Artful Codger et al-

All good considerations. And it's certainly true in general that the person who first "adapts" a poem or "neglected song" has an advantage over all others who tinker with the song. But it's not an insurmountable position. Here's a case in point:

Royal Navy officer Hamish Maclaren composed a song titled "Yangste River Shanty" in his book SAILOR WITH BANJO back in 1929 but did not provide a tune.

I revised the lyrics, in my fashion, and set it to a traditional shanty tune.

Barry Finn took my lyrics and tune, by and large, but made it into a much more robust presentation that could actually be used as a capstan shanty. And his version of the song has gained much wider acceptance in the folk music community.

I think this is a good example of how "folk processing" leads to an improvement to the song, as a work of art, rather than an inevitable "dumbing down" process.

And when I sing "Yangtse River Shanty" now, it's much closer to what Barry sang than what I began with.

It is an open question what Maclaren would say, if he were alive, about what we have done to his song but I would like to think he'd be bemused at the thought that someone was still singing it.

What has been done with "The Outside Track" by the Australian poet Henry Lawson would be another case in point.

Charley Noble