Steve
Something you have yet to address is the wide reaching implications of your claim - and not just about song

Date: 23 Apr 12 - 02:46 PM
My statement
"The same goes for 'folk' tales, customs, beliefs, dances, music, lore, painting.... it is their common origin which identifies them all as "folk art""
Your response
Sorry, Jim, this is just not true, except one would presume with folk painting, much of the rest originated in high art! Or certainly higher than the common folk, sophisticated sources in other words. Dances in particular."
You would have us that working people in the past left no evidence of creative ability with the exception of stone-age cave painting
A serious charge to make
Jim Carroll