I was aware of this sort of gathering very early in my life and by the 60s I was savvy enough to try to get as much recorded as possible even if all I could afford was the cheapest Phillips little reel to reel. All of that material is now cleaned up and deposited in the British Library Sound Archive for posterity. My maternal grandparents both sang mainly Music Hall from the 1890s and parodies, but the odd trad song like The Derby Ram as well. And we had the old upright in the front room so any excuse for a knees-up was taken up. My mother sang stuff she'd learnt as a child, 'Still I love him' 'I wish I was single again', and wartime songs and lullabies. My uncles who were in the Navy in the Korean War knew lots of trad stuff that was sung in the sods operas, 'Died for Love' etc. I filled notebooks with street rhymes, games and songs, and then when a little older filled more notebooks with rugby songs from playing rugby and being in the ATC.
This led me into investigating the singing pubs where I found old salts who had rounded Cape Horn and sang chanties, and from there out into the surrounding villages recording old traditional songs in rural areas.

Hull, Yorkshire.