Swear to Tell the Truth for Tuesday, May 17th (1:00 to 2:30pm)
For 55 years Arhoolie Records has been a leading folkloric or roots label under the direction of its founder, Chris Strachwitz. Notice arrived here indicating that Arhoolie Records has been acquired by Smithsonian Folkways. The deal guarantees the availability of Arhoolie’s catalogue for the foreseeable future. If the Folkways catalogue is the model. Arhoolie’s catalogue will be available in hard copy where vinyl and CD stock remain and in digital form where items are out of print. Currently, some Folkways albums are available “on demand”. An advantage of Smithsonian Folkways ‘ operation is that liner notes and cover art are available as downloads along with the music files, unlike the case with many other labels’ catalogues.
Arhoolie has been a large part of the revolution in our knowledge of roots music, not just North American music but in World Music, as well. We did a profile of Arhoolie some time ago attempting to show the importance of the Arhoolie catalogue in blues and other North American roots music and we thought about presenting a version of that program again. Instead, we put together a mostly new program for this week’s show. With music’s availability through digital download, internet radio and YouTube it’s not always easy to understand how the music of the past became available to us in the first place.
On the Show:
Johnie Lewis – Jesse Fuller – Mance Lipscomb – Bee Houston – John Littlejohn – Billie Pierce – John Semien & the Opelousas Playboys – Freddie Fender – Rev. Louis Overstreet – Campbell Brothers – and others
Listen to the program at FM 93.3 in Hamilton or on CFMU online at cfmu.msumcmaster.ca. The program will be available to stream or download until June 14th.
Contact Us:
To reach us with comments or queries, write us at sweartotellthetruth@gmail.com.
You can also follow the program at sweartotellthetruth@nosignifying on Twitter.
Next week (May 24th)
TBA.
cmc
sweartotellthetruth 
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