"It is arrogant to assume accompaniments either necessary or desirable on behalf of the singers, and more than a little patronising to claim that they would be flattered by it being added.
Jim Carroll"

That is why I carefully chose the words "entertain the possibility that", and I at no point, arrogantly or patronisingly or otherwise assumed or presumed anything at all.

Where I differ is that I don't believe in principles about art, I believe in case-by-case. I already know that accompaniments aren't *necessary*, but whether they are desirable or not depends entirely on the music. If I could hear said banjo accompaniments I could then tell you whether I think they are a good thing or a bad thing.

But that would be an aesthetic argument, not an ethical one. I get the impression, and apologies if I'm wrong, that for Jim any tampering with those songs would be *in principle* like drawing a moustache on the Mona Lisa. Whereas for me, I would have to hear the music first in order to assess that.

It's worth pointing out that Duchamp's drawing a moustache on a postcard replica of the Mona Lisa was a self-conscious art prank, constituting a debate about value, vandalism and authenticity. Very different in intent to a non-comedic-in-intent (I presume) addition of musical accompaniment. Also worth pointing out that the distinction between a replica of the Mona Lisa and a recording of a voice (both endlessly repeatable, re-copiable, replicatable) are one and the same; nobody's "actual voice" was used but a recording of it. To state the obvious: songs aren't people; and recordings aren't songs.