"People can always read the book."
The review that stands out for me said "Look - the folk didn't write folk songs"
That for me undermines the whole basis of folk song
The folk revival went crashing in flames when people started taking the"folk" out of folk clubs and our guarantee of hearing a folk song was removed from us.

Irish Traditional music has been guaranteed a future because a handful of dedicated people built a solid foundation for it based on what the singers and musicians actually sang, played and said
The annual Willie Clancy Summer School (last months was the 46th) was started to honour a fine traditional musician, the first classes, talks and recitals were largely presented by traditional musicians and singers and that has remained the policy for four months short of half a century
Many of the old pupils and attendees of the events are now teachers as researchers themselves and there are literary many hundreds of young people coming onto the scene, some playing better than their teachers.
They can do what they want with the music now - modernise it, experiment with it, merge it with other forms - but the fact that a basis has been built means that it will never be lost among the other genres.
We wouldn't know where to begin if some bugger kept moving the goal-posts as this lot has done.
Irish people now know wahat traditional music is, it is presented on the radio and television most nights of the week, it is recognised as an art form, even by the formal arts world and it is now treated with pride and respect
Before the bankers ***** up our economy, asking for a grant for research was pushing on an open door (we were lucky enough to get two)
The fact that our County Library opened a website to make our Clare songs available is indicative of how "the times they are a-changin' here, as is the fact that the Council appointed two singers-in-residence to take our songs around the local schools   
The Irish Traditional music Archive was opened by Ireland's first woman president, the lovely Mary Robinson and he move to spectacular new premises im Merrion Square was honoured by the Irish Arts Minister

On a personal level, at present I can go out five/six nights a week and hear traditional music well played (that will probably drop to three-four nights during the winter months
Song has some way to go to catch up, but some of us are working on that all the time

It's not the facile boom that once took place, here and in Britain - it's here to stay and many of the musicians are now parts of dynasties - grandparents, parents, children, grandchildren....
That would never have happened in w situation where those involved couldn't find their folk arse with both hands - it was fought for y people who knew what traditional music was and how unique and important it was.