When people turn up with the words of the song in a book and the book is as thick as my fist with hundreds of songs in it most if not all printed from the Mudcat. Then I think it can be a problem. As already stated on this thread are many good reasons why and why not crib sheets. But who is going to sing 50 songs plus in one evening.

Oh and if anyone tells you that I was seen down the then Tap and Spiel in Whitby with a laptop loaded with the digital tradition song files its true and I thought of it first! Yes I was taking the Mickey! Well there was hardly enough room for beer on the tables for songbooks.

I don't know if anyone has mentioned the Oral Tradition where a song is learned from a source singer. "Folk" is a living thing I don't want people in the future pointing at their crib sheets and insisting that they are singing the correct words. Because they got the words of the back of an LP by the Corries as recorded in 1957 or the Mudcat! Wasn't it Mr C Sharp who made a habit of taking all the swear word out of the Sea Shanties and other "Folk" songs

Here's the words you weren't looking for Dick!

It's adieu sweet lovely Nancy I've forgotten a verse or two.
So I'm going home for my Mudcat Book to look for something new.
Kind emails I will send to you from my home to your mobile phone,
I when I do return again I sing the song once more.

If only I had been their in 1977 with my Laptop!