Ron, the club I'm involved in running is not in any danger of dying, thank goodness, so I'm probably booking the right people for the audience. I book a wide range of styles, ages, instrumentation (including banjo, Paul!), etc., etc. (and both male and female, Paul - I was going to say "and sexes", but on second thoughts...:-)) - my only problem is with a certain type of singer-songwriter, and it just seems that it's mostly they who are asking me for bookings. Also, Ron, I don't disagree with you about songs relevant to today, and there are singer-songwriters, such as Jez Lowe or the late lamented Keith Marsden or Duncan MacFarlane and a few others who *reach out* to the audience with their songs and their presentation of them - I do not include them in the 'navel-gazers'. And I do not only book things that I personally like - I get the views of other members of the club's committee and members of the audience, but when we get people of a certain musical style drop in, it's not difficult to see when the audience is bored. Have a look at our guest list on our website here if you think I'm too hidebound in what I book - it may surprise you.

Dick, it's not about advertising in the likes of 'Living Tradition': it's about keeping abreast of what's going on in the scene that we inhabit, and as club organisers, I do think it's important to be aware of what's going on outside our own immediate area, either geographically or musically.

Bryan, I'm sorry, I should have put a smiley in my comment to you - and the bit about what Pete Heywood has said that you might disagree with - I don't know - 'twasn't me that said that.

Olddude, I'm happy to listen to anything that anyone sends me, and I do listen to these S-S's MySpace contributions when they ask me to. I then have to make a considered decision about what will appeal at our club - if I make wrong decisions, the club will go down, and it doesn't take many wrong decisions for that to happen. I've seen it happen in the past.

It's great that there are a *few* clubs - and I mean folk clubs - that are being run by a younger generation than those of us who have been involved for twenty-plus years, but it needs many more if the folk *club* scene is going to survive for much longer. There are just too many of us that are going to run out of steam over the next ten years or so in terms of organising things. And I still believe that the folk club scene has much to offer, in giving a platform for up-and-coming musicians and singers to perform, for somewhere to share this wealth of music and song, and not least, for friendship.

Barbara