Historic Bibliographies and Reference Aids

A Brief List of Material Relating to American Folk Music

Compiled by: Joseph C. Hickerson
Publication Date: December 29, 1965

General

Ames, Russell.
The Story of American Folk Song. New York: Grosset and Dunlap, 1955.

Botkin, Benjamin A.
A Treasury of American Folklore. New York: Crown Publishers, 1944.

Brand, Oscar.
The Ballad Mongers: Rise of the Modern Folk Song. New York: Funk and Wagnalls Co., Inc., 1962.

Chase, Gilbert.
America's Music. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1955.

Dolph, Edward Arthur.
"Sound Off!" Soldier Songs from Yankee Doodle to Parley Voo. New York: Cosmopolitan Book Co., 1929.

Emrich, Marion, and Korson, George.
The Child's Book of Folklore. New York: The Dial Press, 1962.

Folk Music Yearbook of Artists 1964. Fairfax, Virginia: Jandel Productions International, Ltd., 1964.

Herzog, George.
"Song: Folk Song and the Music of Folk Song." Standard Dictionary of Folklore, Mythology and Legend, edited by Maria Leach, two volumes, New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1950, volume 2, pp. 1032-1050.

Ives, Burl.
Song in America: Our Musical Heritage. New York: Duell, Sloan, and Pearce, 1962.

Lawless, Ray M.
Folksingers and Folksongs in America. Revised edition, New York: Duell, Sloan, and Pearce, 1965.

Lomax, Alan.
Folk Songs of North America. London: Cassell, 1960.

Lomax, John A. and Alan.
American Ballads and Folk Songs. New York: Macmillan Co., 1935.
Best Loved American Folk Songs. New York: Grosset and Dunlap, 1955.
Our Singing Country. New York: Macmillan Co., 1941.

Luther, Frank.
Americans and Their Songs. New York: Harper and Bros., 1942.

Nettl, Bruno.
An Introduction to Folk Music in the United States. Revised edition, Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1962.

Sandburg, Carl.
An American Songbag. New York: Harcourt, Brace, and Co., 1927.

Seeger, Charles.
"Folk Music." Collier's Encyclopedia, New York: Crowell-Collier Publishing Co., 1964, volume 10, pp. 132-140.

Seeger, Ruth Crawford.
American Folk Songs for Children. Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Co., 1948.

Silber, Irwin.
Songs of the Civil War. New York: Columbia University Press, 1960.

Wilgus, D.K.
Anglo-American Folksong Scholarship Since 1898. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1959.

Journals

Ethnomusicology: Journal of the Society for Ethnomusicology.

Journal of American Folklore.

New York Folklore Quarterly.

Publications of the Texas Folklore Society.

Southern Folklore Quarterly.

Western Folklore.

Bibliographies

Haywood, Charles.
A Bibliography of North American Folklore and Folksong. Revised edition, two volumes, New York: Dover Publications, 1962.

U.S. Library of Congress. Music Division.
Folk Music: A Catalog of Folk Songs, Ballads, Dances, Instrumental Pieces, and Folk Tales of the United States and Latin America on Phonograph Records.

Regional and Occupational

Arnold, Byron.
Folksongs of Alabama. University: University of Alabama Press, 1950.

Barry, Phillips.
The Maine Woods Songster. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Powell Publishing CO., 1939.

Barry, Phillips; Eckstorm, Fannie Hardy; and Smyth, Mary Winslow.
British Ballads from Maine. New Haven: Yale Univeristy Press, 1929.

Beck, Earl Clifton.
Songs of the Michigan Lumberjacks. Ann Arbor: University of Micigan Press, 1941.

Belden, Henry M.
Ballads and Songs Collected by the Missouri Folk Song Society. Columbia: University of Missouri Studies, volume 15, number 1, 1940.

Botkin, Benjamin A.
A Treasury of New England Folklore. Revised edition; New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1965.
A Treasury of Southern Folklore. New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1949.
A Treasury of Western Folklore. New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1951.

Brewster, Paul G.
Ballads and Songs of Indiana. Bloomington: Indiana University Publications, Folklore Series, number 1, 1940.

Cazden, Norman.
The Abelard Folk Song Book. New York: Abelard Schuman, 1958.

Cox, John Harrington.
Folk-Songs of the South Collected under the Auspices of the West Virginia Folk-Lore Society. Reprint edition, forward by Arthur Kyle Davis, Jr., Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1963.

Davis, Arthur Kyle, Jr.
More Traditional Ballads of Virginia. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1960.
Traditional Ballads of Virginia Collected under the Auspices of the Virginia Folk-Lore Society. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1929.

Dwyer, Richard A., and Lingenfelter, Richard E.
The Songs of the Gold Rush. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1964.

Eckstorm, Fannie Hardy, and Smyth, Mary Winslow.
Minstrelsy of Maine: Folk-Songs and Ballads of the Woods and the Coast. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1927.

Eddy, Mary Olive.
Ballads and Songs from Ohio. Reprint edition, forward by D.K. Wilgus, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1964.

Flanders, Helen Harness.
Ancient Ballads Traditionally Sung in New England. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, volumes 1-4, 1960-1965.

Flanders, Helen Hartness; Ballard, Elizabeth Flanders; Brown, George; and Barry, Phillips.
The New Green Mountain Songster: Traditional Folk Songs of Vermont. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1939.

Flanders, Helen Hartness, and Brown, George.
Vermont Folk-Songs & Ballads. Brattleboro: Stephen Daye Press, 1932.

Flanders, Helen Hartness, and Olney, Marguerite.
Ballads Migrant in New England. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Young, 1953.

Gardner, Evelyn E., and Chickering, Geraldine J.
Ballads and Songs of Southern Michigan. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1938.

Greenway, John.
American Folksongs of Protest. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1953.

Hubbard, Lester A.
Ballads and Songs from Utah. Salt Lake City: University Press of Utah, 1961.

Hudson, Arthur Palmer.
Folksongs of Mississippi and their Background. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1936.

Ives, Edward D.
Larry Gorman: The Man Who Made the Songs. Bloomington: Indiana Universtiy Press, 1964.

Korson George.
Black Rock. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1960.
Coal Dust on the Fiddle: Songs and Stories of the Bituminous Industry. Reprint edition, forward by John Greenway, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1965.
Minstrels of the Mine Patch: Songs and Stories of the Anthracite Industry. Reprint edition, forward by Archie Green, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1964.
Pennsylvania Songs and Legends. Reprint edition, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1960.

Larkin, Margaret.
Singing Cowboy: A Book of Western Songs. Reprint edition, New York: Oak Publications, 1963.

Linscott, Eloise Hubbard.
Folk Songs of Old New England. Reprint edition, Hamden, Connecticut: Archon Books, 1962.

Lomax, John A. and Alan.
Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads. Revised edition, New York, Macmillan, 1950.

Moore, Ethel and Chauncey O.
Ballads and Folk Songs of the Southwest. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1964.

Morris, Alton C.
Folksongs of Florida. Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1950.

Niles, John Jacob.
The Ballad Book of John Jacob Niles. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1961.

Owens, William A.
Texas Folk Songs. Austin: Publications of the Texas Folklore Society, number 23, 1950.

Randolph, Vance.
Ozark Folksongs. Four volumes, Columbia: State Historical Society of Missouri, 1946-1950.

Ritchie, Jean.
Singing Family of the Cumberlands. Reprint edition, New York: Oak Publications, 1963.

Scarborough, Dorothy.
A Song Catcher in Southern Mountains: American Folk Songs of British Ancestry. New York: Columbia University, 1937.

Sharp, Cecil James.
English Folk Songs from the Southern Appalachian. Reprint edition, edited by Maud Karpeles, two volumes in one, New York: Oxford University Press, 1960.

Thomas, Jean.
Ballad Makin' in the Mountains of Kentucky. Reprint edition, New York: Oak Publications, 1964.

White, Newman Ivey, General Editor.
The Frank C. Brown Collection of North Carolina Folklore. Seven volumes, Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 1952-1964.
Volume 2, Folk Ballads, edited by Henry M. Belden and Arthur Palmer Hudson, 1952.
Volume 3, Folk Songs, edited by Henry M. Belden and Arthur Palmer Hudson, 1952.
Volume 4, The Music of the Ballads, edited by Jan P. Shinhan, 1957.
Volume 5, The Music of the Songs, edited by Jan P. Shinhan, 1962.

Whitfield, Irène Thérèse.
Louisiana French Folk Songs. University: Louisiana State University Press, 1939.

The Negro

Allen, William Frances; Ware, Charles Pickard; and Garrison, Lucy McKim.
Slave Songs of the United States. Revised edition, New York: Oak Publications, 1965.

Charters, Samuel B.
The Country Blues. New York: Rinehart and Co., 1959.

Courlander, Harold.
Negro Folk Music, U.S.A. New York: Columbia University Press, 1963.

Fisher, Miles Mark.
Negro Slave Songs in the United States. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1953.

Johnson, James Weldon, and Johnson, J. Rosamund.
The Book of American Negro Spirituals. Reprint edition, two volumes in one, New York: Viking Press, 1940.

Krehbiel, Henry Edward.
Afro-American Folksongs: A Study in Racial and National Music. Reprint edition, New York: Frederick Ungar, 1962.

Lomax, John A. and Alan.
Negro Folk Songs as Sung by Leadbelly. New York: Macmillan, 1936.

Odum, Howard Washington, and Johnson, Guy B.
The Negro and his Songs: A Study of Typical Negro Songs in the South. Reprint edition, forward by Roger D. Abrahams, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1964.
Negro Workaday Songs. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1926.

Oliver, Paul.
Blues Fell This Morning: The Meaning of the Blues. London: Cassell, 1960.

Parrish, Lydia.
Slave Songs of the Georgia Sea Islands. Reprint edition, forward by Bruce Jackson, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1965.

Scarborough, Dorothy.
On the Trail of Negro Folk-Songs. Reprint edition, forward by Roger D. Abrahams, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1963.

White, Newman Ivey.
American Negro Folk-Songs. Reprint edition, forward by Bruce Jackson, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1965.

Work, John W.
American Negro Songs. New York: Howell, Soskin and Co., 1940.

Jazz

Blesh, Rudi.
Shining Trumpets, A History of Jazz. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1946.

Feather, Leonard G.
The Encyclopedia of Jazz. New York: Horizon Press, 1955.

Goffin, Robert.
Jazz, from the Congo to the Metropolitan. New York: Doubleday, Doran & Co., 1944.

Grossman, William L., and Farrell, Jack W.
The Heart of Jazz. New York: New York University Press, 1956.

Handy, W. C.
Blues: An Anthology. New York: Albert and Charles Boni, 1926.

Hodier, André.
Jazz: Its Evolution and Essence. New York: Grove Press, 1956.

Hobson, Wilder.
American Jazz Music. New York: W.W. Norton, 1929.

Lomax, Alan.
Mr. Jelly Roll. New York: Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1950.

Miller, Paul E.
Esquire's Jazz Book. New York: Smith and Durrell, 1944.

Panassié, Hugues.
Hot Jazz. New York: M. Witmark & Son, 1936.
The Real Jazz. New York: Smith and Durrell, 1942.

Ramsey, Frederic.
Jazzmen. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1939.

Sargeant, Winthrop.
Jazz, Hot and Hybrid. New York: Arrow Edition, 1939.

Smith, Charles E.
The Jazz Record Book. New York: Smith and Durrell, 1942.

Ulanov, Barry.
A History of Jazz in America. New York: Viking Press, 1952.

Instrumental Music

Bayard, Samuel Preston.
Hill Country Tunes: Instrumental Folk Music of Southwestern Pennsylvania. Philadelphia: Memoirs of the American Folklore Society, volume 39, 1944.

Ford, Ira W.
Traditional Music in America. Reprint edition, introduction by Judith McCulloh, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1965.

One Thousand Fiddle Tunes. Chicago: M. M. Cole, 1940.

O'Neill, Francis.
The Dance Music of Ireland: 1001 Gems. Chicago: Lyon and Helay, 1907.
O'Neill's Muisc of Ireland: Eighteen Hundred and Fifty Melodies. Chicago: Lyon and Healy, 1903.

The Sea

Colcord, Joanna C.
Songs of American Sailormen. Reprint edition, New York: Oak Publications, 1964.

Doerflinger, William M.
Shanteymen and Shanteyboys. New York: Macmillan, 1951.

Harlow, Fred Pease.
Chanteying Aboard American Ships. Barre, Massachusetts: Barre Gazette, 1962.

Hugill, Stan.
Shanties from the Seven Seas. New York: E.P. Dutton and Co., 1961.

Huntington, Gale.
Songs the Whalermen Sang. Barre, Massachusetts: Barre Publishers, 1964.

Shay, Frank.
American Sea Songs and Shantys. New York: W. W. Norton and Co., 1948.

The Ballad

Bronson, Bertrand Harris.
The Traditional Tunes of the Child Ballads. Volumes 1-, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1959-.

Burt, Olive Wooley.
American Murder Ballads and their Stories. New York: Oxford University Press, 1958.

Coffin, Tristram P.
The British Traditional Ballad in North America. Revised edition, Philadelphia: Publications of the American Folklore Society, Bibliographical Series, volume 2, 1963.

Laws, G. Malcom, Jr.
American Balladry from British Broadsides. Philadelphia: Publications of the American Folklore Society, Bibliographical and Special Series, volume 8, 1957.

Native American Balladry: A Descriptive Study and a Bibliographic Syllabus. Revised edition, Philadelphia: Publications of the American Folklore Society, Bibliographical and Special Series, volume 1, 1964.

Smith, Reed, and Rufty, Hilton.
American Anthology of Old-World Ballads. New York: J. Fischer, 1937.

Wells, Evelyn K.
The Ballad Tree. New York: Ronald Press, 1950.

Religious Songs (see also Negro)

Buchanan, Annabel Morris.
Folk Hymns of America. New York: J. Fischer and Brothers, 1938.

Jackson, George Pullen.
Another Sheaf of White Spirituals. Gainesville: University of Florida Press, 1952.
Down-East Spirituals and Others. Second edition, New York: J. J. Augustin Publisher, 1953.
Spirituals Folk-Songs of Early America. Reprint edition, New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 1964.
White and Negro Spirituals: Their Life Span and Kinship. New York: J. J. Augustin Publisher, 1943.
White Spirituals in the Southern Uplands. Reprint edition, forward by Don Yoder, Hatboro, Pennsylvania: Folklore Associates, 1964.

"Original Sacred Harp" Dennison Revision. Cullman, Alabama: Sacred Harp Publishing Company, Inc., 1960.

Yoder, Don.
Pennsylvania Spirituals. Lancaster: Pennsylvania Folklire Society, 1961.

Dances and Games

Botkin, Benjamin A.
The American Play-Party Song, with a Collection of Oklahoma Texts and Tunes. Reprint edition, New York: Ungar, 1963.

Brewster, Paul G.
American Nonsinging Games. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1953.

Burchenal, Elizabeth.
American Country Dances. New York: G. Schirmer, 1918.

McNair, Ralph J.
Square Dance. Garden City, New York: Garden City Books, 1951.

Mayo, Margot.
American Square Dance. Reprint edition, New York: Oak Publications, 1964.

Newell, William Wells.
Games and Songs of American Children. Reprint edition, New York: Dover Publications, 1963.

Owens, William A.
Swing and Turn: Texas Play-Party Games. Dallas: Tardy Publishing Co., 1939.

Putney, Cornelia F.
Square Dance U.S.A. Dubuque, Iowa: W. C. Brown, 1955.

Ryan, Grace Laura.
Dances of Our Pioneers. New York: A.S. Barnes and Co., 1939.

Shaw, Lloyd.
Cowboy Dances: A Collection of Western Square Dances. Revised edition, Caldwel, Idaho: Caxton Printers, 1949.

Tolman, Beth and Page, Ralph.
The Country Dance Book. New York: Farrar and Rinehart, 1937.

North American Indian

Buttree, Julia M.
The Rhythm of the Red Man: In Song, Dance and Decoration. New York: A. S. Barnes Co., 1930.

Curtis (-Burlin), Natalie.
The Indians' Book. New York and London: Harper and Brothers, 1907.

Densmore, Frances.
The American Indians and their Music. New York: The Womans Press, 1936.

Evans, Bessie and May G.
American Indian Dance Steps. A. S. Barnes and Company, 1931.

Fletcher, Alice Cunningham.
Indian Games and Dances with Native Songs. Boston: C. C. Birchard and Company, 1915.
Indian Story and Song from North America. Boston: Small, Maynard and Company, 1900.

Kurath, Gertrude Prokosch.
Iroquois Music and Dance: Ceremonial Arts of Two Seneca Longhouses. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution, Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 187, 1964.

Nettl, Bruno.
North American an Indian Musical Styles. Philadelphia: Memoirs of the American Folklore Society, volume 45, 1954.

Rhodes, Willard.
"North American Indian Music: A Bibliographical Survey of Anthropological Theory." Music Library Association Notes, volume 10, number 1, December 1952, pp. 33-45.