Thanks, Susanne - I stand corrected!

Were/are the band Irolt low German? (Sorry, my UK geography is bad enough - when it gets to Germany I'm hopeless) - we saw them at Bracknell many years before Jams were over here. (I think their dialect/language was Friesian).

I know the Bavarians see themselves as "apart" (indeed, some of them seem to have forgotten who "won" the last war . . ) Which is why it's perverse that their music, to most people, characterises "German" "folk" music . . .

However it remains my IMPRESSION that when in France or Spain you can't miss the regional "flavours" of the folk music, whereas in Germany (excluding Bavarian and Austrian) I've never encountered that subdivision. Although, as has been widely noted, the only "flavour" of folk (with the previous exclusions) it's easy to find is Irish!

Not that we go as far south as Bavaria - well, not recreationally, anyway! (Our head office is in Munich, but that's another story.)

G.