Why is it not permissible to change a word, but condoned--even encouraged--to muck with the tune and performance style? I think that altering the performance style shows greater "disrespect" since it frequently results in anachronistic mutants, as convincing as your father wearing your son's clothing. Before indulging in such adaptations one would do well to listen to modernized folk arrangements from the 40's, 50's and 60's, and consider how cringeworthy they were just ten or twenty years later (while period performances remain timeless). In comparison to this, changing the wording is a trifle.

While I venerate the tradition, I have few illusions about the quality or sanctity of folk songs--as with modern songs, most are doggerel, and can be well served still by judicious editing. That songs are usually improved by the folk process, however, is a myth: the tyranny of mediocrity tends to pull all things to its own level. A single discerning editor can do more good than hundreds of years of "folk processing". Of course, the art of revising should be like legerdemain in a magic trick: it should support the desired illusion while drawing little attention to itself.

I see no particular merit in continuing to repeat misguided corruptions which have "entered the tradition".