Thanks for that Annie.
We had an odd experiece years ago here at a singing session in Miltown Malbay.
We were sitting with an Irish Language singer (very well known and respected on the scene) and her husband and Pat, my wife, had just sung MaColl's 'The Trees They are Ivied'
John, the husband, who adored his wife's singing and went to listen to her every time she sang, turned to Pat and asked, somewhat puzzled, "what shtyle's dat?"
Pat explained about Scots ballads and, how they were 'story based' and the importance of the words - John replied, "oh, I never listen to the words".
Joe is right in the sense that there are no 'hard and fast rules" - you can perform these songs (I'm talking about traditional or traditionally based ones) in any way you choose, to the accompaniment of a string quartet or a thirty-piece orchestra, if that's what turns you on, but if you are going to follow the function of the song, you have to understand the words in a way in which they can be interpreted in order to make sense of them.
In Joe's case, America is different - his traditions took a turn in the road somewhere and many of them became instrumental based - just digitized dozens of Appalachian albums of songs and ballads from the thirties and became hooked - beautiful but different, and not something I could ever manage as a singer, or a listener for too long periods - there's not enough in them to hold my attention - but that is down to my taste.
The English, Scots and Irish song traditions are basically unaccompanied and the songs are structured around that fact
Alan Lomax's Cantrometrics team summed them up perfectly as being "wordy" and, if you don't interpret the words they become superfluous and you may as well just pay the tunes.
Of course accompaniment can be used, MacColl and Seeger claimed that, for them as professional performers, it was essential for them to present a mixture of both to hold the attention of their audiences by providing a balance to the evenings.
But they also insisted that, if you produce only a 'sound' when you're singing, which can be what happens with over-instrumented songs, the audiences stop listening; "Their ears go to sleep".
This can also happen if singers all sing in the same tone, or use only one 'effort' (dynamic) - but that's a different problem.
Jim Carroll