When I first became interested in folk music ~ along with MANY others, in the USA at least, back in the mid-1960s ~ the distinguishing characteristics of the genre were (a) genuine human feeling expressed in generally unpolished vocals and (b) a simple and straightforward instrumental sound devoid of "studio tricks" and orchestration.

This approach distinguished this newly popular old-style music from an earlier generation's favored theatrical-style songs and also from that era's rock n roll, which had lost most of the vitality characteristic of the first RnR/R&B recordings, znd had seemingly become the province of corporate interests intent upon "marketing" at the expense creative personal expression.

This "authentic" sound was about equally accessible in old-time/traditional folk (both as performed by "source" artsts and as reinterpreted by younger performers) and in the new music created by artists who would later be called "singer-songwriters." It was only in later years, and/or in other cultures, that contemporary compositions would become definitively excluded from the category of "folk" by some enthusiasts.

I certainly understand that some people will prefer art of one or another historical era and/or bygone culture, whether out of some kind of academic preference or simply because they like the sound. What irks me about some of the less tolerant of the "traditionalists" is their contention, implicit or otherwise, that their particular favorite subcategory of song is superior, and some how more valid, more heartfelt, more expressive of the communal feeling and experience of The Folk, than someone else's.

It is patently absurd for contemporary people, often fairly privileged economically and culturally, and almost always tuned into electronic commuications of various sorts, to pretend that they are "preserving" some long-gone and never-to-be-seen-again culture that evolved in relative isolation from the wider world. They are only enjoying the opportunity to attempt replication of the sound of recordings that they've been privileged to hear ~ nothing more.

All those preserved-in-amber songs and musical styles were the communial musical expression of various different human communities, but they're something different today. They're artifacts.

The human community to which all of us here belong today is international, electronically interconnected, and English-speaking by default. The musical culture that we all share, even when that "we" is self-defined as a group sharing special interest in music that is vaguely defined as "folk," includes plenty of music that we've all heard and, to different extents, enjoyed ~ almost none of which stands up to "the 1954 definition."

While we all have our different favorite areas of intense interest, the musical culture that we all share as "folk" of a common group includes, yes, the best-known traditional songs of older English and Celtic English-speaking cultures ~ but it also includes the best-known and deservedly enduring songs of the British music-hall and the American musical-comedy stage and movie screen, jazz "standards," blues, rock "oldies," country-and-western classics, Stax and Motown, "British Invasion" pop, "singer-songwriter" pseudo-folk, etc., etc., etc.

Without any intention of denigrating anyone's favorite subgenre, I content that this very broad range of popular (i.e., widely disseminated) music ~ essentially, anything one might sing around a campfire ~ constitutes the real folk music of the world we live in today.