GUEST, re:   accents and dialect.

Richard Dyer-Bennet was cognizant of the need for regional accents and dialect in songs that call for it. He does a creditable Scottish accent in songs like "Bonnie Dundee" and "The Bonnie Earl of Moray," and Irish in "Molly Brannigan" and "The Kerry Recruit" and others. And as far as anything Lightnin' Hopkins did, Dyer-Bennet didn't touch blues. He knew his limitations (which, unfortunately, can't be said for all singers!).

It's a matter of TASTE. And mainly, making sure that the audience can hear the words, which is especially important in ballads, which are songs that tell a story. And for that matter, non-ballad folk songs usually imply a story.

Even when he used accents or sang in dialect, you never had any problem hearing the words Dyer-Bennet was singing.   

I've heard singers in coffee houses and at open mikes who spoke perfectly crisp, clear English go all "mush-mouthed," or put on some kind of indefinite semi-southern accent when they sang—only because it was a folk song. Trying to make out what's happening in a song when the singer is singing like he's got his mouth stuffed with hominy grits is, in a word, phony.

Dave Van Ronk had a voice like a rusty hinge. And Bob Dylan's school mates in Minnesota (when he was still Bob Zimmerman) said that when he was doing rock in high school, he had a smooth, clear voice, similar to Buddy Holly's. But when he got into folk, he did his damnedest to sound like he was eighty years old and had been inhaling coal-dust all his life.

But with Dave Van Ronk (who could really put a song across), and even with Bob Dylan doing his thing, you never had any problem hearing the words!

Taste is important. Even if it IS "just" a folk song. Really!

Don Firth