A New History of American and Canadian Folk Music

Description

Building on his 2006 book, Which Side Are You On?, Dick Weissman's A New History of American and Canadian Folk Music presents a provocative discussion of the history, evolution, and current status of folk music in the United States and Canada. North American folk music achieved a high level of popular acceptance in the late 1950s. When it was replaced by various forms of rock music, it became a more specialized musical niche, fragmenting into a proliferation of musical styles. In the pop-folk revival of the 1960s, artists were celebrated or rejected for popularizing the music to a mass audience. In particular the music seemed to embrace a quest for authenticity, which has led to endless explorations of what is or is not faithful to the original concept of traditional music. This book examines the history of folk music into the 21st century and how it evolved from an agrarian style as it became increasingly urbanized. Scholar-performer Dick Weissman, himself a veteran of the popularization wars, is uniquely qualified to examine the many controversies and musical evolutions of the music, including a detailed discussion of the quest for authenticity, and how various musicians, critics, and fans have defined that pursuit.

Dick Weissman is Associate Professor Emeritus at the University of Colorado at Denver, USA, and has been involved with the North American folk revival as a musician, performer, composer and scholar. He is the author of many critically acclaimed books about American roots music and the music industry, including The Folk Music Sourcebook (1989), which won the Deems Taylor ASCAP Music Critics Award; The Music Business (5th edition 2003), which sold over 100,000 copies; Navigating the Music Industry (2003); Which Side Are You On?: An Inside History of the Folk Music Revival in America (Bloomsbury, 2006); and Songwriting: The Words, the Music, and the Money (2010).

A renowned and prolific writer on folk music, Weissman (emer., Univ. of Colorado, Denver) expands on his earlier book, Which Side Are You On?: An Inside History of the Folk Music Revival in America (CH, Mar'06, 43-3956), by providing an updated chronicle of American and Canadian folk music from the early days of folk-song collecting in the 18th century to the present ... Anecdotal as well as scholarly, this book is appropriate for both fans and researchers. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers. * CHOICE * Few insiders from the Folk movement of the 1950s/60s have been as prolific as Dick Weissman. This overview is scholarly, amiable, and anecdotal: he sheds light on the well-known and lesser known music types with his first-person experiences. He delivers an excellent study of styles and personalities that shaped this special genre of American and Canadian music. * J. Michael Kearsey, Berkshire Snow Productions, USA * Dick Weissman was in the room at the dawn of the US-Canadian folk revival of the 1960s. As a musician, songwriter, and recording artist, he is uniquely placed to reflect on North American folk music as practice, cultural movement, and commercial industry. Also a professor and teacher, he is able to offer the wider historical overview. His New History is at once informed and idiosyncratic, scholarly and personal. It is sure to become a major source for future historians and lay readers alike. * Will Kaufman, Professor of American Literature & Culture, University of Central Lancashire, UK, and author of Woody Guthrie, American Radical (2011), Woody Guthrie's Modern World Blues (2017), and Mapping Woody Guthrie (2019) *