Whatever culture it might come from, traditional music, by definition, needs to be passed from generation to generation in order to survive. This process is alive and well in the British Isles. Ancestral songs and dance tunes from various regional traditions are being enthusiastically reinterpreted and revitalized by a new cast of singers and instrumentalists, most of whom learned the music from parents and performers of the 1960s folk revival generation. Now in their 20s and making music themselves, they have taken their place as a part of a folk process that's as strong and vital as anything that came before. One of the best of these new generation musicians is Kate Rusby, a young singer/guitarist/ keyboard player from Yorkshire who has a voice and a presence as timeless and familiar as the English rain.

Although she's had only a few years to build an audience, the diminutive, vivacious Rusby has already become one of the most popular performers in the British folk scene. Her warm, endearing, comfortable alto voice sparkles on lighter material, but she can also capture the chilling edge of singers like June Tabor on the darker songs that make up much of her repertoire. She relishes being a part of a long tradition and studies old source material with an enthusiasm seldom seen these days, but her most distinctive talent lies in adapting, arranging, and pushing the songs into brilliantly contemporary new versions. On stage, she's a naturally charismatic performer whose wry, self-deprecating sense of humor contrasts with the mature emotion and vocal strength of her singing. And she's still at a relatively early point in a career that seems to hold even more promise. Like most of the new wave of tradition-oriented British musicians, Rusby credits her parents with her introduction to the music. "It all started when I was really, really small," she explained last January, in a cheerfully chatty phone conversation from her home near the onetime coal-mining town of Barnsley. "Both of my parents have been interested in folk music for years and years, since they were 19 or 20." Ann and Steve Rusby were active amateur musicians and fans, playing in a local ceilidh band, working in the summer as festival staffers, and attending lots of concerts year round with their children in tow. "So when I was young I was brought up with the music, because they were always singing and going to folk festivals and sessions and things like that where there was live music around all the time. Most kids over here don't get in contact with live music until they go see their first rock band when they're teenagers, but I'd already had it. We always had a lot of instruments hanging around the house as well; I'd been a-plunkin' and a-plinkin' and all that kind of stuff. My dad is a sound man at a lot of the folk festivals, and he's been doing that since I was about four or five. It was just another reason that I was around music. Most of the weekends through summer I was at these festivals with the rest of my family, and just kind of lapping up all of the music.

"Then I got interested in the stories in the songs. All of the old songs are just so special, and always make me cry, almost, when I find a new song. Oh, god, it's awful!" she added, with one of her frequent bubbly laughs. "For some reason that's the kind of music that cries out to me most. I've always had this strong bond with it, and it's my first love, really, in music. But I do also listen to lots of other kinds of pop music and rock music and all that kind of stuff. I don't listen just to folk music, although my collection now is huge. I can't fit it in my house any more. So many CDs everywhere, they're going in my bathroom now!"