'tradition' is the process a song undergoes in order to arrive at a certain form and function

A tradition is also the genre which determines the form and function of a song - any song.   

'folk' is an indication of the people and communities who put it through that process

All songs are processed by people and communities.

- where does your 'Strangers in the Night' fit in with all this and again, where can we go for a documented form of your re-definition?

It underwent a process in order to arrive at a certain form and function and there is an indication that a community put it through that process.

thus, with one flick of the typing finger, you have removed all the Walter Pardons, Sam Larners, Ceclia Costellos, Phil Tanners, Harry Coxs, Elizabeth Cronins, Joe Heaneys........ to - where, compared to, say Frank Sinatra, (or Amy Winehouse, or Maria Callas?

I dig them all actually, and more besides, though I'm not so convinced by Amy Winehouse's singular retro. My favourite singer of all time is Davie Stewart, and I'd say Frank Sinatra is possessed of a comparable idiosyncrasy.

OH NO THEY BLOODY WELL WOULDN'T

How do you account for aims of the ICTM? I've (personally) known Ethnomusicologists doing studies of musics as disparately exotic as Barbour Shop Quartets, Karaoke, and the George Formby Society.