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Still lagging here. I have the grid filled, the line from the song and the additional letters neatly added to the preceding line but am stumped by what 'particpants' refers to. Is there more than one version of the song? I can only see one type of participant, albeit moving in different sized groups.

the 6 non participants (not the other 20 ......not your 6 letters + 4 letters from the song)...are in a diagonal . the other 20 are in 4 diagonals going the other way.

20 + 6 = ....

"the other 20 are in 4 diagonals going the other way".

Mine must be wrong then

It should be as in the song, so it's five diagonals.

Notnil, remember that the "participants" are what you get by prefixing the six letters to the subjects of the song.

Thanks, Mathsprorockstar. I feel like one of those seaside arcade games when the penny takes a long time to drop. Thanks for the shove.

To my delight I solved the AZED Playfair having put this Listener aside for two days.
have now returned to it and am back to my usual state of confusion. I simply can't get the song so can go no further. A fair hint (on this thread) would be to ask which of the clues clues are the extra words nth letter - as opposed to 2nd. I think I have (all) the extra words but, assuming the letters are in clue order, cannot see any word pattern.

I'm keen to slog on so any help apprecaited.

To be fair to you, Williamseal, I had never heard of this song before this week either. You can find it easily by Googling the second letters message. This excludes 16Ac, 21Ac, 33Ac, 9Dn, 18Dn, 23Dn. It is (3, 6, 3, 4, 2, 4, 3, 4) The important number you require from the preceding line rhymes with the last 4 letter word. This number gives you the nth letters from excluded words in 16Ac, 21Ac, 33Ac, 9Dn, 18Dn, 23Dn, which must be placed in front of the protagonists from the preceding line. You then have to identify 20 of the newly formed protagonists (5 diagonal lines of 4 symmetrically placed). The non participants (6) are 5 obviously excluded from the 20 by their nature and one usually included but infiltrating the diagonal line of the obvious non participants. Beware of 7 down's 7th letter.

I’ve highlighted the 20 plus 6 but having sat back I am unhappy about 30ac. I have fiuit which can’t be right.

Sorted! Why does the penny always drop as soon as you post!