Nick wrote: -
Some of us will have gone to the great sing around in the sky, others will not feel like running weekly or even monthly Folk Clubs.
Well, a lot of us had done our share and we have been saying for a while that we need a lot a new blood on the organisation side but it is not coming through in the numbers that there were 30/40 years ago.
This is not just a folk music phoenomenon, Nick, it is a societal thing. There is an annual event at Lewes Town Hall called the Societies Fair where every local organisation, political, environmental, charitable, musical, artistic, cultural etc. are gathered together for the day. It is really encouraging to see that so many things happen in a small town but a couple of years ago when I was there the local folkie organisers promoting our festival and folk clubs, I took time to go round the stall holders networking with them, I found that nearly all the organisers were in their 60s or 70s and I frequently heard comments like, 'I shouldn't be doing this anymore, but I can't anyone younger to take over'.
It is one of the ways that society and communities have changed. If you try to examine the reasons for this, you will find they are complex. Employment is less secure and more demanding on people's time and energy. Just think how the conduct of General Elections have changed, Local hustings and candidate meetings used to be at the core of them - now it's all advertising, social media, radio and TV debates. This is just skimming the surface of the way we live has evolved.
All we can say it that compared with similar minority musics folk music is not doing so badly. In the 1960s there was probably as much jazz as folk music in pubs in the Lewes/Brighton area. The impression I get today is that there must be ten folk events for every jazz one.