Major performers who emerged from the 1940s to the early 1960s included Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Peter, Paul and Mary, Phil Ochs and Tom Paxton.

In the UK, the folk revival fostered a generation of musicians such as Fairport Convention, Richard Thompson, Donovan, Martin Carthy, and Pentangle, who achieved initial prominence in the 1960s.

Major changes occurred through the evolution of established performers such as Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Judy Collins, and Peter, Paul and Mary, and also through the creation of new fusion genres with rock and pop.

The Canadian performers Gordon Lightfoot, Leonard Cohen, Bruce Cockburn and Joni Mitchell represented such fusions and enjoyed great popularity in the U.S.

"[5] Though he considers folk music to be difficult to define, Blumenfeld lists some observed consistencies:[5] Beginning in the post World War II era, folk revivals occurred in Europe, Canada, and the United States, and developed through the 1960s, with the subject matter of this music influenced by the political and social climates of the day.

[7] Odetta, who is known for blending her operatic vocal background with blues and folk songs, was notably active in the Civil Rights Movement, which is reflected in her music.

Starting in 1950, the Sing Out!, Broadside, and The Little Sandy Review magazines helped spread both traditional and composed songs, as did folk-revival-oriented record companies.

Bob Dylan, Paul Simon and Tom Paxton visited Britain for some time in the early 1960s, the first two especially making later use of the traditional English material they heard.

In 1950, prominent American folklorist and collector of traditional songs Alan Lomax came to Britain and met A. L. 'Bert' Lloyd and Ewan MacColl, a meeting credited as inaugurating the second British folk revival.

[9] At the same time, Quebec folk singer-songwriters like Gilles Vigneault and groups such as La Bottine Souriante were doing the same in the French-speaking world.

Most of the audience for folk music in those years were part of the working class, and many of these songs expressed resistance to the social order and an anger towards the government.

Major changes occurred through the evolution of established performers such as Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Judy Collins, the Seekers and Peter Paul and Mary, and also through the creation of new fusion genres with rock and pop.

[13] Other performers such as Simon & Garfunkel and the Mamas & the Papas created new, hard-to-classify music that was folk-inflected and often included in discussions of folk rock.

[16] Songs like Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind" became an anthem for the civil rights movement, and he sang ballads about many other current issues of the time, such as "Hard Rain's Gonna Fall" about the Cuban missile crisis.

The Canadian performers Gordon Lightfoot, Leonard Cohen, Bruce Cockburn and Joni Mitchell represented such fusions and enjoyed great popularity in the U.S.; all four were eventually invested with the Order of Canada.

The mid to late Sixties saw the development of British folk rock, with a focus on indigenous (European, and, emblematically, English) songs.

Fairport Convention, Pentangle, Alan Stivell and Mr. Fox's work included electrification of traditional musical forms.

In the British Isles, the Pogues in the early 1980s and Ireland's the Corrs in the 1990s brought traditional tunes back into the album charts.

Folk metal bands such as Korpiklaani, Skyclad, Waylander, Ensiferum, Ithilien and Finntroll meld elements from a wide variety of traditions, including in many cases instruments such as fiddles, tin whistles, accordions and bagpipes.

[22][23][verification needed] The Ashgate Research Companion to Popular Musicology describes folktronica as "a catch-all [term] for all manner of artists who have combined mechanical dance beats with elements of acoustic rock or folk.

"[24] The 1993 album Every Man and Woman is a Star by Ultramarine is credited as a progenitor of the new music; it featured a pastoral sound and incorporated traditional instruments such as violin and harmonica with techno and house elements.

[25] According to The Sunday Times Culture's Encyclopedia of Modern Music, essential albums of the genre are Four Tet's Pause (2001), Tunng's Mother's Daughter and Other Songs (2005), and Caribou's The Milk of Human Kindness (2005).

[26] More "worldbeat" influenced electronic folk acts include Bryn Jones with his project Muslimgauze (before his death in 1999), the artists of Asian underground movement (Cheb i Sabbah, Asian Dub Foundation, Joi, State of Bengal, Transglobal Underground, Natacha Atlas), Shpongle, Home Sweet Somewhere, Mavka, Ott, Zavoloka, Linda George, Banco de Gaia, AeTopus, Zingaia, Afro-Celt Sound System, Métisse, A Tribe Called Red, Go_A, and some early work by Yat-Kha (with Ivan Sokolovsky[27]).

Some of the definitive country folk artists from the early years include Harry McClintock,[28][29] John Prine, Kate Wolf, and Nanci Griffith—all singer-songwriters with thoughtful lyrics whose arrangements are backed by the aforementioned instruments.

Emmylou Harris moved into neo-traditionalist country, Chris Hillman into progressive bluegrass, brother harmony duo (with Herb Pedersen), and Bakersfield revival.

Still, later low-key, acoustic-dominant country-inflected recordings by these and many other earlier artists have at times loosely, but not inaccurately, been defined as country folk by some sources.