When I'm singing my own songs I tend to use a guitar, because it helps me keep in tune, and gives me something to do if I find the next line or the next verse has gone walkabout.

But I know that, when I'm on form, singing unaccompanied is better - the rhythm is freer and the tune can change more easily from verse to verse, which is how I think the kind of songs I sing need to be sung. That's one reason why friends have found it tricky to accompany my singing.

In a non-folky setup, unaccompanied singing tends to confuse people, and gets in the way of them listening.

Accompanied singing for what we'd think of as folk sonmgs is a very recent development in our cultures. Instrumental music has been primarily for dancing, and when it's time for a song the players put down their instruments and listen.

And none of this is to say that there aren't singers who can use their instruments to give their songs greater emotional depth and power. I'm just back today from Whitby Folk Week, and am thinking of people who wereat this year's Whitby, like Vin Garbutt and Tim Laycock and John Kirkpatrick, who showed us how to do precisely that.

But I am also thinking of other brilliant musicians who allow their playing to get in the way of and pretty well destroy their rendering of songs. And I'm not going to name any names here.