All right, WLD - I hate to blow my own trumpet and I actually don't think I'm all that good, but about a year ago (maybe two) my daughter who then lived in Nottingham told me that the pub (large pub, near Nottinhgam City Centre) that the chap who later became her bass player in a band (since split) called Basso Loco managed was having a beer fest/folk weekend, so I killed three birds with one stone, packed some guitars and headed north to see daughter/sleep on her floor/go to a beer festival/get some folking.

The folking turned out to be an open mic in a room that opened off the main room of the pub. I was not on the "list" so I sat and chatted and drank beer and listened in another room that opened off the other two. There was a sequence of frankly pretty horrible "original" stuff, mostly but not all not very well done (a different weekend I saw a youngster playing some very useful DADGAD in the Orange Tree but there was nothing like that) and pretty well no-one was going into the room with the PA rig. All that relevant, new, young, original singer-songwriter stuff was just so much acoustical wallpaper.

Then one of the listed performers no-showed, and since they'd seen me sitting there like Banquo's ghost the manager offered me the slot. As you know I do mostly traditional or "mistaken for traditional" stuff. Gradually, over about half a dozen songs (that was the slot length) most of the pub started really to listen. One barman later complained that I had not done any shanties (which I had guesstimated to be too hardcore for the gathering), one youngster was all over me for details of my guitar and how I got that "liquid gold" sound out of it (mostly down to the guitar and actually quite a good soundman, not me) and a couple of chaps quite a bit younger than me but not as young as most of the other players were (foolish fellows) saying nice things about my guitar accompaniments, how nice it was to hear the old songs, and was I booked (! - I wish, usually they pay me to go away) anywhere else over the weekend.

No, WLD, it is not the old songs, nor even the old folkers who are driving people away - not if people as average as me can get a reaction as good as that. The demand for it is there.