Hey Jerry,


" Not all songwriters, and perhaps not even most write songs that are "conscious efforts based on a personal agenda." Personal experiences, usually, but not agendas."

Some try to be folkier-than-thou. It sounds phony.

" Forced to guess, I'd think that most sonwriters write songs because they enjoy writing songs."

Butfor some, there is a hidden ego-driven agenda. Some of this may be a latent wish that their songs will become popular or even somewhat commercial.

" At least the songwriters I know. And yes, the folk process is not self-conscious. Why do you assume that all songwriters who sing in the folk idiom are consciously trying to write "folk songs?"

I assume that they want to redefine what traditional folk songs are to fit their agendas.
That is the point.


" That's not been my experience. I write songs. They have a lot of the flavor of folk music because I love folk music and have been deeply immersed in it for most of my adult life. But I never consciously try to write a "folk" song. I also don't know any folksingers who characterize themselves as traditional folksingers."

This is done all the time on Mudcat. They claim their "tradition".

" The few people I was able to book who I thought of as true traditional folk singers would never call themselves that. They also tended to throw in a popular song now and then, or a recently written song that wasn't a "folk song" at all. They didn't label each song as to it's authenticity before singing it."

Sure. They don't want to be locked in to doing just one kind of song. But the question becomes when do they stop singing folksongs and start doing pop stuff?

" And who thinks you have to be stupid and uneducated to be a traditional folk singer? No one I know."

They are out there but not overt in their prejudice. Try playing an Almeda Riddle
example for a class of young popular music students.

You must be hanging around with the wrong folks. :-)

You must be hanging around with a clique of your own.

"Besides, this thread is NOT about the definition of folk music or traditional music. It's about the process by which new songs are created, and old ones changed."

Since Mudcat states that it is folk music or traditional music, the process can't
be separated here. New songs are created and old ones changed in the realm of
folk music too. The definition is important toward discovering the process that you describe.

" A folk song printed in a collection is one version of a song. There were probably a dozen others equally traditional being sung at the same time."

A printed song is really not definitive of the process by which a folk song changes.

"Finally, I love Leadbelly's music and agree that he was a prime force in folk music. That said, I think it's allright to enjoy a particular song by someone else who wasn't traditional but was having a Damn good time singing."

Of course but this is not the issue. The thread is entitled "The folk process and songwriting". If you make an assumption that any recent song is part of the folk process just because someone claims it is, this is incorrect.