First Songs by Michael Hurley, released on Folkways in 1964.

A self-taught folk singer and guitarist, Michael Hurley plays music reflective of his upbringing in the rural backcountry of Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Recorded when he was 22, First Songs was released in 1964 and is described by album producer and recording engineer Frederic Ramsey Jr. as "less frenetic, more in-looking, more expressive" than his early "rambling" days on the road. Hurley’s compositions from First Songs and other albums have been recorded by many contemporary artists including Espers, Vetiver, The Violent Femmes, and Cat Power. - Bandcamp Notes

https://michaelhurley.bandcamp.com/album/first-songs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nl9lC94JLc&list=RD-nl9lC94JLc&start_radio=1&t=1s

#MichaelHurley #Folkways #FolkMusic #Music #Snock

Sings The Blues With 6 & 12 String Guitar by Barbara Dane, released on Folkways in 1964.

Barbara Jean Spillman (May 12, 1927 – October 20, 2024), known professionally as Barbara Dane, was an American folk, blues, and jazz singer, guitarist, record producer, and political activist. She co-founded Paredon Records with Irwin Silber.

"Bessie Smith in stereo," wrote jazz critic Leonard Feather of Dane in the late 1950s. Time wrote of Dane: "The voice is pure, rich ... rare as a 20-carat diamond" and quoted Louis Armstrong's exclamation upon hearing her at the Pasadena jazz festival: "Did you get that chick? She's a gasser!" On the occasion of her 85th birthday, The Boston Globe music critic James Reed called her "one of the true unsung heroes of American music." - Wikipedia

https://barbara-dane.bandcamp.com/album/sings-the-blues-with-6-12-string-guitar

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmjnYDoA_pg&list=PLAPpP5SQgYZp7qCH_TiymoiAkvbWSncLI&index=1

#BarbaraDane #Blues #Folkways #FolkBlues #Music

Two-Way Trip by Peggy Seeger And Ewan Mac Coll, released on Folkways in 1961.

PREFACE by Ewan MacColl

I mostly sing Scots and English songs. The Scots material was part of the background of ray childhood, the English I began to acquire during my adolescence and have gone on adding to my store ever since. The Scots songs are closest to me, with the Liverpool shanties and forebitters running them a close second.
As for American folkmusic, my first contact with it was during the late thirties when I heard some of the Library of Congress recordings broadcast in the first B.B.C. folksong series. I can still remember the tremendous impact they made on me, and still recapture something of the initial excitement that was roused in me by hearing Woodie Guthrie, Blind Willie Johnson. Texas Gladden..

[read in full below]

https://ewanmaccoll.bandcamp.com/album/two-way-trip

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdyUqIfGa1Y&list=RDLdyUqIfGa1Y&start_radio=1

#PeggySeeger #EwanMacColl #Folkways #folkmusic #traditionalsongs #ScotishBallads #childeballads #MattyGroves

Paul Clayton - "Dulcimer Songs and Solos" (1962)

If you see a dulcimer record, just get it.

#NowPlaying #FolkwaysRecords #Folkways #dulcimer #PaulClayton #vinyl #VinylRecords @vinylrecords

https://youtu.be/WkjSIi1mlE4

Ended Thursday and welcomed Friday with Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews, 1967​-​1981, released on Tompkins Square in 2020

Guitarist Wall Matthews is surviving member of experimental 70's collective, Entourage. Sampled by Four Tet, their name whispered in reverence through the decades, Entourage forged bold musical ideas on their two rare ’70s Folkways LPs. Tompkins Square released Ceremony of Dreams : Studio Sessions and Outtakes, 1972-1977, in 2018 to wide acclaim. Spine River : The Guitar Music of Wall Matthews, 1967-1981 is a collection of unreleased or obscure music by the master guitarist. This volume will be released as a limited edition LP, along with four other digital volumes of Wall's music, mapping his entire career. All five albums will be released on April 10th, 2020.

https://tompkinssquare.bandcamp.com/album/spine-river-the-guitar-music-of-wall-matthews-1967-1981

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wc6j20FOYI8&list=PLjaxaO_WM6PA1_K__xAfySPmP3F3_texz&index=1

#WallMatthews #TompkinsSquare #acousticguitar #Entourage #fourtet #folkways

Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry Sing by
Brownie McGhee and Sonny Terry, released in 1958 on Folkways.

Folkways wrote:

"The acoustic music duo of guitarist Brownie McGhee and harmonicist Sonny Terry were named National Heritage Fellows in 1982 in recognition of their distinctive musical contributions and accomplishments. Although primarily considered to be blues musicians, McGhee and Terry transcended the genre by including American folk songs and ballads in their repertoire. This 1958 recording, their first for the Folkways label, provides a small but inspiring example of the range of Americana and down-home blues music the duo performed throughout their 40-year partnership."

https://folkways.si.edu/brownie-mcghee-and-sonny-terry-sing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPLvL3j2-O8&list=RDDPLvL3j2-O8&start_radio=1

#BrownieMcGhee #SonnyTerry #blues #countryblues #folkmusic #americana #folkways #1958inmusic

The Real Boogie Woogie: Memphis Slim, Piano Solos by Memphis Slim, released on Folkways in 1959.

Peter Chatman Jr., aka Memphis Slim, stomps out a "progressive boogie and blues" on the piano. Self-taught in the honky-tonk juke joints of Tennessee, he produced some of the most powerful boogie-woogie out there, with an incessant bass like you wouldn’t believe. - Folkways

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ewSlbPvZGgA&list=PLZPEOlTnCG_rFDUi7FPgMcUBvHG-DX5l-&index=1

#memphisslim #folkways #boogiewoogiepiano #blues

American Industrial Ballads is a studio album by American folk singer Pete Seeger. It was released in 1956 by Folkways Records. It was reissued in 1992 by Smithsonian Folkways.

Seeger sings songs of struggle which emerged from the coal mines, textile mills and acres of farmland, and spoke of issues important to the American laborer. There are twenty-four songs, written about the unprecedented industrialization of the 19th century, including "Peg and Awl", "The Farmer is the Man", and "Winnsboro Cotton Mill Blues"...

Writing for Allmusic William Ruhlman wrote "Seeger presents the songs straightforwardly with only occasional flourishes, intent on getting the meanings across." He continued, "Taken together, they chronicle a century and a half of the efforts of farmers, textile workers, and miners, primarily, to get what they deserve from increasingly rich and powerful captains of industry." - Wikipedia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jfDljUZSOc

#peteseeger #folkways #american industrialballads