I love to find the origins of a song, but I don't think that's enough - I want to find the story of a song, how it developed and branched off into various forms. One version of a song is never enough for me - I want to see ten of them. When I want to make a song my own, I try to choose the version that's most interesting to me and that best fits my singing - not necessarily the "original" version. Oftentimes, though, the story of the song can be more interesting to me than the song itself. Sometimes, I'll sing two versions of a song, one after another.

Every once in a while, we'll have a great discussion of the various versions of a song, and somebody will post a message saying how boring the discussion is. I suppose they have a right to an opinion, but it seems strange to have people like that at a site that emphasizes traditional music. When I see comments like that, it makes me cringe.

-Joe Offer-