Sinister Supporter, I'm in agreement with everything you said in your last two posts. The bit about the building resonated because my dad is an old school builder. He's old now and retired, but he was lucky enough to find a few people now and then who could afford to pay for the time it took to do the really nice work. Of course, whenever he couldn't find that work he took whatever there was, which usually meant intense physical labor outdoors in a climate that ranged from months of freezing cold and snow to months of skin-blistering heat and humidity. There's a huge and beautiful gate on an estate that he built decades ago that he still goes to check on from time to time, just make sure it's still there and not sagging.

I also agree with what you said about which songs make it into the tradition and why. Oh, and the tediously earnest session players. One of the things I love about them is that traditional music, as much as anything, is local music. So now we have people all over the world studiously learning everything there is to know about a tradition from somewhere else. Nothing wrong with that, and I'm glad they're doing it, but it brings two different ways of looking at traditional music front and center.