"After all, Vaughn Williams' Variations on Dives and Lazarus would be pretty boring if it was just the basic tune repeated over and over."
Vaughan Williams composed classical music
To suggest a tune repeated over and over and over again is boring wipes out our entire archive of field recordings as "boring" -it's what our older singers did - seldom using ornamentation, never using accompaniment (except for a few rarities) - Walter Pardon, Harry Cox, Sam Larner, Phil Tanner... all dedicated repeaters of tunes - hardly boring.
They made the words work, for themselves, and so, for the listeners
The times that accompaniment has been imposed on the older singers have, in my opinion, proved utter disasters - Kennedy's doctored BBC tapes being one of the most extreme examples.
We still have the rather sad example of Jeannie Robertson with guitar accompaniment.... I'm sure Robin Hall meant well, but oh dear...!!!!
Jim Carroll