basically.. folk songs were crap happy clappy singalong light entertainment subliminal Cold War brainwashing & torturing music
manipulated for their own evil ends by weirdy dubious scout masters and sinister sunday school teachers..

then fortunately some hairy commie layabout students had the genius stoned idea to add electric guitars and drums
and turn it into really good sexy grooving beat party music.

Mantovani was possibly an evolutionary dead end, or perhaps maybe even a missing link..
involving cocktail parties and swingers and jacuzzis..
instead of canvas tents , campfires, and cold miserable church halls.

So Yes Mantovani might have been almost possibly but not definitely
sort of folk.. A bit more than Liberace perhaps..???