Traditional Folk

Traditional folk is music transmitted orally within a community across generations, authored communally rather than by known composers: ballads, work songs, lullabies, dance tunes and ritual songs preserved by memory and reshaped by every singer. Collectors such as *Cecil Sharp* and *Alan Lomax* documented the repertory in Britain and America, and source singers like *Jean Ritchie*, *Roscoe Holcomb* and *Shirley Collins* carried family and regional traditions onto record. The category stands apart from singer-songwriter folk: its songs belong to the community, vary from place to place, and often survive in dozens of versions at once.