"STOP TRYING TO BE CLEVER, AND JUST GO WITH THE FLOW"

A leading figure in the 60s UK folk revival, Martin Carthy always relied on a simple songwriting philosophy, through his friendship with Bob Dylan and Paul Simon to his role in moulding the folk-rock movement with Steeleye Span. Since then, his creative and romantic partnership with late partner Norma Waterson helped create the “first family” of British folk. “There have been several ‘me's’ through the years, and some of them are very interesting,” he tells Rob Hughes.

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Inside his house in the North Yorkshire coastal village of Robin Hood’s Bay, Martin Carthy’s walls bear witness to an extraordinary career. There are framed photographs of the great and the good everywhere you look. A young Bob Dylan and Richard Fariña at London’s Troubadour during the early 60s; Carthy and Davy Graham in the studio; Anne Briggs and companion; Carthy and Dave Swarbrick jamming; family portraits of the Watersons.

As we settle into the kitchen, where Carthy prepares two mugs of tea, there’s still a birthday card on the table. He recently turned 84, marking the occasion with a wonderful new album, Transform Me Then Into A Fish, his first in over a decade. It’s a record that brings him full circle, reworking (among other things) eight songs from 1965's Martin Carthy, a dazzling debut that introduced him as a master interpreter of traditional folksong.

A former chorister, Carthy was blessed with an exceptional voice and a rare gift for invention as guitar-player and arranger. Dylan, Paul Simon and Richard Thompson were among those he inspired and befriended during the early 60s. Dylan used Carthy’s version of Scarborough Fair as the basis for Girl From The North Country; Simon borrowed the arrangement for S&G, leading to accusations, at the time, of thievery.

Carthy’s innate curiosity for the possibilities of folk have sustained him ever since, from his 70s tenure as on-off member of Steeleye Span to solo work and a host of collaborations. There is, too, his integration into The Watersons, the first family of English folk whose matriarch, Norma, he married in 1972. She passed away three years ago, but her presence is everywhere chez Carthy in the form of memorabilia, posters and suchlike.