Possible thread-drift warning!!!!
Although there are aspects of this question that concern me, I've avoided becoming involved as from where I stand as someone who has only encountered the commercial aspect of folk music from the point of view of making field recordings available, this thread bears all the hallmarks of a family squabble.
By and large our traditional performers have been handed the shitty end of the stick by much of the revival: marginalised, denigrated, ignored, taken up then abandoned, and commercially preyed upon in some quarters; spectacularly so in the case of one collector (who shall remain nameless, as it is a no-no to speak ill of the dead, I'm told).
Our first dealings with 'the market' were with Topic who, as far as paying the singer concerned went, acted honourably. The problems came later, and this, I believe impinges on the Celtic Music fiasco. Topic, without consulting us in any way, sold on some of their catalogue to another company, which then reissued the album under a different title, along with some of the tracks on a sampler; neither our singer nor his family, following his death, received any more payments for his efforts.
This practice became even more unacceptable in the case of Tom Munnelly's recordings of the Traveller, John Reilly. As John had died (ironically, of malnutrition in an abandoned house in Roscommon) before the release of 'Bonny Green Tree', Tom donated the proceeds of the album to a school for Traveller children – the school never saw a penny from the re-releases of tracks by the company which bought the catalogue. To add insult……. the aforementioned rip-off collector issued a pirated copy of the recordings which, despite pleas for it to be withdrawn ot payment to the school, it remained in the catalogue up to the death of the individual concerned.
A footnote, which, to me sums up an attitude prevalent in some parts of the revival.
To my knowledge, the only copyright of John Reilly's most important song, The Well Below The Valley, now resides in the possession of a well-heeled non-folk musician.
The only other dealings we had with Topic were in supplying tracks for the 'Voice of the People' series, where we requested a 'single use' option, which, hopefully, they will honour.
Other bodied we have dealt with have been above board in their financial dealings, though one of those, an internet magazine, has proved less than satisfactory regarding its attitude to some of the singers – but hey – nobody's perfect!!!
We have always avoided benefiting in any way from our field work. Where it was not possible or necessary to pay the singers directly, with the agreement of them or their families we have donated any money raised to where it can be put back into the music; in our case to The National Sound Archive at The British Library or to the Irish Traditional Music Archive in Dublin.
It has been suggested before, but can I reiterate the idea that a small (voluntary if necessary) levy be applied to any venue where traditional music is sung or played, or on any commercial recording of traditional music, and be donated to bodies that are likely to use it for the furtherance of that music.
Who knows, it might make a difference to its survival – just a thought!
Jim Carroll