You don't half talk some shite "Big" Al. Would you listen to yourself?

"You can't put it right following a tradition or arranging university courses for middle class kids who want to take the risk out of joining the circus.

I know you don't particularly like young traditional singers - there's plenty around I find pretty bland myself - but this blanket assumption that they are all middle class kids with a folk degree is as tedious as it is false. But, hey - don't let facts get in the way of the opportunity for another bilious whinge, eh? The truth is, most young people playing folk music of one sort or another have come about as close as you to a folk music degree.

I did get old, but also the acts got worse.

Then you're clearly looking in all the wrong places. If you want to hear excellent young performers playing folk music - in all senses of the word - the last place you'll find most of them is the folk club. As it ever was - including, no doubt, in your day, when folk clubs filled this role in way they can't any more because of their aging demographic - most young people are attracted to places that other young people go to. Quite apart from the music, the sex and drugs are better. That's not to say there aren't all-ages tunes sessions like Will's - we have one near us that's rammed every week with people of all ages - but the old style folk club is generally more Darby and Joan than down with the kids.

"I can think of a whole generation of young singers that should have been nurtured by the folk scene, but weren't."

Name names, then. And did you check with them whether the actually wanted to be "nurtured by the folk scene"?

"And the folk establishment is SO bloody smarmy, middle class and offensive.. at major festivals you see them smarming over some young puppy, whose parent played the third yoyo on the 60's folkscene. Totally forgiving their lack of talent, stage presence, instrumental ability, preparedness to perform....and generally pissing away the creative opportunity that should have gone to someone far more dedicated. If you haven't noticed this, you're blind."

You really like to present yourself to the world as if you were a prize turd, don't you? Once again, if there is any truth in your generalisations, name bloody names.

Ok, this is thread about the Folk Awards, supposedly, so I'll give you Alasdair Roberts from the Furrow Collective, who are nominated for an award. This is man who has been at it since he was a teenager, clocking up numerous albums - both in his own right and as collaborations, both original material and traditional. He's a brilliant fingerstyle guitarist who uses multiple tunings and has his own unique way of presenting traditional material and writes beautiful, totally original songs. He's clocked up hundreds of gigs - very few on the folk scene. He's easily the equal of the Stewarts and McTells of this world - in my view he's far more inventive that either of them - though he'd probably see himself more in the tradition of Clive Palmer or Robin Williamson or Bert Jansch than either of those. If you think he's someone you can sneer at as a middle class folk degree type, you really do have your head up your backside. Or you're twisting facts to fit your jaundiced worldview. Oh, and as this seems to be important to you, he's an excellent between-song raconteur, too, though you may be disappointed he doesn't go in for the sort of dodgy jokes some of the folk singer comedians from the so-called golden age were overly fond of (this is by-the-by, but I've heard live tapes of various of the 1970s folk club performers and some of the material wouldn't sound out of place at an EDL social. I won't name names because they might have grown up a bit since then, and if so I wouldn't want to embarrass them, but, jeez, it was sad).

Alasdair Roberts - I Went Hunting
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