Oh dear me. What monster have I created?

I feel like Pandora who has opened a really big can of worms.

Come on Jim C, are you really such a perfectionist that you cannot tolerate anyone who does not come up to your own perfect standards?

Think about your own humble roots. Have you never, when starting out, had to glance at a song book/crib sheet or fluffed your lines and had to admit you were almost human?

I find it very difficult to accept that the very fact of someone singing from a song book is dumbing down the folk scene or that folk music is withering and dying and is in it's death throes.

From what I have seen in the UK, the folk scene in general is in extremely good health, with an abundance of young musicians and singers having a go and not feeling shackled to some kind of death wish to tie them to an unflexible rule book that would choke them at the outset.

And long may that remain so!

Chris