I'm afraid I've found much of this thread a combination of misunderstanding, misrepresentation and distortion, in order - apparently, to justify presenting bad singing to the public.
An appeal for basic standards has been met with responses like 'elitism', 'prima donna', 'exclusion', 'auditioning' 'glass ceilings', demanding 'concert standards' and only selecting the 'few who are good enough to sing' - none of which have been suggested by those of us who prefer our songs well enough rehearsed to be enjoyed.
A number of the attitudes on display here have shown, in my opinion, at best a basic misunderstanding of our music and at worst, an open contempt for it.
Richard's 'wild flowers' are, if I have waded through his treacle-field of academic verbiage correctly, a giant step for mankind - backward to the 19th century when our folk singers were regarded as unthinking peasants whose art was as unconsidered as bird-song - and if that were not enough, he would turn our clubs into venues for mixed-voice choirs.
I'm afraid I'm going to have to drop out of this, for a while at least. We're off to Dublin for a couple of days, where I hope we will be be entertained by two plays whose participants will have undergone sufficient periods of rehearsal for us sit back and appreciate the works of two great playwrights. Hopefully the actors will not have to read their lines from a script or stumble through their interpretations, or fail to articulate or project and will send us home entertained and emotionally and aesthetically satisfied.
Would that folk song be granted the same respect.
Jim Carroll