Cap'n
You are confusing the issue.
As far as I can remember we never included songs written by the singers on the Clare albums.
We did include songs made during the singers lifetimes that had been absorbed into their communities - a particular interest of mine - of course these are traditional songs and the singers traditional singers.
The only self-penned material we have ever collected has been a few pieces from Travellers because of their social significance - not to say we wouldn't collect such stuff if we came across it, but we wouldn't bust a gut looking for it. To my recollection, the only self-penned stuff we ever issued were two songs made by Travellers on 'From Puck to Appleby - were they traditional? They would have been if they had been taken up by the community; don't think they were - but they were both extremely important to the work we were doing.
Howard
You are right that there's no reason copyrighted songs should not be absorbed into a living tradition - but it's not as simple as yes/no.
We noticed that published songs learned by traditional singers from print tended not to change, but remained in their original form - there seemed to be a mystique surrounding the printed word - this was not always the case - in the early days singers used to use the 'ballads' and garlands as rough guides for singing. Somewhere along the way the printed word influenced the attitude to learning songs, as did commercially issued recordings.
"The early collectors are now criticised for selectively collecting only the songs which fitted their ideas of what a folk song should be and ignoring popular songs in the singers' repertoires"
True, and unfairly in my opinion.
What is often forgotten is that collecting is, to all intents and purposes a volunary unpaid pastime indulged in by enthusiasts.
At the height of our collecting we were both putting in a days work, bolting a meal down and heading for the nearest Travellers site - four or five nights a week. On top of this we were reaching deep into our pockets for tape and expensive equipment.
We didn't consider ourselves ethnomusicologists or social or oral historians, we were folksong collectors and we had arrived at a concept of what we believed to be folk song and we made that our priority. What we collected was a delicate balance between what we wanted and what the singer wanted to give us - and I have to asy I am still staggered as to how close those two were. On numerous occasions we were refused songs because "That's not what you are looking for" etc.
To be honest, my attitude is, if you want to record 150 versions of 'Stand By Your Man', please feel free; I'll be interested to hear what social or cultural conclusions you draw from them.
Admittedly, some of the early collectors were not bound by financial and time considerations, but they did have to write down the songs and tunes by hand and they all believed they were mopping up a dying art-form
Full-time collector Tom Munnelly summed it up perfectly for me when he describes his work as "A race with the undertaker"
Sharp, in desperately poor health, dragged himself around the Appalachians and brought back a treasure trove - for which he will have my deepest gratitude forever.
It's easy to adopt the smug hindsight that the Dave Harkers of this world do when discssing the early collectors - as I learned in the building trade, it's far easier to pull down something somebody else has built that build something yourself.
Sorry to be so long winded about this - difficult subject
Jim Carroll