Leadfingers: that's a very good idea, and something I was thinking of doing.

Simon G: this is a process that I'm attempting to do right now. I'm relatively unfamiliar with the different folk club formats, as we're a bit more festival-based over here. I guess I would prefer clubs that are accessible to outsiders and provide a setting that isn't too concert-based to talk to people. Which formats do you think fit these criteria?

Beyond that, I'm not terribly concerned with narrowing down a certain demographic. I'd like to talk to a variety of people and attend a variety of clubs. My study is broad, and I'm not going to be "observing" the workings of a folk club--like the nineteenth-century image of an anthropologist so cleverly invoked by Jack Campin above--as much as just talking to folk fans in various places. I just very much want to include British folk clubs as part of my survey, because we don't really have institutionalized folk venues over here.