I think there is a great deal to be said for learning the facts about traditional English vernacular music and dance. Those can surely be examined. I would be very worried indeed that there might be a right or a wrong way of performing them. I cannot speak for the steps of the dance, which I suppose may well have "right" and "wrong" versions, but the concept of folk music demands not only the transmission of the tradition but its modification by transmission.

By way of example I might turn to a recording of Bert Lloyd to find the words and tune of a song, but I certainly don't want to sound like him. I have one particular song I have nearly finished learning where I took the words and the underlying accompaniment sequence from a recording of Martin Carthy, but as I am currently doing it the rythmic delivery is almost more dance-trance. Some like it. Others it offends. Certainly my delivery of the Coppers "Sweep" has some saying the late great man would be turning in his grave, and others say they could imagine him grinning broadly at it.


Naturally one performance of a modified version of a song or tune might be more or less pleasing to a listener than another, but I am not clear that the difference is properly to be examined. "Taste" is very hard sensibly to examine.

The potential upside - continuity and knowledge. The potential downside, ossification and alienation.

How about English folklore and traditional culture as a GCSE?