A few venues have stopped having live music because of the change in the law - but not as many as we all feared. The main reason there are fewer gigs is because clubs are closing, or stopping booking guests, or having fewer guests, or paying less for guests, or putting less effort into promotion - perhaps because folk audiences are getting older and less bothered about fighting the decline.

We only have a fraction of the clubs in the Uk we had 20 or 30 years ago when most of the big stars originaly won their reputations.

There are new places opening up, of course, but it's very hard to get audiences to come to arts centres, theatres and the like. Habitual folkies prefer clubs and festivals, and the rest of the world only turns out in numbers for people they know.

The best way to short-circuit this problem is air play. Which is why the Mike Harding Show and the Folk Awards (which do need to be televised) are so important.