"The very act of recording someone singing"
This depends entirely on the relationship between the singer and collector
We recorded our singers for as long as we could manage
We recorded Walter over twenty years - he became a close friend and I believe what we got from him was 'natural' - we have his the recording he made of himself before he was ever 'discovered' which confirms that belief
We recorded Kerry Traveller Mikeen McCarthy regularly fro, 1975 to his death in 2005 - Mikeen was another family friend , as was Tipperary Traveller, Mary Deleney and Clare singer, Tom Lenihan - all important sources of information on singing styles and functions

One of the things we found fro Mikeen was how some singers altered their singing to suit their particular surroundings - street singing and ballad selling required one approach, singing in noisy pubs, another - singing on the site was entirely different to both - he referred to it as 'fireside style'

Personally, I love singing and sing all the time (often to the annoyance of Pat) but I cannot bear to listen to my recorded voice - I never have
Maccoll once told us that he could not listen to any of his early recordings
Jim Carroll