"I don't exactly call an old man crooning out of tune into a cheap microphone entertainment"
You are talking about personal taste again - nothing top do with definition
Harry, despite his age and all the problems that brings managed to convey the feeling of the songs to all who cared to listen - as did his contemporaries - fairly rare in most modern singing.
Singing with guitar' finger in ear - if you are going to denigrate a music you obviously don't like - the British tradition is largely an unaccompanied one - the traditional singers almost universally sang unaccompanied.
Nobody sings with "his finger in his ear" that would be stupid.
However the act of cupping the hand over the ear in order to stay in tune is centuries (possibly millenia) old - particularly useful to street singers and ballad sellers in the open air
Try to get it right
This thread has become overloaded with personal taste from people who neither like nor appear to understand folk song - somewhat arrogant to pontificate in those circumstances eh- what.
Personally, I think Led Zeppelin are noisy inarticulate shit, devoid of content - but I wouldn't put it forward as an argument that my music is better and it would be extremely arrogant of me to do so.
If you don't like the goods, don't muck 'em abaht.
Jim Carroll