Captain Birdseye,

My point was that a "source" singer/musician with traditional material in his/her repertoire will have "collected" that from other musicians. Is there any difference, morally or legally, between that and a formal, academic collector? Does the performer actually have any rights of ownership? Or was Walter Pardon, quoted above by Jim Carroll, correct in saying the songs are everybody's?

I can imagine several scenarios:

1) a proper "old boy" learns traditional material from other musicians - whether family, other locals in the pub, or visiting musicians. He will certainly benefit from it in some way, if only in terms of enhancing a reputation as a singer or musician. It is entirely possible that he will get some financial benefit from it, ranging from the occasional pint in the pub to cash for singing or playing at local dances and other events

2) a "collector" comes along and "collects" the piece. He too is likely to benefit from it, ranging from social or academic recognition to financial reward from publishing it

3) It turns out the old boy's source was Fred Jordan, who'd learned the piece in truly traditional fashion ie from a Martin Carthy album.

I don't see any substantial difference between the musician and the collector - both are gathering material from the tradition. Their reasons for doing so may be different, but they are both likely to benefit, both financially and otherwise. The collector may be better-able to exploit the material - on the other hand many source musicians have become successful paid performers on the folk scene.

Does the academic collector owe a greater duty of care to his source than a musician does to his? Perhaps so - the big difference is that it will have been collected in a more formal, self-conscious manner. It is also a more one-way process, whereas between musicians there is more likely to be an exchange of material (perhaps not directly, but in the sense that they are all contributing to and taking from a pool of material).

It is also different where recordings are to be published - here the performer clearly has both moral and legal rights to his performance, and the collector/publisher has an ethical as well as legal duty to recognise this. But does the musician have any moral rights to the material itself, or is it just that it happened to be in his possession at the time?