On behalf of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, I’m sad to pass along the news of the death of Pete Seeger, a longtime friend of the AFC Archive and a giant in the folk music world, one of the most significant American folk musicians ever. Many AFC staff members have personal […]
Though the recent polar vortex may have tempered my enthusiasm a bit, this January I’ve been pulling on my running shoes and hitting the pavement with renewed focus. The resolution to exercise more in the new year led me to think about the role that sports have played in military life over the years. Athletics […]
“Soldier’s Joy” is one of our favorite fiddle tunes, and one of the oldest and most widely distributed tunes in the English-speaking world. There are numerous renditions of this piece located throughout Library of Congress collections, many of which are online. Let’s take a brief tour of this American classic. “Soldier’s Joy” appeared in late eighteenth-century sheet […]
This week we’re hosting three digital humanities scholars at the American Folklife Center to discuss potential research projects that would draw upon AFC collections. It got me thinking about digital humanities inquiry in developing and understanding the AFC Archives. Across our history, we have embraced new media, explored data- and metric-driven approaches to studying and computing […]
As the holiday season comes to a close, the staff of the American Folklife Center wishes you all the best for the coming year. In this picture, we pose by the Christmas Tree in the Great Hall of the Library of Congress, with some of us still in the costumes we wore in the AFC […]
When the New Year arrives, thoughts often turn to what the coming year might bring. During wartime, service members inevitably wonder if the next year will be the year: the long-anticipated time when peace is declared and they can reunite with their families after so many months spent apart. For soldiers fighting in the Pacific […]
As the Old Year turns to the New Year, thousands of people around the world will sing along to “Auld Lang Syne,” a Scottish song that has come to be firmly associated with New Year’s celebrations. The song has a fascinating history, and we’re lucky at the Library of Congress to have several unique items […]
St. George and the Data Dragon: A Digital Assets Mumming Performed by American Folklife Center Staff with Guests Script drawn from multiple plays in the James Madison Carpenter Collection. Compiled by Stephen Winick, with additional material by Stephen Winick, Jennifer Cutting, Theadocia Austen, Hope O’Keeffe, and the company. Digital assets jargon courtesy of Bertram Lyons. […]
Every year, in the week before Christmas, staff members of the American Folklife Center put our research and performance skills into play, bringing collections to life in a dramatic performance that tours the halls of the Library of Congress. Dressed in costumes that range from striking to silly, we sing, act, rhyme, and dance for […]
There are many examples of songs of the winter season available among the online presentations from the American Folklife Center’s archive, but the largest group of these is found in California Gold: Northern California Folk Music from the Thirties, a documentary project of the California Work Projects Administration headed by Sidney Robertson Cowell from 1938 […]