Jim, sorry to take so long to respond to your response to my response etc - I've been busy writing an article on Canny Fettle (in which you get mentioned, by the way!)...

Anyhow, just a couple of things. I was interested to see your dictionary definition of "traditional" included "Any time-honoured practice or a set of such practices." Now, I know I should probably pause to attempt to define both "time-honoured", "practice" and, for that matter, "any", but it does occur to me that any practice that has been going on for years in the folk scene, such as the writing of new songs in the traditional folk idiom, might be accurately described as one of the traditions of that scene. I do accept your point that such a tradition is different to the older tradition of creating and passing down and mutating songs within a village or region or work community, but as that tradition is almost certainly extinct in the UK, this newer tradition (60 years young!) in the folk community is an interesting developement in its own right and, it might be argued, a tradition in its own right, albeit one that is slightly different to the older defunct folk tradition - largely because of the differences in what constitutes community. It is fascinating to think that for the past 60 years there has been a group of people who self-consciously attempt to write songs that echo and pay homage to the traditional songs of these islands and get taken up and sung by other members of that community, some of whom will not only have not met the author, but not even be aware of their existance. I wonder what this process is, if its not a form of the folk process still alive and kicking in this particular community of interest?

"Going by your own definition - what right have you to suggest that Elvis tributes don't count at a folk club - the club is the community, therefore anything they care to put on is 'traditional' - isn't that what you are suggesting?"

Not at all. For a start off, I'm not attempting to define anything, just to describe something that appears to be actually happening in a particular community - if you accept my description of the folk scene as a community. If its not, it certainly looks and behaves like one! As for Elvis tributes, I would suggest that would be something slightly different to writing new songs in the style of traditional songs. Though, of course, there is an argument that some of Elvis's earliest singles were rooted in the blues and folk traditions of the American south, if different in execution and purpose.

Anyway, I digress. Back to listing great songs, I reckon.