Here where I live, there are small enclaves getting together and making music for themselves. Some are pro, semi-pro and others amateur musicians. I think that this is the way folk music has always been generated. The idea of a singer/songwriter playing a guitar in a coffee house as a folk singer is a recent development and marketing ploy.

I don't think that the large numbers of people figures here. Usually in small circles,
there were players and listeners. Today with the exorbitant price of musical instruments,
I don't think you can talk about the lack of expensive "frills". To get a decent instrument because of the demand the price is too much. It's not right to expect a trained musician to play on a cigar box.

The problem with organizing a "free" jam session or concert is that you get into hierarchical problems and power moves. It's OK if it serves the public by giving them
something musical of value, but so often this turns into political jockeying and the enforcement of an individual leader's taste on the public. This is why this type of
"session" should take place on a local level with small groups of interested people.

Here, we have an Old-Time community, a Bluegrass community, a Jazz jam commnity and a singer/songwriter community. There well may be a Blues community but if so, it doesn't overlap outside of the African-American scene. The communities don't overlap much. But they are vital and alive.

I am not conversant with the scene in the UK but my hunch is that it is quite different in that the unaccompanied traditional ballad style of singing is prevalent and has a following. It's not here, for most of the States with perhaps the exception of Portland/Seattle area and Northeastern US around Boston, Cambridge or parts of New York.

The Rousseauian idea of returning to the "simple life" of the "noble savage" has permeated the thinking of many in the folk scene and it doesn't have too much application today in a society that is struggling for economic subsistence and and wading
through a technological maze. The viewpoint of the "noble savage" becomes an affectation for those well-heeled enough to support it. I suspect that many who are
underprivileged in the States would prefer hip-hop, rap or rock sessions. This has
a lot to do with musical education being downsized in the US public school system.