Steve
I sincerely hope things ahve changed radically at Cecil Sharp House
During my time in \london they were turning away major collections such as that of Leslie Shepherd (Broadsised and books) because there was simply no room - much of what they had was crammed into cupboards, much unexamined, never mind catalogued
We spent years searching for somewhere to leave our large collection and Library and totally failed in the UK - we couldn't give our sound archive away
We tried the Working Man's Library in Salford (who have dedicated part of their space to MacColl), but they neither have the staff or funding
WE didn't try Newcastle in vew of hahat happened to other University-based folk Departments - I can't remember whether it was Sheffield or Leeds whose newly appointed head peremptorily closed down her long running folk department, describing them as "tree-huggers)
We also suggested there might be a club willing to take our digitised sound archive as a resource for its members
One club refused our of hand, another could find no-one prepared to bell the cat
In the end we were lucky to ask Limerick Uni. World Music Centre who has welcomed the Library and collection and has suggested that they might be able to put sore recordings on line and use it to expand their already established Traveller section - there was talk of a 'Carroll/Mackenzie Library - I'm not sure I want that to happen

As far as I'm concerned,, the impossibility of bequeathing folk material is as much a sign of the run-down state of the folk scene as are the clubs
Jim