Jim wrote:
"I have to say that your description of a folk club (at a somewhat superficial glance) sounds less like the clubs I know and more like a Freemasons Lodge where the public does not venture, but as I said, a superficial glance."

It's a club, Jim, but not as you know it.

"the question here is what is the 'lowest' standard we are prepared to accept from performers at the clubs."

That's up to the club members.

"Our music is held to ridicule by those outside our immediate circles"

I find the opposite - I'm surprised, when you mantion it, how many people say that they enjoy folk music - often people who you would not expect to. Folk is becoming the new cool.