Louisiana Cajun & Creole Music: The Newport Field Recordings

(Jambase.com) Rounder Records has announced the release of Louisiana Cajun and Creole Music: The Newport Field Recordings.

Due September 28, this CD release encompasses 27 tracks on one disc, and is comprised of recordings made over the years 1964-67 by Ralph Rinzler, working under the auspices of the Newport Folk Foundation and at the suggestion of board member Alan Lomax. Rinzler, who later came to head the Festival of American Folklife at the Smithsonian Institution, arrived in “Cajun country” in southwest Louisiana at a time when the very existence of Cajun music was under threat as the forces of the surrounding English-language culture pressed in upon the Cajun people.

Among the artists included in the set are the Balfa Brothers, Bois-Sec Ardoin, Canray Fontenot, Austin Pitre, and Adam & Cyprien Landreneau. In subsequent years, Dewey Balfa and Bois-Sec Ardoin were both recognized with National Heritage Fellowships awarded by the National Endowment for the Arts.

This release contains numerous photographs, many never before published, and extensive liner notes by a number of authors which run over 80 pages in the PDF embedded in the disc.