I have just watched last night's Folk Britannia for the second time and it reminded me of the night I was taken to Ewan McColl's Singers Club in Holborn in the late Sixties which was interesting and edifying but couldn't be described as a relaxing fun filled evening.

He came over as a very forbidding and short tempered person, black looks for anyone who dared sneak out to the bar except when he declared a break. He and Peggy Seeger did nearly all the singing and only two or three singers from the audience were allowed to do a number, perhaps because he was in his "only sing songs from your own region" phase.

I'm glad I had the experience of seeing him but I'm also glad that folk clubs and singalongs that I go to nowadays are generally much freer in their approach to music.