Smithsonian Folkways mourns the sudden passing of folklorist, author, professor, producer, and musician Burt Feintuch (1949-2018), who died October 29 at the age of 69. Feintuch produced three albums for Smithsonian Folkways (Northumberland Rant: Traditional Music from the Edge of England, The Heart of Cape Breton, and Cape Breton Fiddle and Piano Music: The Beaton Family of Mabou). He served on the Library of Congress’s National Recording Preservation Board, and for five years, he represented the American Folklore Society at the World Intellectual Property Organization. He was awarded prestigious grants and fellowships by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Endowment for the Arts, the American Council of Learned Societies, the United States Department of Justice, the New Hampshire Humanities Council, the New Hampshire State Council on the Arts, and other agencies and organizations.

He will be missed by friends, family, colleagues, and countless musicians he befriended and worked with over the years. ”So very sad to hear of Burt’s passing,” said musician Wendy MacIsaac, one of the fiddlers featured on The Heart of Cape Breton. “We all felt pretty proud to be a part of this project and lucky that Burt was so interested in bringing more of the Cape Breton style to the archives of the Smithsonian.”