I am delighted to report that Ruth and I are back singing from the same hymn sheet(well, one or two minor typos aside). Which is not to say that I regard the chasing of funding as an invariable panacea. Supping with the devil, as everyone knows, requires a very long spoon. Which, as has often been observed, is why arts organisations took to employing administrators. The perennial discussion, which every group needs to have all the time, is "admin: long spoon or wooden horse?" You can't live without administration making funding applications(or at least the EFDSS couldn't, right now).But you always need to think very carefully what you want to do and what you want to get to help you do it. As they say, more heartache is caused by prayers answered than by prayers refused.
    I have made a considerable study of this, having been involved with an inordinate number of companies, many connected with folk music, and some not.