I'm entirely with Amos here; it's HOW it's sung far more than what's sung. If someone starts "The wild rover" then I'll decide it's time to go to the loo or the bar, 'cause almost invariably that song's sung "on auto-pilot". Then again, a few months Tommas Lynch sung it in our local club - slightly slower than usual, with a few different twists to the tune, but above all with meaning - and I was transfixed.

Or to take another example. In our local "major" venue (Corn Exchange, Cambridge, UK - this venue should carry a sound quality warning) we couldn't resist a "dream" pairing of Dick Gaughan playing support to June Tabor (with band). For Dick the sound was dire; there was little enjoyment to be had in his spot (and before that event I couldn't have dreamed of ever writing that about a Dick Gaughan concert), and certainly this was made much worse by the fact that almost all of the repetoire he performed was unfamiliar to most of the audience. Sound was only slightly better for June and band, but it's easier for a band to "work" a large venue and there was a good response to a concert which didn't have a very high familiarity count. Then, as an encore, they performed Bill Caddick's "The writing of Tiparary". It's quite possible no-one in that audience had ever heard that song before (and certainly not that version of it, as I believe this was its first performance). And it's not an easy song; it doesn't have a "familiar" feel (until the eventual bit of "Tipparary" itself); there's a lot of narritive in it, and it has two very contrasting "parts" to the tune. But it was stunning; it had the audience on the edge of their seats (and me in tears for the second half of it, with its intensity of impending doom). Without doubt the high-spot of the evening, and one of those performance moments which lives on in the memory. [This version was with her regular band of Huw Warren and Mark Emmerson, with the addition of Andy Cutting. Her recorded version of the song - with the Modern Jazz orchestra - while excellent does not have the same intensity. IMO!]

G.