"I'm very keen that we don't fall out about this "
Not as far as I'm concerned Joe - I may disagree with people about their very personal interpretation of folk song, but I feel rancour to very few - you don't begin to raise to those giddy heights
If you don't particularly like traditional song you are one of a vast majority in Britain - your/their loss, as far as I'm concerned (I have family members I feel the same about) :-}
The problem for me is that, judging by what's happened to the present scene, there are far too many who do do much about it

I find some of this discussion downright distressing - describing one of Englands best, last and most respected source singers as Water Pardon has been here would once have been met with cries of "lynch the bastard" and, had someone suggested that he had been falsely "lionised" and had no claim to being being part of the oral tradition, it would have been Martin Carthy and Norma Waterson and their daughter Eliza carrying the rope

I accept the statement for what it was and why it was made and can write it off as such, but the almost total lack of outrage that followed it shows clearly where folk stands at present - If this is where the scene stands it has lost its way and no is longer going anywhere
That's the hardest thing to come to terms with - the scene has been uprooted and is being used for something else entirely
I can only hope that this discussion is not representative of the wider picture, but I fear it might be

Jim Moray is not to my taste - I've actually argued with him (surprise-surprise) on this forum, but, were he just another experimenter with folk song, I would have no problem with his performance - the problems arise when he and people like him are taken up and 'lionized' by the media and given prizes as 'the Britain's best folksinger' which he oviously is not
You only have to put him up to, say Sam Larner or Phil Tanner, or Harry Cox to see that Jim is doing something else entirely different to our real folk singers
It is like giving George Butterworth or Ralph Vaughan Williams prizes as 'Britain's best folk composers' - I dote on the "cowpat" music of both but 'folk composers they are not

For me, the situation is that if someone doesn't come to terms with what is happening to English folk song (I totally agree with the poster who said that Scotland doesn't have the same problems), then folk song is going to be lost for generations to come
I'd put up with what has gone on here a thousand times if that could be avoided

Stewie
Lankum isn't particularly to my taste either, but I see them as part of the interesting and healthy experimentation in Irish Traditional singing that is taking place here at present   
If Lankum was the only, or even a major thing on offer in Ireland I might have a problem with them - thankfully they are not
Youngsters are beginning to take up the old songs in a big way and there are signs that the singing is being give the same guarantee of a future that the music has won for itself - on Tuesday we'll be at a mini-concert by two fine musicians and a singer, Máire Ní Chéileachair, who is busy encouraging and guiding young people into taking up their singing traditions
Hope the new Ken Loach film doesn't bring us down to earth with too much of a bang during our three days away

Coincidentally, we'll be in the venue where I first saw Lankum tonight - 'The Cobblestone' in Dublin - hopefully I'll get a song in myself
I've already chosen an English version of 'The Tailor's Britches' so I can get a plug in for Musical Traditions's rather good 'Songs of the North Riding' in the hope that they sell more than the three they managed for Sam Larner's magnificent double CD collection

"Have a good and safe trip, Jim."
Thanks for your good wishes Starry - Just learned that the beautiful three-master, 'Libertad' has docked on The Liffey and will be open to visitors - the icing on the cake
Jim