting mix of their first years, in a global context clearly much more receptive.
Most_of_the Pentangle's albums
do not contain printed lyrics (excluding Cruel Sister and
Solomon's Seal),
both on LP than on CD. This is not an unusual situation, but
very often, for other groups, the lyrics were transcribed by fans or
included in official website and made available on Internet. This is not
the case for the lyrics of the English group, and for this reason this
site started some
years ago to collect available lyrics and to transcribe and add the
others.
The Pentangle's songs can be divided in a)
English or Scottish traditional songs; b) original songs; c) blues,
rhythm & blues and pop songs selected among Pentangle's members
favourites.
Lyrics of traditional tunes are usually available from anthologies and
they are
often available on Internet, even if the words are sometimes different, as
usual in folk songs. Songs c) are also sometimes available, while those
written by Pentangle's musicians were completely unavailable until the
appreciable initiative of Doug Johnson in his site (no longer available),
that has transcribed a selection of their song.
Now, after a work of many years and the contribution of many visitors, with a special mention for Nicole D'Eliso, all the songs of the Pentangle's albums are available to not English speaking visitors (and also for all, being sometimes the lyrics not clearly understandable, because of the particular voice and of the way of singing of Jacqui McShee).
In this site, Music Graffiti (the english version of the well known Italian site Musica & Memoria) are gathered the information about all the six albums of the first period of the English group, all the lyrics available, annotation about them (both in English than in Italian) a list of the songs, the covers and pictures of the musicians.
During their first period the Pentangle edited six albums, one of which was a double LP (one side live and one in studio) with 22 tracks. A very important musical heritage, since all the six albums show a high quality, interesting and surprising solutions, and the absence of these "filler tracks" so usual in the CD era. The songs follow each other in a succession of styles, and also the traditional tunes are arranged in always original ways.
The reviewers do not agree about the best album of the quintet, it could be Basket Of Light, their main success, or Cruel Sister (the album with only traditional songs and the electrical guitar for the first time), but probably the best synthesis of their peculiar style is contained in Reflection, the album that includes their remarkable cover of the traditional tune Will The Circle Be Unbroken.
Links
Jacqui McShee
Bert Jansch (by Bert Jansch Foundation)
