I face this same question each week when I plan and present the music for our church service. The best stuff is the old stuff. But I am not of that culture that spawned it; I know I layer on my own life experience, as much as I may love the originals (whatever THAT means).

What I try to do is present things so that they are within my own authenticity, and point the way to the source materials for people to dive in if they wish to capture something of the older sensibilities. I think that's what is fair to expect of anyone-- to know as much as we can about how the music came forward to now, and be a signpost pointing back to the wealth of tradition.

We each do that in our own ways, or we would not be artists (or think we are), we would be curators. Both are needed.

I think what is true about music, and people, is that there will always be people who love the pure and authentic, and are collectors and teachers and sharers of wisdom, and there will always be people whose interest is in the here and now, and who will make the old songs live in the culture of the day. It's a vast continuum of individual responses to music, and there is a big middle ground, too, because each person who encounters the music responds individually. That's just how music is, and how people are.

~Susan