FOLKNACIOUS: The only difference nowadays: 1) we have hundreds of festivals where people get to find out how good the music can be, especially played by the newer generation, so become less tolerant of the shoddy, 2) arts centres, where people get to find out how pleasant it can be to experience music in a decent listening environment with reasonable professional organisation, so become less tolerant of the shoddy.

Whilst I largely agree with these sentiments (though disagreeing with your other ones about singarounds happening behind locked doors!) I think the problem with this is that you can only go to so many festivals, so what do you do for your fix in between? Also, not everywhere has concert type venues already putting on folk acts. In Manchester you can see well known people like Waterson Carthy, Seth Lakeman, Kate Rusby etc, but none of the smaller concert venues seem to want to touch folk with a barge pole.

This is where there is a possible role for a decent, well run folk club who fancy taking it on. Drawing a parallel with the world outside folk for a minute, for many years in Manchester if you wanted to see alt. country, americana, post rock, pychedelia and so forth (usually by newish, not-well-established, non-mainstream artists) you could only do so because of the enthusiastic efforts of one man - Nick Georgiou - an amateur gig organiser, who did it so he could bring the acts he wanted to see to Manchester when no-one else was. He's now 'retired', but inspired and in some cases 'trained up' by him, others have leaped into the breech. The point for folk is that even if standard folk clubs aren't doing it, it still often needs the equivalent of a folk club organiser to make folk concerts happen. Just like with other forms of music, you haven't made it, as far as professional promoters are concerned, unless you are on their radar. The role of the talented amateur enthusiast therefore remains paramount.

Disclaimer: This may not be true of everywhere.

Captain Birdseye: Whilst I accept that folk clubs are also social clubs for those who regularly attend, can you not also see that if you are not one of those regulars (who have often been attending for years) that very clubbishness can often be offputting? I'm sure the regulars would be horrified to think that might be the case, because presumably they are usually decent people, but unless you're the type to stride up and force yourself on strangers (which I'm not, except on-line!) you can feel a bit like you're crashing someone else's party, which is not necessarily conducive to a good night out. Especially if you've gone on your own because none of your pals like folk... (sob), but that's for another thread: "TECH: None of my friends like folk - should I have them thrashed?"