Dave the Gnome:
"what of us who simply don't like everything that Walter did? Are we not allowed to say so for fear of offending someone?"

Not as far as I'm concerned, Dave. What I wrote was: "Even within the ranks of folk music lovers there are many who would prefer a revival performance every time and... I don’t object to their choice."

I would guess that, for the majority of listeners and participants in the folk music scene, revival performance is what they like to hear, and may in many cases be all they've ever heard. The reason I play recordings of traditional singers to lecture and workshop groups is precisely because they may have heard nothing like that before, and I want to at least give them the chance. That certainly doesn't mean I don't like revival performance - it's what got me into this in the first place, I still enjoy many modern performers, and as you say, that's what I do.

What I was trying to suggest is that, if you want to go deeper into the music, particularly the research aspect that animates a few of us on Mudcat but is very much a minority sport, then you need to put the work in to understand it. But that's not for everyone.