Woodrow Wilson Guthrie was an American singer-songwriter and composer who was one of the most significant figures in American folk music. His work focused on themes of American socialism and anti-fascism. He inspired several generations both politically and musically with songs such as "This Land Is Your Land".
Gilbert Vandine "Cisco" Houston was an American folk singer and songwriter, who is closely associated with Woody Guthrie due to their extensive history of recording together.
"Grey Goose" is a traditional American folk song. Its subject is a preacher who hunts and captures a grey goose for dinner on a Sunday. He tries to kill the goose prior to eating it, but no matter how hard he tries, he cannot kill it, the implication being that he had not properly observed the Sabbath. The various methods the preacher used to unsuccessfully kill the grey goose were, in order according to the song:
Dust Bowl Ballads is an album by American folk singer Woody Guthrie. It was released by Victor Records, in 1940. All the songs on the album deal with the Dust Bowl and its effects on the country and its people. It is considered to be one of the first concept albums. It was Guthrie's first commercial recording and the most successful album of his career.
Smithsonian Folkways is the nonprofit record label of the Smithsonian Institution. It is a part of the Smithsonian's Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, located at Capital Gallery in downtown Washington, D.C. The label was founded in 1987 after the family of Moses Asch, founder of Folkways Records, donated the entire Folkways Records label to the Smithsonian. The donation was made on the condition that the Institution continue Asch's policy that each of the more than 2,000 albums of Folkways Records remain in print forever, regardless of sales. Since then, the label has expanded on Asch's vision of documenting the sounds of the world, adding six other record labels to the collection, as well as releasing over 300 new recordings. Some well-known artists have contributed to the Smithsonian Folkways collection, including Pete Seeger, Ella Jenkins, Woody Guthrie, and Lead Belly. Famous songs include "This Land Is Your Land", "Goodnight, Irene", and "Midnight Special". Due to the unique nature of its recordings, which include an extensive collection of traditional American music, children's music, and international music, Smithsonian Folkways has become an important collection to the musical community, especially to ethnomusicologists, who utilize the recordings of "people's music" from all over the world.
American singer-songwriter Woody Guthrie's published recordings are culled from a series of recording sessions in the 1940s and 1950s. At the time they were recorded they were not set down for a particular album, so are found over several albums not necessarily in chronological order. The more detailed section on recording sessions lists the song by recording date.
The Asch Recordings, recorded between 1944 and 1949, are a series of albums featuring some of the most famous recordings of US folk musician Woody Guthrie. These sessions were recorded by Moses "Moe" Asch in New York City.
Folkways: A Vision Shared – A Tribute to Woody Guthrie & Leadbelly is a 1988 album featuring songs by Woody Guthrie and Lead Belly interpreted by leading folk, rock, and country recording artists. It won a Grammy Award the same year.
Folkways Records was a record label founded by Moses Asch that documented folk, world, and children's music. It was acquired by the Smithsonian Institution in 1987 and is now part of Smithsonian Folkways.
Moses Asch was an American recording engineer and record executive. He founded Asch Records, which then changed its name to Folkways Records when the label transitioned from 78 RPM recordings to LP records. Asch ran the Folkways label from 1948 until his death in 1986. Folkways was very influential in bringing folk music into the American cultural mainstream. Some of America's greatest folk songs were originally recorded for Asch, including "This Land Is Your Land" by Woody Guthrie and "Goodnight Irene" by Lead Belly. Asch sold many commercial recordings to Verve Records; after his death, Asch's archive of ethnic recordings was acquired by the Smithsonian Institution, and released as Smithsonian Folkways Records.
Woody At 100: The Woody Guthrie Centennial Collectionis a 150-page large-format book with three CDs containing 57 tracks, including Woody Guthrie's most important recordings such as the complete version of "This Land Is Your Land," "Pretty Boy Floyd," "I Ain't Got No Home in This World Anymore," and "Riding in My Car." The set also contains 21 previously unreleased performances and six never-before-heard original songs, including Woody's first known—and recently discovered—recordings. It is an in-depth commemorative collection of songs, photos and essays released by Smithsonian Folkways in June 2012.
Woody Guthrie Sings Folk Songs is a remastered compilation album of American folk songs sung by legend Woody Guthrie accompanied by Lead Belly, Cisco Houston, Sonny Terry, and Bess Lomax Hawes originally recorded for Moses Asch in the 1940s and re-released in 1989 by Folkways Records.
"Ain't Got No Home" is a song by Woody Guthrie, released on Dust Bowl Ballads, in which the singer laments the difficulties that life presents him. It was based on a gospel song Guthrie heard on his visits to the migrant camps known variously as "Can't Feel at Home" or "I Don't Feel at Home in This World Anymore", which had been made popular by the Carter Family in 1931.
Folkways: The Original Vision was released in 1989 and is the first album created by Folkways Records under new acquisition by the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage following the death of the record label's founder, Moses Asch. Funds were raised for the acquisition of the label to be established as a non-profit entity in conjunction with the Smithsonian Institution by the collaborative recording A Vision Shared: A Tribute to Woody Guthrie and Lead Belly by artists such as Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan, and U2. Folkways: The Original Vision was digitally remastered and re-released in 2005 by Folkways Records.
My Dusty Road is a 4 CD box set of Woody Guthrie music containing 54 tracks and a book. It is a collection of the newly discovered Stinson master discs. It was released by Rounder Records in 2009.
Stinson Records was an American record label formed by Herbert Harris and Irving Prosky in 1939, initially to market, in the US, recordings made in the Soviet Union. Between the 1940s and 1960s, it mainly issued recordings of American folk and blues musicians, including Woody Guthrie and Josh White.
Jeff Place is the Grammy Award-winning writer and producer and a curator and senior archivist with the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. He has won three Grammy Awards and six Indie Awards.
Leadbelly Sings Folk Songs is a remastered compilation album of American folk songs sung by legend Leadbelly accompanied by Woody Guthrie, Cisco Houston, and Sonny Terry, originally recorded by Moses Asch in the 1940s and re-released in 1989 by Folkways Records.
Midnight Special is an album by Lead Belly, Woody Guthrie, and Cisco Houston, recorded in 1946 and released as an album in 1947.
