I figure that if a song has a good chorus or refrain, it shouldn't matter how long it is--the audience will still enjoy it (assuming of course the singer is not reading it off a sheet--or especially out of the Blue Book of Death.)

From my perspective as an audience member that's certainly true--I love choruses. "I know the value of a kindly chorus". I also feel that if the song is good, like any other pleasurable activity--you want to prolong it. No cantus interruptus.

If I'm singing a song, I want to sing as many verses as I know, give any instrumentalists chances to take breaks, and in general spin it out and enjoy it. I hope anybody else singing will do the same so I can enjoy a good song well sung--with others' participation.

Admittedly I don't sing Robin Hood ballads (warned by Eric Bogle--or was it Dave Diamond?--"I'll fix you with Bold Robin Hood--that's 80 verses long") or Lord Randall ballads.   Though I do love the Little Musgrave ballad--at least the haunting version done by Planxty.

But I pity anybody who can't take 4 verses of Hard Times--there are only 4!--or 6 of Lorena. I find both very evocative of a long-dead era when self-created music not pre-programmed for a 90-second attention span was the rule for entertainment.

I sometimes feel I would have been more at home then--but of course there are the little negatives--like pandemics, no sanitation, etc.--which tend to tip the balance.