Yep, broadcasting rites are a complicated business Bernard, and especially for the BBC, contracts have to be signed and often payment to the artist or artist management have to be made. This seems to be the major stumbling block as most local BBC radio stations dont have a budget for this.

John J, youre quite right that BBC Radio Shropshire do cover Shrewsbury FF, but as far as Im aware, they only do interviews and the odd impromptu session from the artistes they are interviewing. There is no actual airplay from the concert itself. I actually approached BBC Shropshire this year with regards to some airtime from the main marquee at SFF and offered my services for free to capture some live performances, and suggested to them to maybe instead of the impromptu session from the people they were interviewing, they could actually hear their live performance from the festival marquee. This idea was positively received as BBC dont really have the facility to do this without calling in extra BBC resources. Unfortunately I think the whole broadcasting rites thing came into play again and we had to call it off.

Shrewsbury FF are definately a forward thinking festival though and they have decided to broadcast video from the main marquee on the internet and as far as I can see, have negotiated broadcasting rites
with the artists themselves.

I personally think that this is the way other folk festivals should go, but maybe instead of broadcasting on the internet, take the initiative to sort everything out themselves and present their local BBC radio station with a fully sorted package so they can air without any worries of broadcasting rites.

I way be a little out there on this one, but I do think its along the right lines.