Excellent point, Howard. There's not much point, other than curiosity or general interest, in going to a guitar workshop if you cannot play a guitar. Furthermore, a good performance will certainly inspire many more people to play than a workshop. Any workshop - and I've both attended and run them - is very dependent on the skill levels of the attendees. I've watched, on TV, filmed workshops/masterclasses held by opera singers such as Pavarotti, and they're a mixed bag, frankly. Undoubtedly useful for the people being taught, but not as inspiring as a concert by Pavarotti. Workshops can also dig down to levels of detail which can be tedious for the onlooker, though fascinating for the attendee.

The other point, which we've rammed home here, is that you can take a horse to the water but you cannot make it drink. There are no shortage of places where one can listen to folk music - clubs, sessions, singarounds, festivals, even on Spotify - so those who want to be drawn in will be drawn in - and those that have no interest in the genre will give it a miss.

I've still not heard any evidence that folk music is so necessary to one's "lifeway" that we have to concentrate on educating people into it, rather than simply enjoying it for what it is. As for folk clubs changing, dying and being born - which is what has happened continuously for the last 50 years or so - I wouldn't trust the sole evidence of the BBC when I have the evidence of my own environment all around me.

Like many another before you, Conrad, you talk constantly of folk music consisting of songs. But, as I've constantly banged on about in this forum on previous threads (and I apologise in advance to those who know my taste here), traditional music is composed of both songs and tunes. There are literally hundreds of books of traditional tunes - arranged for piano, guitar, fiddle, mandolin, pipes - available for the musician. I was up in Morpeth only last week and picked up a clutch of tune books from the bagpipe museum. (The total cost of those books, by the way, was around the price of 4-5 pints of beer, and I know which will last longer and give me more pleasure).

I would be very interested in knowing what tunes you would select from your repertoire as being of importance - so important that they should be taught to people who know nothing of traditional music - so important that it's more important to teach them than to entertain with them. I await your response with bated breath...

... but I'm sure I'll wait in vain!