"Really? You mean you've never looked at VWML online? I don't believe you!"
I am well aware that at long last (how long has it been going?) EFDSS have made accessible its holdings
I am referring to the club evenings we attended thare
No apology forthcoming

""People can still go to folk clubs to hear 'folk songs reasonably well performed'. "
And \I respnded and have done over and over again
Tare are not enough of them to make a future for folk song viable and there never will be while people consider that to take folk song seriously is "purist" and believe serious argument to be insulting
The development of both of these tendencies can be traced on this forum through terms like finger-in-ear and the particularly deplorable "folk fascist"

It all boild down to what you consider is a "folk club" and "a good folk club"
For me a folk club is a place where you are guaranteed to hear folk songs, a good one is where you can hear folk songs performed well enough to be enjoyed without worrying that the singer is in tune or has remembered the words or is involved in what hie or she is singing
I stopped when all this ceased to be the case and what has gone on here has convinced me that little has changed.

I don't want to have to send scouts ahead to find if a folk club does folk songs, but that's the case now and has been for a long time
People on this forum in the past have argued here for poor standards, suggesting that to demand work and a degree of understanding and dedication is "elitist"
We've had threads arguing for the use of crib-sheets and mobile phones, saying that to oppose them is to put of people is to exclude people - which, in my opinion, patronised the singer and insults the audience
The 'anything goes" approach is highly supported, which assumes that anybody who wanted to listen to 'Lord Gregory' is going to be happy to sit through to 'Livin' Doll' or the 'Birdie Song'   
On this latter, some time ago I was taken to a convert of folk songs in Scotland by a friend -n the whole a highly enjoyable night until the star singer, whose singing I have always admired decided to finish the evening with two Cliff Richard songs
I can never remember feeling so let down - while I remember clearly what she finished the evening on, I cannot for the life of me remember what else was sung that night.

Despite the latest desk-jockey revisionism, our folk songs are unique - they stand apart form all other song forms as artistic creations and pieces of our social history and, because they do, they are as important as Shakespeare or Dickens or Haydn or Bechet... and that's what makes them both important and highly enjoyable if you take the time and trouble to listen
If people haven't the time or inclination to thumb through the bools and manuscripts clearly labeled "folk" or "traditional", they can recognise the uniqueness of folk song by comparing it to other forms
None of this is a criticism of the other forms - I happen to like song of them myself.
If I choose to go out to hear any form of music - folk, jazz, blues, opera, swing.... I expect to be given what I am told I am going to get         
My own interests developed among people who fervently believed that folk forms could be used to create a new repertoire - that is still my position, but I respect those who want to listen to those who just choose to listen to folk songs on a night out and would be happy to join them occasionally - that may be 'purist' to some, but it's certainly not "boring", as has been suggested.   

For me, and apparently for many others, the club scene plummeted when clubs removed the right of people to choose what they want ed to listen to and decided that standards of performance weren't necessary.
As a singer, I began to feel self-conscious that many of my songs didn't fit into evenings were I was able to sing - the number of venues where this wasn't the case got less and less so I and many like me stopped going
Nothing I have seen here has persuaded me that that has improved in any way, or not enough to make a difference

Finished here, I think - I have a load of work on folk song to get through while my memory and hearing holds out - I think I have got all I'm going to get

Once again I find it very telling that nobody has shown the slightest interest in acquiring our recordings
Jim