"drum kits, belted lyrics, electric and eclectic instruments...as I said above, those who do know must be more militant."

As opposed to good old pipe and tabor, a probable import from the Iberian Peninsula, or the cittern, a German instrument popular in the French court, and brought to England by Italian musicos playing European style tunes?

"...I know that English folk rarely gets a guernsey on the BBC these days, and, when it does, it's often anything but what our forebears did for centuries - e.g., not one song was sung unaccompanied during the 2 and a half hours of the "Cambridge Folk Festival" "highlights" last night."

And nobody wears wool underwear anymore either.

"(And, "with respect", IB, I have 4 technical certificates and a BA in humanities.)"

WAV, as a Christian, you might be interested in the following verse. Go ahead, look it up. Acts 4:13.

"1 and a half hours, sorry - before it was a programme on RVW - who DID respect his own good English cultural-heritage."

So, as long as the arrangement is a classical one, the use of non-English and non-traditional instruments is allowed? How is '5 Variations on Dives and Lazarus', or 'Fantasia on Greensleeves' any different to the Imagined Village in concept?

"I did listen to a bit from the Imagined Village the other night, Gervase, and, rather than "implode in a messy splutter of outrage" said I didn't like it...I'd rather imagine being in a proper English village, with traditional English music being played in a traditional English pub,...a glass of mead in hand, a clog dancer by my side, and a plate of stottie and chips on the table; and, out the window, a weeping willow licking a river's flow, as snow falls gently on a bevy of swans...
And, as for horses, J from K, I'd rather see them running free in a field..."

I didn't liked Imgained Village much, but that's because I think the arrangements didn't turn out as well as they could have. LOVE the concept.
Mead is just as Russian as it is English, in fact, it was a large part of any ancient Slavic feast.
Stotties are quite similar to thick breads found in places such as North Africa, Turkey and Georgia. A very primitive sort is baked by Bedouins in small ash pits. Chips, an import, and when someone says chips, my first thought is of Belgium, rather than England.
What happens if the traditional pub isn't built over a river, no swans reside in the area, and nobody has planted the weeping willow, a late import to England? And if the clog dancer is by your side, doesn't that mean that she can't practice her own good culture, because she is cavorting with you?