GUEST,Ewan Spawned a Monster

Beyond criticism? So it would seem.

According to Tom Bliss there are around 300 folk clubs booking guests in the country. I would reckon that means at least 1000 people working as as organisers. I'd be interested to hear if any of us actually made any money at it. I think, at most clubs, the organisers pay on the door like everybody else.
I'm sure we'd all welcome constructive criticism and useful ideas.

What we get is -

Nigel Spencer:

the half-arsed, the lazy or the can't be bothered.

It's all a bit sad really. No, not sad. Pathetic. Insular. Smug. Self defeating. Short sighted. And so on.

What I do see here is a insular, hermetically-sealed world, shot through with bile and rancour and willing to atrophy rather than engage with the outside world. What I see is a scene that hates its young and resents everything they are trying to acheive.

Captain Ginger:

the "it's folk, so who cares" brigade

I repeat: there exists among some in the folk world an attitude that crap performances don't matter because it's only folk.

the procession of the half-dead and the tone-deaf up the pub stairs to the local folk club and the dreadful bleatings and twanglings that they hear therefrom.

In your smug, complacent southern comfort, ignorance really is bliss, it would seem.

Diane Easby:

your "regulars and residents" are still unable to tune, find an appropriate pitch, remember the words or perform PROFESSIONALLY

Then I'm told -

not to bridle at imagined slights and be so stubbornly determined to take comments personally.

Well, how could I.

All this from people who wear it as a badge of merit that they hardly ever go to folk clubs.

Bring us your suggestions and ideas. Help your local club with the administration. If you haven't got a local folk club, start one. Come and help put the chairs out, pay your ticket so all those struggling professionals can earn an honest crust. Do a floor spot so we can hear how it should be done. Come and drink the landlords beer so he looks favourably on us.

But if you can't do anything to help, GET OUT OF OUR WAY.