I have just come back from the Bradfield Traditional Music Weekend (just north of Sheffield, ) a really enjoyable weekend of song and tune sessions and some fine presentations. The finest and most interesting as far as I was concerned was The Fragrance of Country Melody - Irene Shettle's presentation, the result of exhaustive research into the life and work of Lucy Broadwood.
My ears really pricked up when she quote from a letter of Lucy's saying that of the 420 songs that she knew to be in the repertoire of the great Henry Burstow of Horsham - her major informant - that 75% of them could not be regarded as folk songs by her strict definition.
Irene has promided to sent me a copy of her script an when I receive it, I will post the actual words that Lucy wrote.