I guess I'm with Crow Sister -- I just like the songs and tunes. I've never seen myself as being part of any revival, and don't really care about "traditions", except as an occasionally interested intellectual pastime. It's fun to learn about the history of the songs, and I'm fascinated by finding and learning various versions of songs from different places and times. But none of this has any bearing on whether or not and why I like or dislike specific songs.

As for whether or not the oral tradition is dead, I think it seems clear that the society that had to rely on oral traditions in order to pass on information is, for the most part, a thing of the past. Does the fact that we now have different ways to share music mean anything important? Maybe to a historian or folklorist it does, but not to me. I will continue to learn music from whatever source is handy, and if it's an old traditional song, I'll continue to call it traditional music.

I spent most of last evening learning Swedish dance tunes from a band mate. He was teaching them to me without reference to written music or recordings, and most of them he learned from other people who taught them to him the same way. Maybe this is just how musicians often learn music, and maybe it's always been that way, whether or not the musicians could read, had a stereo, had a parent who played, or are part of a "traditional" community. Isn't this the oral tradition persisting in the face of modern society? I don't know what else to call it.

I have processed many traditional songs. Some I changed on purpose, some I heard the source version years later and realized how far I strayed, and some I simply misremembered what I was taught. I have written tunes that have been adopted by other folkies, and they have come back to me in quite different form. Isn't this just the folk process in action? How is it really any different than what the folk process has ever been?

I really don't see much difference between an illiterate person learning a tune from the fiddler in an isolated village sometime in the past, and some modern musician learning a tune from the internet. We learn tunes, we do with them what we want, we teach them to others. It's what musicians do, and have always done.

John