Maud Karpeles

Once a week, Karpeles volunteered at the Mansfield House Guild of Play in Canning Town.[3] Started by workers at the Bermondsey Settlement, the guild's mission was to teach girls "vigorous happy dances for recreative purposes on educational lines."[4][5] According to founder Grace Kimmins, songs and dances from "Merrie England" would help to counteract the negative influences of urbanisation.[5] Maud's piano skills were useful in teaching music and movement,[1] and after a while, her younger sister Helen started to help as well.[6] Around this time, Maud Karpeles also became a member of the Fabian Society.[1]

"Old English Games and Sports" at Shakespeare Festival in 1909 including maypole and Morris dancing

In May 1909, Maud and Helen Karpeles went to the Shakespeare Festival in Stratford-upon-Avon, where folk dancing competitions were being held.[1][7] There, they met Cecil Sharp, who was an adjudicator at the competition,[7] together with Mary Neal.[2] Sharp had been working with Neal and the Espérance Club in teaching Morris dances and folk songs to girls employed in the dressmaking trade in London, and had had considerable success.[7] The Karpeles sisters were "instantly entranced" by the style of folk dancing they saw at the festival.[7][8] Starting in September, they audited Sharp's classes at the School of Morris Dancing in the Chelsea Polytechnic Institute.[7] Their objective at first was to be able to teach the dances to children at the settlement in Canning Town.[9][10]

In 1910, the Karpeles sisters formed an informal Folk Dance Club, together with a group of girls who had been practicing every week at their parents' house.[7][1] On 3 April 1911, they held a fundraiser for the Invalid Children's Association at Baker Street in London.[1] The Folk Dance Club roped male relatives to join them in dancing, and gave a performance in front of an audience of 500 people.[7] Cecil Sharp gave a lecture and contralto Mattie Kay sang.[7] The event was well received and raised an impressive £60.[1]

The popularity of the Folk Dance Club grew quickly,[7] as Maud Karpeles and her dancers started to give more public demonstrations,[1] and Sharp traveled across the country to promote folk dancing.[7] Maud and Helen Karpeles were soon teaching Morris, sword, and country dancing classes five hours a day as members of his teaching staff.[7][8] At the Shakespeare Festival that summer, the Folk Dance Club gave performances each week in the Memorial Theatre Gardens.[7] Following a public meeting in December 1911, the Folk Dance Club dissolved to make way for a new national entity, the English Folk Dance Society (EFDS).[7] Helen then became the Honorary Secretary of the EFDS – a role which Maud would take over from 1922 to 1930.[7]

In 1913, Maud Karpeles started working for Sharp as his amanuensis, after he developed neuritis in his right elbow.[11] Initially, she wrote his letters in longhand, but quickly learned typewriting and shorthand.[1] In May 1914, Karpeles was involved in Harley Granville-Barker's production of A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Savoy Theatre, which featured folk music and dancing.[1] Sharp arranged the music and choreography, while Karpeles trained the dancers.[1]

Karpeles lived with the Sharp family when they moved to Hampstead in 1915, not long after his wife, Constance Sharp, suffered a life-changing illness.[10] Cecil Sharp referred to Karpeles as "the faithful Maud".[8] On their many travels together, Sharp would introduce her as his "adopted daughter".[8] She would continue to work closely with him until his death in 1924.[10]

With the outbreak of World War I, folk dancing activities were put on hold,[7] and Sharp decided to seek work in the United States to support his family.[12] In the summer of 1915, Maud Karpeles accompanied him to the United States for the first time.[13] She was one of three British teachers assisting Sharp at a summer school he was directing in Maine.[7][13] During this trip, Sharp met with Olive Dame Campbell, who shared her collection of 200 ballads she had collected in the Appalachian Mountains, inspiring Sharp to embark on his own expedition.[12]

Between 1916 and 1918, Karpeles assisted Sharp in collecting Anglo-American songs in the Southern Appalachian Mountains.[13][14][10] Over the course of these expeditions, they visited 281 singers, often in remote and inaccessible locations.[10] During their visits, Karpeles recorded the words of the songs, while Sharp wrote down the tunes.[8] In the end, they collected 1,612 tunes representing 500 different songs, from 281 singers.[13][14] They also "discovered" the country dance now called the "running set".[10]

From July to September 1916, they spent nine weeks in Madison County, North Carolina.[12][10] At first, Sharp and Karpeles were accompanied by John C. Campbell, who introduced them to numerous key contacts and singers, including Edith Fish, a teacher at a Presbyterian mission school, who was a song collector herself.[12]

On Armistice Day, Karpeles and Sharp were in Cleveland, Ohio.[7] One month later, they had canceled all further speaking engagements and headed home to England.[7] From 1919, Karpeles and Sharp were busy reviving the English Folk Dance Society.[7] They traveled extensively, resuming many of their previous activities, while also doing field work whenever they could.[7] In September 1922, Karpeles and Sharp collected Morris dances and folk songs across 45 villages in the Midlands.[7] In 1923, the EFDS was reorganised on a county basis, with 43 branches.[7] Sharp continued to suffer from asthma, bronchitis, and fevers, and relied increasingly on Karpeles to get through his many engagements.[7] In May 1924, Karpeles traveled with Sharp through Torquay, Sheffield, Cardiff, Newport, Bath, Birmingham, Lincoln, Norwich, and Ilkley.[7] Sharp was en route to Newcastle to adjudicate a three-day competition, when he became so ill that Karpeles had to take his place.[7] During their trip back to London, Sharp suffered a seizure.[7] By the third week of June, he was only semiconscious, and died peacefully on 23 June 1924.[7]

Maud Karpeles became Sharp's literary executor after his death, and fought legal battles on behalf of his estate, concerning the legacy of his collections.[10] She later came into conflict with the EFDSS over the issue of copyright.[3] Critics have held that her assertion of copyright was ironic, given that the songs had been shared freely by individuals.[15]

During the Second World War, Karpeles helped refugee musicians and with the Red Cross.[10] In 1962 refugees from Tristan Da Cunha arrived in Britain. Karpeles visited them and recorded their dances.[10]

Cecil Sharp's "English Folk Song: Some Conclusions" was considered to be a classic on the subject and Karpeles added material to the second, third and fourth editions.[10] She never wavered from the original idea of the essential purity of folk song, free from commercialisation or vulgarity.

In 1967 she published "Cecil Sharp: His Life and Work". In 1974 she published two substantial volumes: "Cecil Sharp's Collection of English Folk Songs Vol 1 & 2". "The Crystal Spring" (1975) is shorter version of the collection.

Karpeles was awarded the OBE in 1961, for services to folk music.[14] She received two honorary degrees: one from Université Laval in Quebec (1961) and one from the Memorial University of Newfoundland (1970).[14]