Frank Proffitt's version of Young Hunting is absolutely haunting, and unlike any other I have heard. If I recall correctly, he learned it from a family member years previous, and had to 'reconstruct' the melody before recording it. A lot of Profitt's songs are like that - he learned them from others, and yet they are often different from 'common' versions, even from his own region.

That, in my opinion, is the Tradition - the songs are part of a common body of music within a community. Each singer interprets the songs in his own way. Recreations based upon faulty memory or mishearing are part of the process. So is deliberate elaboration and fine-tuning. Not an either-or situation.