The attendance figures have plummeted - Can't remember if you are one of them, but some have excused this as 'oldies dying off' so someone seems to agree with me
The clubs have diminished in number - acknowledged by people who clain that festivals are the thing now or people are singing at home (this information has been gathered by spy cameras presumably)
THere can be litle doubt that people have turned away from folk song by the number of people who make excuses for there being no guarantee to hear a folk song in a folk club any more
Not anecdotal Dave - actual statements here
I started a thread based on Rod Stradling's declarations of plummeting sales - more figures
People are not only not willing to discuss this situation, but resort to insults when the matter is raised
You are one of the 'good guys' as far as I'm concerned, yet your persistent complacency depresses me - "if you want to hear good folk songs come to Yorkshire" is just that
EFDSS had always been the butt of jokes - now they have even ceased to be funny
An the research side, we have ivory tower researchers who respond to criticism with patronising and insulting and seem to have dedicated themselves to tearing down all past work to make room for their own - Dave Harker's 'Hit-list technique.
Discussions like this have made me more-or-less write off the English folk scene - my concern is now for the survival of what I consider the most important of our art forms
Jim