Pseudonymous, "early twentieth century" is an entirely random cut-off point (and in fact we do have those recordings of C19th singers, albeit they were made in the early years of the C20th). It is true that Sharp and the other collectors at that time thought they were capturing the dying embers of a tradition just before it died out completely, but the sort of community song culture I described in my earlier post continued into the C20th and even up to the present day, if only in a few places.

Are you suggesting that "tradition" does not in fact exist? Are you suggesting that the idea of "tradition" is simply a left wing, even Marxist, concept?

Are you suggesting that Walter Pardon and all the singers recorded for VoTP and the other recordings I mentioned are not "traditional" and should be considered simply on their ability as singers and not as representatives of a tradition or examples of a traditional style?