Steve Gardham wrote:-
You seem to place a lot of weight on Walter's discrimination and compartmentalisation of his repertoire. That is beyond question. You also seem to indicate that this is typical of source singers in England. I presume from that you have studied what is known about other traditional singers like Harry Cox for instance. I have also studied this sort of information and done a lot of recording of source singers in the 60s and 70s. I only know of one other singer, quite celebrated at the time, who was capable of/desirous of compartmentalising his songs in this way.

I find this very interesting and would like to extend it to the influence of their contact with the folk revival had on the source singers, their singing and their repertoire. Initially, I would like to stick to my own experience of what I remember of these singers and folk clubs in Sussex from the 1960s and 1970s onwards.
I have only realised in retrospect that the contact between the clubs and the old singers in Sussex was closer and more symbiotic than in other parts of the country - not all the clubs, of course, but certainly our club in Lewes along with the clubs in Horsham and Chichester. Other clubs saw that, for example, an evening with The Copper Family or Gordon Hall ensured a good crowd and (I suspect) booked them for that reason. Some comments on individuals: -

The Copper Family never, to my knowledge added to or augmented or changed their songs through their extensive contact with the folk clubs, though I know that the way that they sung them was discussed. I remember Bob telling me - in the presence of his son, John, that he had said when running through the songs, 'Hang on, boy, slow down a bit.... We're the Coppers; we're not The Young Tradition." Peter Bellamy was a huge fan of the Coppers but in his turn, John Copper was a huge fan of Peter. However, if you compare the speed of the early family recordings. Bob & Ron with their fathers, Jim & John with the current speed of songs in a live family performance then those early recordings you will find that generally, the old boys sang faster. Any singer will tell you that when you are in front of an enthusiastic audience that knows and loves the choruses that the pace of the song will be slowed.

George Belton lived near the Chichester club and was there every Friday and would turn up at our Saturday club pretty frequently whenever he could get a lift (usually Bob Lewis or Mary Aitchison). He and Johnny Doughty were the only ones who ever, as far as I remember, ever learned modern songs that he had heard in clubs. His way with Sydney Carter's Mixed Up Old Man became one of his party pieces, but the clubs also had another effect on his repertoire. Sometimes a younger singer would be singing a traditional song and his bright old eyes would light up and at the end of the song he would go into a huddle with his wife. A few weeks later he would turn up with a different version of that song. I am convinced that contact with folk clubs and festivals had a positive effect on his 'dormant' repertoire from his younger days.

George Spicer was the one who was most wary of folk clubs and was full of incisive questions about them - (Why do a lot of your singers sing with their eyes closed?) - but he must have got enough out of them to come back time and again. He was always the 'go to' person for an entertaining song after a darts match, a produce show or a cricket match - he was an umpire in village cricket for over 40 years. The skills that he had gained in singing in those circumstances proved to be very useful in folk clubs. His son, Ron, on the other hand loved folk clubs right from his first visit. He and Doris were our most regular supporters for over a decade. He started off with his dad's song but then he learned all sorts of others at a phenomenal rate, mainly traditional but country comedy and modern as well. I could point you to some of his modern songs that have been given a Roud Index number.
Johnny Doughty was certainly what you would call a character. He was another who could command an audience and had no trouble putting himself over in front of an audience. I had helped Jim Lloyd construct the line-up a concert at the Gardner Centre at the U. of Sussex and Johnny was amongst them. The concert was to be recorded and broadcast. Johnny kept stepping to the side of them and he sang directly to the audience. After his first song, Jim, as compere, came on and Johnny was asked to come backstage to be told - by me - to sing into the microphones. "Those bloody things are a nuisance. I can't see people's faces." I don't think his songs were broadcast. At one of the National Folk Festivals, Eddie Upton was his minder. Johnny had been asked to open a concert there for The Spinners and he was very worried about this. What would he suitable to sing in that situation? His wife made a suggestion. "Don't be daft, Meg! I learned that one off one of their records!"

Gordon Hall is a unique case amongst these singers. He actively sought out songs, versions, different tunes and I was one of the people that Gordon had long telephone conversations about where, for example, could he find more versions of Hind Horn. He wrote hilarious parodies of traditional songs, set his own tunes to broadsides like The Chichester Merchant (Roud 29941 ). His interest went far beyond the English tradition. His elder brother Albert moved to France after the 2nd World War and Gordon learned French songs from his brother. I had conversations with Gordon about which Portuguese Fado singers we liked just as I had chats with Bob Copper about early country blues.
Bob Blake was lovely as a singer and as a person. He had mixed for years with his contemporaries from the pre-folk revival singers in Sussex. To me he was one of them. Tony Wales. Nick Dow, John Howson, Mike Yates all collected songs from him but on investigation Mike found that Bob had not learned the songs from his community and therefore he was not a traditional singer. Quite a difficult decision and at one time, Mike waqs berating himself over this. My own view on this in that if a bird sings like a cuckoo, flies like a cuckoo and is a nest parasite, then it is probably a cuckoo. Bob Blake's recordings can be found in the Roud Index.