Bluegrass on Folkways
Bluegrass music is the synthesis of American southern string band music, blues, English, Irish, and Scottish traditions, and sacred and country music. It is distinguished by its high energy, fast tempo sound. The typical bluegrass band includes 5-string banjo, flat-top guitar, fiddle, mandolin, and bass. The instruments are traditionally acoustic with the guitar read more...
Mahagita: Harp and Vocal Music of Burma
The Burmese arched harp, a little known treasure among Asian musical instruments, figures prominently in Burma's classical music tradition. That tradition, developed over several centuries in Burma's royal courts, exhibits the restraint, subtlety, and elegance of many aristocratic traditions - but in an idiom uniqely Burmese. read more...
Sounds of the Office
When defining the term "Folkways" Moses Asch said simply: "Anything that is sound." In the spirit of Asch's assessment, one of the most essential, yet least known component of the Folkways collections are recordings made not of music or even speech, but of everyday sounds. read more...