I am not going to ressurect any old arguments, Brian, as I think that you have never been to our folk club and I know I have never been to yours. Let us just say that as we both have many years experience in running and arranging folk events we have had slightly different experiences. It is only slight, we are talking a tiny proportion of floor singers, but it is enough for us to come to different conclusion on certain things.

To come back to using books, one of the consistantly poor performers at our club (not seen him for ages funnily enough - maybe our clubs are now the same:-) ) does all the things mentioned above. Looses the page. Does not know the song. Looses the tunes. Does not know what he is going to do next etc. He is a prime example of how to not sing from a book! He would have no qualms whatsover about singing anywhere yet, based on past discussions, I would be very reluctant to perform at your club. I do not consider myself particularly bad but I am afraid that I would make mistakes and somehow let down the high standards you have achieved.

I know it is me, not you, that is at fault here but, I could not help but feel I was under pressure to a) Perform and b) be good! Something I could not promise:-(

I can see how singing from books got into a disagreement about standards but can we not just agree that standards are measured in different ways, by different people, in different parts of the country, depending what colour underwear we have chosen that day? In other words - We will never agree on a standard standard:-) None of them are right or wrong - just different.

Cheers

DeG