"What is unfortunate is that folk music has largely become a spectator sport instead of a participatory one"

I agree Ron, & that's part of what seperates "them" from "us". We don't need preaching & we don't want to be sung at!

The language & vernacula, the idiom that the songs like "Greensleeves" were sung in, were in the same tone as was to those listening. The songs were directed towards the people of the community even when they were "whinning" (I do so hate that song but love the melody). It is the lack of connection, the being "full of one's self", the "it's my trip" that I dislike about the current crop of SS. They are not 'folk' when they tend to their own selfness needs. I am not in any way trying to say what's folk & what's not, I'm just saying that when a SS like the crop that's billed at this festival (with few exceptions) don't fit any of the normal excepted discription of folk singer, when they've crossed the line so far that the line's no longer even blurred, when it becomes all about them & nothing about us, then it's time to call them on it. They need to change the name, other wise it's a mockery.

Barry