Wednesday, January 19, 2005  

For Immediate Release
January 19, 2005

MSN Music Makes Historic Songs From Smithsonian Folkways Recordings Available Online for the First Time Archive Includes Nearly 35,000 Songs From Legends Such as Woody Guthrie, Lead Belly, Pete Seeger, Doc Watson, Ella Jenkins and More

This is great. The Smithsonian (as well as the Library of Congress) has so much material in its vaults, and crazy stuff at that, but there's no place for full CD releases of much of it because it's cost prohibitive to mass produce niche-music discs. This solves that. I love the digital age! And thermal underwear!

MSN still needs to link the music releases to descriptions/details because so many Folkways releases are just baffling (in a good way), and the interface is a bit clunky (is there a way to list just the Folkways releases from one genre and not get everything in the MSN catalog in that genre as well?), but these things will likely be ironed out down the road as more and more releases are added.

Check below the press release to see the Suburbs' Guide to Smithsonian Folkways Recordings on MSN:

An alliance announced today between MSN Music and Smithsonian Folkways Recordings will make tens of thousand of historic songs from legendary performers of folk, blues, jazz and world music available online for the first time, allowing music fans to discover a diverse world of music and sound. The Smithsonian Folkways catalog of nearly 35,000 tracks, which is only available for download through MSN Music in the United States (http://music.msn.com/smithsonian), features legendary artists Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, Lucinda Williams, Big Bill Broonzy, Lightnin' Hopkins, Ella Jenkins and more. The archive also features nonmusical tracks including speeches, poetry and natural sounds from around the world.

"The music in the Smithsonian Folkways archive is a strong reminder of the incredible emotion in authentic roots music," said Rob Bennett, senior director of MSN Entertainment at Microsoft Corp. "The music in this catalog has influenced countless artists -- including Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, Jerry Garcia and Kurt Cobain -- yet it's often almost impossible to find. We're excited to bring these important artists and their work to a larger audience through MSN Music."

"The success of our Anthology of American Folk Music, edited by Harry Smith, which won two GRAMMY Awards in 1997, showed us that there is a substantial audience for roots music," said Dan Sheehy, director of Smithsonian Folkways Recordings. "The problem is that people can't always find this music. It's not on the radio, and many retailers don't carry it. We're thrilled to work with MSN Music to give people an easy way to hear music by artists they may have only read about and discover others they may have never heard of at all."

To aid in catalog exploration, MSN Music will regularly feature articles from recording artists and music scholars that celebrate the wealth of diverse musical, verbal and natural sound content. "The catalog is so huge, we have the ability to continually add features and editorial content to help music fans explore and discover the many hidden gems and unique tracks that make this addition to MSN Music so special," Bennett said.

Beyond the wide range of music, the archive also features an extensive collection of nonmusical content from the United States and around the world. The collected works include poetry and historical oratory, natural sound such as "Sounds of North American Frogs," and quirky tracks and audio documentaries such as "Speech After Removal of the Larynx" and "Sounds of the Office," recorded in 1964.

After a quick scan of the catalog, the Suburbs recommends a handful of releases to begin:
>Drums of Defiance: Maroon Music From the Earliest Free Black Communities of Jamaica
(They still need to add Music of the Maroons of Jamaica.)
>Street and Gangland Rhythms, Beats and Improvisations by Six Boys in Trouble
>Vox Humana: Alfred Wolfsohn's Experiments in Extension of Human Vocal Range
>Electronic Music: From Razor Blades to Moog
>Calypso Awakening: From the Emory Cook Collection
> Lord Creator's Calypso, Calypso in New York, Calypso Travels and There's a Brown Girl in the Ring and Other Children's Calypso Songs
>Abayudaya: Music From the Jewish People of Uganda
>Kora Music From the Gambia
>Discover Indonesia
>Sounds of a South African Homestead

The Suburbs recommends visiting the Smithsonian Folkways homepage for more info; you can also buy custom-made CDs of material from the Folkways vaults (including tons of stuff not on MSN yet) and scan all the releases at once in a particular genre. The Suburbs also recommends writing in the third person, gas-log fireplaces, and Lashish restaurant in Dearborn, Michigan.

Posted by CP | Link |

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