Jim, I agree with almost everything you say. What I find puzzling is your refusal to acknowledge that 'folk' has acquired a broader meaning than traditional folk, and did so decades ago. Furthermore, the folk clubs have always been open to 'folk' in its broader sense, at least for the last several decades. You may deplore this casual and inaccurate use of a use of a word which for you has a specific technical meaning, but your apparent insistence that this is not so is frankly baffling.

What is more reasonable is to say that the folk club scene is moribund. The reasons for this have been debated at length. However there is more to the folk scene than clubs and festivals. There is a network of informal sessions, particularly for tunes but also for song, where in my experience the standard of performance is far higher than you now get in most singaround clubs. There is also a network of house concersts. It is here, rather than in clubs, where the younger generation are developing the skills which allow them to enter the club and festival scene as seasoned performers. Many of them are deeply interested in traditional music, or are writing new material based on folk forms.

The folk scene has changed. Folk clubs served their purpose, but they were in their own way an artificial format which didn't reflect the way the music had originally been performed. As the once-young generation which created the clubs grows old, younger generations are coming to the music and doing it their way. For example, this evening I shall be going to the launch of a new album by a 30-year old musician - it will be a house concert, not in a folk club. The music is alive and vibrant, it's just not happening in old-style folk clubs.