In this post, the American Folklife Center (AFC) highlights a May 2024 concert performance and oral history interview with the Somapa Thai Dance Company and Orchestra--an ensemble performing traditional music from Thailand, whose members now predominately live in the Washington, DC metropolitan region. The AFC organized Somapa's performance in celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and as part of the 2024 Homegrown Concert Series.
The following is a guest blog post by Don Bannai and George Wada, Veterans History Project interviewers with the Asian American Community Media Project. Two years ago a couple of guys, George Wada and Don Bannai, had an idea. Japanese American veterans of the Vietnam era deserved to have their oral histories recorded to recognize …
In the Botkin Folklife Lectures Plus series, we present selected lectures in our Benjamin Botkin Folklife Lectures series that also had accompanying oral history interviews, placing both together in an easy-to-find blog post. In this post, we'll present a classic lecture from 2018: Joseph J. Palackal and his presentation Syriac Chants & Aramaic Christianity in India. As usual for posts in this series, you'll find a lecture video, an interview video, and a set of links to explore.
Welcome back to Homegrown Plus! We're continuing the series with a concert and interview featuring Grammy Award winning American Roots artists Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer together with accomplished Chinese classical hammered dulcimer player Chao Tian. The trio's repertoire includes traditional Chinese and Appalachian music as well as contemporary and traditional music from around the world. They use instruments that include yangqin (Chinese hammered dulcimer), gourd banjo, five-string banjo, ukulele, guitars, dumbek, cello-banjo and mandolin, employing them in unusual combinations to create exciting new arrangements of old music. Cathy and Marcy join Chao in singing Chinese songs, and Chao easily adds her love of American Old-Time music to fiddle tunes and songs. As usual with Homegrown Plus blogs, you'll find the concert video, an interview video, and a wealth of links to related collections and concerts, all right here in this blog post.
