My wife has a long list of "folk songs" she sings to the kid before bed. They are 100% John Denver, Joan Baez & Peter Paul & Mary.
You know, as someone who loves folk music, folk stories, folk art, etc., I'm not too sure of the mechanisms behind how something goes from "someone's song" to a "folk song" or "someone's story" to "folk story." I've heard it argued though, that a hundred years from now, people might know the tunes and lyrics to artists like The Beatles or Bob Marley, but not necessarily know who originally wrote and performed them, effectively making them folk songs. But then, we would still know who made them, so they also wouldn't be folk songs. I dunno. Everyone seems to run by different definitions and maybe that's part of the problem. I've also heard it argued, somewhat convincingly actually, that kids in their bedrooms recording themselves playing the guitar and covering other artist's songs, is basically the 21st expression of folk music. It's just that the community has gone from a public gathering to the internet. At least your wife isn't singing Lady Antebellum or Florida Georgia Line or something.
I have no problem with my wife singing Joan Baez to the kid. And yeah - this is from a 1941 Yiddish musical but you know what? Nobody saw that musical. They listened to Track 7. This reflects my bias, this reflects my experience, this reflects my prejudice, this is not necessarily accurate to the rest of the world but I fucking hate folk music. Not because it's folk music but because 99% of it is Bob Dylan or The Chieftains or Peter Paul & Mary and what it is? What it truly is? Is a bunch of privileged 'boomer ex-hippies claiming their musical tastes are superior to mine because they've been filtered through a wokeness filter. For People Of A Certain Age (who include my parents), all music is crap except music with "heritage." That "heritage" is invariably "one of my dirty hippie idols sang it back in the '60s." These are the people who booed Dylan at Newport, the ones who disavowed Denver when he went on the Muppets, who will tell you The Chieftains are "musicologists" while The Pogues are "noise" and Clannad is music while Enya is "new age dreck." The argument "what is folk" permanently poisoned me to all things folk-related forever because it's so hypocritical. It's so disingenuous. It's an attempt to argue that one form of music is objectively better than another because of some trumped-up pedigree. I sing my kid Waltzing Matilda and Molly Malone because they're jumped-up fake folk. Fuckin' Molly Malone wasn't even written in fucking Ireland. My main problem is most of the stuff I'd sing the kid has pauses for guitar solos; she got a fair amount of Jane's Addiction for awhile.
"All music is folk music, I ain't never heard no horse sing a song" - Louis Armstrong
Mmm. Yeah. I come from a slightly different direction, but end up at a similar perspective. Personally, I think people are not only concerned with pedigree, but aesthetics. Me? I worry more about the philosophy and the drive to play. I'd readily argue that a bunch of kids playing a barn show doing Stooges and Ramones covers for free because they like the music and they like to party or a bunch of kids experimenting with Hip-Hop and mixing equipment on their downtime and those afore mentioned kids and their YouTube covers, have more right to the "folk" title than commercial country music.The argument "what is folk" permanently poisoned me to all things folk-related forever because it's so hypocritical. It's so disingenuous. It's an attempt to argue that one form of music is objectively better than another because of some trumped-up pedigree.