On January 29th, the AFC launched the Live! In the Archive concert series, where artists are invited to perform selections from the Center’s collections live in its reading room. The first artists featured in this new concert series were Lone Piñon. The video of their Live! In the Archive concert is embedded in this blog post, which also contains an interview with Jordan Wax and Tanya Nuñez of Lone Piñon.
Episode eighteen of the Folklife Today Podcast (or Season 2, Episode 6) is ready for listening! Find it at this page on the Library’s website, or on Stitcher, iTunes, or your usual podcatcher. It's the first episode of the podcast that we've created from our homes, while unable to return to our offices or studio in the Library of Congress due to the social distancing measures imposed by Covid-19. In the episode, John Fenn and I talk to three AFC staff members, Allina Migoni, Michelle Stefano, and Maya Lerman, about folklife collections and items that have been inspiring to them in this strange and difficult time. We also talk about some of the materials that have been inspiring us. As usual, there are lots of audio excerpts from tunes, songs, and interviews in AFC collections.
This guest post by Alda Allina Migoni of the AFC reference staff is the first in a series of posts called Staff Finds During Difficult Times, in which staff members discuss collections and items that have been inspiring them while they are working at home during the covid-19 pandemic or in other difficult circumstances. In …
In the Homegrown Plus series, we present Homegrown concerts that also had accompanying oral history interviews, placing both together in an easy-to-find blog post. (Find the whole series here!) We’re continuing the series with a concert and oral history with Grupo Rebolú. Grupo Rebolú is an Afro-Colombian musical ensemble that includes some of the finest Colombian …
It’s Valentine’s Day. It seems everyone has love on their minds today—at least half of us, anyway. Last year, the National Retail Federation predicted that 54.7% of the United States adult population was planning to celebrate the holiday with their significant others, friends or pets to the tune of nearly $20 billion. Yes, billion with …
A team of folklorists made recordings of Cuban folk and dance hall music as part of projects to document Florida arts for the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Found online in the presentation Florida Folklife from the WPA Collections, 1938-1942, these recordings occurred at a time when old songs from rural Cuba could still be found, …
A shy but determined young teletype operator. An Air Force engineer with dreams of going into space. A spy with a talent for driving fast cars and getting thrown out of East Germany. The commander of a squadron of the elite Special Forces unit known as Delta Force. What’s the common thread tying together this …
Between 1976 and 1978 Karen S. Ellis recorded the playground songs of elementary school students on St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands. She was teaching at the Ricardo Richards School and many of the children she recorded were her students. This work culminated in a book and recording, Domino, a resource for children and teachers, published …
The following is the fifth and last post in a series relating to the Medal of Honor. At the age of seven, Alfred V. Rascon was so enthralled by the idea of becoming a paratrooper that he made his own parachute, jumped off the roof of his house, landed on his head, and broke his …
