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Category: Alan Lomax

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Treasures of the AFC Archive Banner #3

Posted by: Stephen Winick

This is the third in a series of six posts presenting AFC’s new traveling exhibit Treasures of the American Folklife Center Archive. The exhibit takes the form of lightweight, colorful vinyl banners containing information about AFC, the Library of Congress, and (as the title suggests) some of the treasures found in our archive.  Originally conceived …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Lomax Kentucky Recordings Go Online

Posted by: Stephen Winick

Note: this blog post makes liberal use of a press release devised jointly by the organizations involved in this project, and especially of the announcement made by Berea College. As part of AFC’s year-long celebration of Alan Lomax (1915-2002) during his centennial year, the American Folklife Center is thrilled to announce that The Lomax Kentucky …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Rosanne Cash Curates a Carnegie Hall Exhibit with AFC

Posted by: Stephen Winick

When Rosanne Cash, recognized by the Library as one of the most compelling figures in popular music, was asked to curate a series of concerts at Carnegie Hall in New York, she graciously brought the American Folklife Center along for the ride. Cash asked AFC to help her curate a photo exhibit, which is being …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

Lomax Family Manuscripts Go Online

Posted by: Stephen Winick

The following is a guest post from Todd Harvey, the curator of the Alan Lomax Collection at the American Folklife Center archive, Library of Congress. The American Folklife Center today announces the online publication of the Lomax Family manuscripts. This phased project begins today, with access to 25,000 pages created primarily by Alan Lomax during …

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Rediscovering Lomax: Joshua Clegg Caffery and “I Wanna Sing Right”

Posted by: Stephen Winick

During the centennial year of the great folklorist Alan Lomax (1915-2002), we at AFC have been celebrating his legacy in all kinds of ways: digitizing collections, sponsoring performances, encouraging publications, creating web content, designing exhibits…even writing blog posts! One of the things we most loved about Alan was his concern that the field recordings he …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

The Folklore and Folksong of Trains in America, Part Two

Posted by: Stephanie Hall

This is the second part of a two-part article on the folklore of trains. Part one, focusing on the development of railroads in the United States and related songs and lore can be found here. Part Two: Trains and American Culture The coming of the railroads made profound changes in life and culture in the …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

AFC Junior Fellow April Rodriguez on Lomax’s Choreometrics

Posted by: Stephen Winick

The American Folklife Center is very grateful to April Rodriguez, one of this year’s 36 Library of Congress Junior Fellow Summer Interns.  April has been working with Alan Lomax’s choreometrics materials, a lesser-known but crucial aspect of his research. Her work has revealed aspects of the collection our own staff didn’t know about, and will …

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James P. Leary and Folksongs of Another America

Posted by: Stephen Winick

The following post introduces James P. Leary, a researcher who has published extensively on Library of Congress collections in the American Folklife Center. Most of the quotations from Leary in this article come from an email interview we did in July 2015, but I also quote occasionally from a lecture he gave at the Library …

A man playing a guitar and singing to a close crowd of a dozen or so men and women

The Folklore and Folksong of Trains in America, Part One

Posted by: Stephanie Hall

Part two of this article is available at this link. Part One:  The Development of the Railroads The advent of railroads in the United States is part of the country’s coming-of-age story as an industrial power during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Because of this, trains and people associated with the developing railways became …