BBC2's current series about the origins of modern British folk music is strong on faces - Martin Carthy, Norma Waterson, Kathryn Tickell - but not so hot on places.

England's first folk club was founded by the great Ewan McColl in London in 1953. Ballads and Blues, which later became The Singers' Club, closed in 1991.

The Good Earth, founded in London in 1954, lasted just five years. The only other folk clubs of note were Wayfarers in Manchester, Spinners in Liverpool and The Topic in Bradford.

Unlike the others The Topic, founded by Alex and Louise Eaton and friends in 1956, is still going.

For 22 of its 50 years, The Topic was based at The Star, Westgate (1969-1991) and The Melborn, White Abbey Road, (July 1995 to the end of 2005). Concerts now take place at The Cock and Bottle pub near Bradford Cathedral on a site associated with brewing and drinking since 1747.

Not so long ago The Cock and Bottle had a little run as a Christian pub, but the idea of dropping in for a chat about God and a jar of Old Muff' in that particular part of Bradford 3 did not catch on.

Evidently the late 1950s was a hot time for music venues in Bradford. Apart from ballroom dancing, which was popular, jazz nights were regular at city-centre pubs such as The King's head, The Castle Hotel and The Market Tavern. In 1957 The Students' Club, in a basement under what is now Prince's Way, added skiffle to the weekend music scene.

The Topic - named after a record label - started out in September 1956, in the upstairs of a building in Albion Court, off what is now Kirkgate. Laycock's Tearooms was a temperance hotel which had been a location for radical political debate over the years. The site is now occupied by the New Guiseppe's restaurant.

During the five-year period from 1959 to 1964 that the club was based at The Fox and Goose pub, then in Canal Road, popular music underwent its second great innovation since skiffle - the advent of rock 'n' roll.

Something else happened too. John Waller, assistant secretary of the University of Bradford, who now runs the Thursday night club, said he had it on good authority that a young American singer visited the club one night.

"The word is that Bob Dylan came in with Ramblin' Jack Elliott. His performance was not treated with acclaim. Who was this youth singing scratchy songs that had no history to them?' "I have spoken to a number of people who were there who saw him. It was probably 1962 because by 1964 he was established. He probably got up and did a couple of songs and nobody thought much of it," he said.

At that time the British folk scene was divided between traditionalists, left-wingers and innovators. When John Waller came to Bradford 36 years ago he said there was a dichotomy between traditionalists and those who, like Ralph McTell, were writing their own material. McTell's Streets of London was an enormous hit.

"I was made to feel unwelcome, so I went to the Bradford Playhouse and Film Theatre for 20 years.

"In the last ten years the Topic has had an absolutely eclectic mix of singer-songwriters with fewer and fewer traditional musicians. They don't attract audiences as much as what you might call contemporary entertainers," he added.

Even so, folk legend Martin Carthy has been booked to perform at The Topic early next year.

"It doesn't take much to survive. The club has met weekly. Sometimes that means three people with guitars turning up to sing. You can run it with no income and no expenditure. At basic it's just people meeting in a pub. We happen to have a constitution, a membership, an annual meeting and contracts with established artists," Mr Waller said.

The Topic also has a healthy five-figure bank balance which has enabled John Waller to book artists such as Julie Felix, blues guitarist Wizz Jones, who first played at The Topic in 1958 and Bradford's own Scarlet Heights in advance. The Topic is booked up until December 20 even though the trend is changing.

"There is a growing tendency for people to gather in pubs to play. The Gaping Goose at Wibsey and The Abbey at Kirkstall where you can get 50 to 60 people. There is a real tradition of that in folk music.

"There are a lot of active singers and musicians about. In its heyday The Topic got about 100 people in to watch a booked guest who had hitched up from London. Now you get people slightly greyer, bearded, 50-ish - like me - who play and sing a bit.

"Fewer people sit down and listen. Most the people who go to folk clubs can do a session themselves. The standard, I would say, is utterly variable. You don't get many young people in now," Mr Waller said.

Perhaps that's because young people prefer an entirely different style of entertainment, more akin to an all-action rave than an evening of beer, beards and worthy sentiments about farm labourers and the gipsy way of life.

Looking back over the 50 years of The Topic's existence and the club's 11 venues the obvious conclusion is that place is not as important as the people who choose to keep the idea of the club going.

"The Topic has kept going because there has been a succession of people who decided to keep it going. Roger Sutcliffe ran it for three or four years before he got fed up with it. He's in Whitby now, but every July 4 he comes back. It has to be July 4 because he plays American blues. Philomena Hingstone took it on for ten years. She's 79 now. She stopped doing the doors in December. It would stop if nobody could be bothered," he added.