"Jim: I don't want to get into an impasse over the football chant thing,"
Me neither; as you say, no great difference between our attitudes.
For me, it is only important if it is used as an argument that these are no different from the recognised song tradition and that everyone who's ever peed through a rolled up newspaper on the terraces is a traditional singer - hate to see 'traditional' go down the same pan as 'folk' appears to have done.
There should be no problem in defining our song traditions; god knows, our music is among the most researched, documented and debated of any. At the risk of my being included in somebody's 'non-discerning' books it seems to me that once you know what the tradition is, identifying traditional singers should logically follow.
I believe we have lost most of our song traditions and that all of the features that held it in place have now gone, though I must say I was pulled up a little short this afternoon when I played a recording of a programme on Traveller songs (The Blue Tar Road) and heard some superb singing, including from a couple of very skilful young Traveller women, all recorded in the last six months.
Jim Carroll