"Gargoyle" Bobbie? Oh, Lord no!

First of all, I spent 15 minutes checking my spelling and syntax to the best of my ability, but more importantly, the obvious joy he gets from from his attacks would be anathema to me. I know he loves traditional music, but his cynicism towards people makes me quite sad. Thanks Bill, by the way.

There's no mystery or attempt to deceive here. I'm a typical long time opinionated Mudcatter, who's tried to contribute as much as I could in the areas I felt appropriate. Unlike the last 'guest' poster in the 'merely guest' thread, I've been very lax for a long time in the 'personal security' department, so decided to add some 'detachment' to my views. I'm obviously very pro-Mudcat, and that can engender some real nastiness these days. Whether it comes from 10 'guests' or one guest posting ten different ways, it takes away from the 'positives', and in my case, just makes me lose interest in the thread.

Completely in a different direction, I spent over an hour last night jotting down the names (or Mudcat 'handles') of the people still with us who are tremendously knowledgeable in several areas of folk music. I stopped at thirty, and I've no doubt that another hour's checking would have revealed at least another thirty. I'm talking about people who write succinctly and with clarity, quoting names, dates, places, hows, whens and whys. At different times I've accepted without question the point that some make about the 'real' folkies leaving Mudcat because of the 'bullshit'. I suspect now, that it's a very small number, and may well include people who simply don't think that 'folk music' goes beyond traditional balladry. Fair enough. I can see why they'd be very frustrated here. The argument that 'there's nobody left here who knows anything about folk music' is simply untrue. Mudcat may have it's share of 'casual folkies', but I'll bet that 90% of them want to, and HAVE learned a lot here. I think that's good enough for most of us.

traddles