ah, Shambles...maybe it is my advancing age that makes me so picky..*grin*...I spent many years hearing and sorting out my musical tastes, and now with a limited income and even more limited time, I want to be able to cater to my mood quickly...and there is much I KNOW I will not be interested in, so when a store has a couple of bins labeled simply 'American Folk' and 'International', I cringe.

Yeah, I 'might' learn something new flipping thru all the neo-folk and pop-folk and S/SW stuff to find one or two things that I really fancy, but it seems to me that NOT breaking it down into clear categories that make sense is sheer laziness if you are in business.

Same goes for advertising concerts, open stages, festivals, and song circles...if all you do at your song circle is "Rise Up Singing", say so, so I can stay home! If you bill yourself a folk-singer, but barely know anything older than Dylan, and write most of your own stuff, you are fooling two of us, me and YOU! And I would prefer NOT to spend money on a concert that I only like 10% of.

I simply do not accept that having narrower, well defined fields of interest in music..(or any other area) is somehow petty and/or shallow. Dog shows, woodworking, cooking, antiques, auto racing and computers all have categories which people pick & choose among....and you see the same discussions there about lumping & splitting, but many of those groups have **DEFINITIONS** of their various formats. You can be part of several different groups, but you can at least choose.

Anyway...if you bring your tuba to my party, be prepared to be locked out of the ballad room...*big grin*