GSS:rob naylor, manY GUEST BOOKING folk clubs STILL ARE THE BEST WAY TO LEARN HOW TO PERFORM.
Open Mics, rely upon microphones, microphones are a barrier in the art of performing, opoen mics encourage the music to be background music, in my opinion that is the wrong approach.

Firstly, your initial posts were putting forward the thesis that fingerpicking was dying out among younger guitarists. Myself and others disagreed, and gave concrete examples, stating that folk clubs were perhaps not places that these younger finger-pickers frequented.

You then appeared to change tack and say that these youngsters "should" go to folk clubs as they were the "best places to learn to perform". We'll have to disagree on that....regarding the learning *from* people, I pointed out above how much learning went on at the 2 open mics I attend semi-regularly AFTER the PA was turned off, everyone else had left and those musicians who were interested swapped techniques, tips and ideas. More productive, I reckon, than watching Carthy or whoever and trying to see what they're doing from the back of a crowded room.

There are many other places than open mics where youngsters can hone their skills. As I pointed out above, in Tunbridge Wells there's the Grey Lady Music Lounge, and The Forum, both of which showcase young talent to mainly respectful audiences. There's also the Trinity Theatre which showcases during spring and summer many of the artistes who play at the "Local & Live" festival at the end of August. I reckon local musicians will learn to perform in these venues more easily, and to more enthusiastic audiences mainly their own age (myself and a few others excepted!) than they would in folk clubs.

You sound remarkably like my dad did in the 60s when he dismissed all then "modern" music as noise, and disparaged the musicianship of youngsters....at a time when the Carthys, Grahams, Joneses etc of our generation ( not to mention the Claptons, Pages etc) were getting to the tops of their forms.

To summarise: fingerpicking is certainly not dying out. It's alive and well, but going on in places that you don't frequent. Youngsters are learning to perform in a variety of venues, some against background noise (though you can hear a pin drop at the Ax Open Mic when a performer "grabs" the audience) and some where the audience's default mode is quiet. Not many of them are doing this at folk clubs, which they don't seem to find very relevant. Which is probably as it should be. In the 60s folk clubs were part of the cutting edge of youth culture. Now they're not.