"And I'm not too bothered about a discussion of standards either—"

I think that pretty well sums up the source of the problem.

I don't think that troubadours such as William of Aquitaine, Bernart of Ventadorn, Blondel de Nesle, or the Welsh bard Taliesin, or the Scottish minstrel Thomas Learmonth (the real Thomas the Rhymer) or the Icelandic skald Einarr Skúlason, when they sang a song that they had recently composed, announced that "This is a folk song I just wrote." And yet, it's people like these who conceivably may have been responsible for first penning (or quilling) some of the songs that we now call "ballads" (including, possibly, some of the Child ballads). Nor do I recall hearing that Woody Guthrie or Tom Paxton or Gordon Bok ever said that the songs they wrote are "folk songs."

There is a certain self-serving pomposity in proclaiming a song you have just written as a "folk song." To do so is to try to claim an unearned prestige for a song that has yet to prove itself.

Don Firth