("Continuing to make the same unsupported statements over and over again just makes you sound like a Republican or something."   Howling with laughter, John!!)

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Conrad, there are a lot of people with "ordinary" voices around who are excellent singers.

I'm not saying, nor have I ever said, the folk music should be sung only by singers with voices the caliber of Dmitri Hvorostovsky or Natalie Dessay.

Or for that matter, Richard Dyer-Bennet, who was a cultivated tenor who had a quite successful concert and recording career singing folk songs and ballads. But he certainly didn't have the best voice in the world. It was thin-sounding compared to most tenors, and he could actually get a bit shrill at times. But he did have good vocal technique and excellent breath control. He said, himself, that he didn't particularly like the sound of his own voice, and if he was a successful performer, it was in spite of his voice rather than because of it.

Both Pete Seeger and Peggy Seeger don't have extraordinary singing voices. Quite ordinary, in fact. But they know the material very well, and know how to present it in both an entertaining and an informative manner. This makes them very good singers indeed!

You don't have to have a great voice to be a great singer. It's what one does with one's natural endowment that determines whether one is a great singer or not. Many singers you hear on field recordings—MOST singers you hear on field recordings—have quite ordinary voices, but their singing is often good to excellent.

Conrad, you may have a very ordinary voice. But there is no reason you couldn't perform if you would learn to sing the songs well.

And otherwise learn to behave yourself!

Don Firth

P. S.   Richard Dyer-Bennet said the following, which is well worth noting, whether one has a good voice or a very ordinary voice. As most people do, even the vast majority of singers in almost all genres except for opera and lieder, which are very demanding and require special abilities that not everyone is born with:

"The value lies inherent in the song, not in the regional mannerisms or colloquialisms. No song is ever harmed by being articulated clearly, on pitch, with sufficient control of phrase and dynamics to make the most of the poetry and melody, and with an instrumental accompaniment designed to enrich the whole effect."

Read it. And think about it.