Smithsonian Folkways Collection Now on CDR!

dateline: 3/3/00

The Smithsonian acquired the Folkways Collection on the death of its founder Mo Asch. It includes over 2500 rare and historic recordings documenting the rich folk heritage of the United States. Director Tony Seeger, has helped this national archive enter the 21st century right on time by making the entire collection available through custom-ordered CDRs.

CDRs are like regular CDs, except that they are burned individually on a per-order basis. This technology is radically changing the archive business. In the past, albums would simply go out of print when it no longer made economic sense to manufacture them in the thousands and store the inventory for years. Folkways bucked the trend by insisting on keeping all titles in print, no matter how slow the sales and the Smithsonian pledged to continue the policy. Now, songs can be stored cheaply by the terabyte, along with album graphics and liner notes. With the click of a button, a single, professional-looking package can be produced on demand at a price comparable to that of a normal CD.

When I asked Tony Seeger, Executive Director of the collection, which rare albums he is particularly glad to finally make available in this format, he listed four:

Sounds of The Junk Yard (1964) F-6143

Anthology of Brazilian Indian Music (1962) F 4311

Ring Games: Line Games and Play Party Songs of Alabama (1953) F7004

The New Lost City Ramblers, Songs of the Depression (1969) F5264

You can browse the Smithsonian site by label (they've acquired a few over the years) or by genre, but to order CDRs you must use the database search.

Go to the following page to get more information on the new CDR program: http://www.si.edu/folkways/CDRorders.htm.

And here to read their press release: http://www.si.edu/folkways/monitorpressr.htm

Or go directly to the search page:
http://www.si.edu/cgi-bin/SFgate.all?template=f_search.tem-startSearch&tie=and&conf_file=folk&m=a

Happy hunting,

Hugh Blumenfeld, Editor
hugh@balladtree.com