I think this has been touched on in another thread, but more and more I am receiving promos for albums by artists who have achieved a degree in performance arts or the historic traditions of music.
Dear old Cyril Tawney did it the other way round. He became famous first, then did his masters degree in Naval Folklore afterwards!

They are usually very good of course, (they ought to be) but I am wondering if a more valuable approach is to absorb the music and song at the feet of others in the family group or local folk community, if there is one.

I do seem to find that the academic approach has an element of showing off how clever the artist is, rather than making the best of the song. The song tends to be a vehicle for the artist's skills, rather than the artist being the purveyor of the song.

Maybe I'm totally wrong about this. There is obviously some cross-over too, but I would be interested in the thoughts of other Mudcatisti.