By the way, Terry, speaking of "the tip of the iceberg" as was mentioned above, if you want a broader overview of the iceberg before delving in, a good though rather scholastic-oriented book is _Ballads into Books: The Legacies of Francis James Child_. (Editors Tom Cheesman, Sigrid Rieuwerts; pub. by Peter Lang; 2nd revised ed. 1999.) It's a collection of selected papers from the 26th Int'l Ballad conference held in Swansea, Wales in 1996 which address Child's life, ideas, and the sources for his works - as well as current thinking on his ballads, and the place of ballads in different cultures - both as written texts and as songs sung - in the past and present. If you're feeling studious about it, it's a good way to ease yourself into the study of ballads.