The Back Porch News

In 1999 Smithsonian Folkways and CKUA radio collaborated on a series of twenty four programs highlighting the recordings in the Folkways Collection. The series is now available both as a podcast and as individual downloads from the Smithsonian Folkways web site.

Founded in 1948 by Mose Asch and Marian Distler, Folkways Records released 2168 albums which include traditional music, as well as ethnic and contemporary music from around the world.Folkways was tremendously influential in the folk revival, releasing recordings by Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Lead Belly and many others including Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music. When Asch died in 1987 Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage acquired the collection and makes it available today.

This audio documentary includes material from the collection and interviews with an amazing array of musicians and writers. The Folkways site mentions Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Mickey Hart and Studs Terkel. Listening to the first program I also heard Anglea Davis, Nora Guthrie, Bernice Johnson Reagon, Dar Williams and Mose Asch himself.

To give you a taste of what’s included, here are the episode titles:

1. A Folkways Overture
2. Moses Asch: Man and Myth
3. Folkways: An American Canon
4. The Anthology of American Folk Music Part I
5. The Anthology of American Folk Music Part II
6. The Anthology of American Folk Music Part III
7. Huddie Leadbetter (Lead Belly)
8. Woody Guthrie
9. Blues
10. Jazz
11. Country and Bluegrass
12. Pete Seeger
13. Music and the Winds of Change: The Labor Movement
14. Music and the Winds of Change: The Civil Rights Movement
15. Music and the Winds of Change: The Women’s Movement
16. Children’s Music
17. Voices of History
18. Music of the World
19. Music of the World II
20. The Poets
21. Subterranean Homesick Blues I
22. Subterranean Homesick Blues II
23. Phil Ochs
24. Epilogue

I don’t quite know when I’m going to find time to listen to all twenty four hours worth of documentary, but I intend to try.

The Folkways Collection Podcast

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