Electronic Folkways

Here's a piece I enjoyed doing for NPR Music - a piece I had been wanting to do for a while - on the  streak of electronic, experimental, and unclassifiably oddball records released by Folkways alongside its much larger and image-defining output of American traditional music and field recordings from around the world. The peg is Smithsonian Folkways's recent vinyl reissues of Craig Kupka's New Age classic Crystals: Music for Relaxation 2 and Ann McMillan's musique concrète gem Gateway Summer Sound: Abstracted Animal & Other Sounds.  McMillan is sadly no longer with us but I interviewed Kupka and Richard Carlin, who worked alongside Folkways founder Moe Asch in the later years of the label.