Are you including "sessions" and "folk dance clubs" in your study? The dance clubs are a little world of their own with some members who never go to other folk events. And the age range is not the 'middle aged up' as described above, more the 'retired'. We've been the 'young folk' at our club for 20 years. They get new members, but not young members.

One thing about sessions. We sometimes get people who happen to be in the pub getting really enthusiastic about how good the music is. So much so that they spend all the time talking to us about it and we can't listen or participate properly.
So if you want to talk to people in a sensible way you might do better to arrange to meet up with someone before or after the club, and just enjoy the music while it's on. If you fix this up in advance you may sort out the transport problems too. (Sorry if this is too obvious, I'm sure you've thought about this already.)