Customer Reviews

Folk Song USA

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"Folk Song USA" (also published under the title "Best Loved American Folk Songs")contains 111 American ballads as collected by John A and Allan Lomax. Many of these songs were first printed in other John Lomax books including "Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads" as words only or words with melody only. Unlike previous books from the Lomaxes that presented these ballads as poetry (how can one have a song without the melody?), this book was meant to be sung! Each song has simple piano arrangements by Charles and Ruth Crawford Seeger with guitar chords supplied by Pete Seeger. The short description, giving its known history and how John Lomax first encountered it, often offers valuable insights on rural American life before WWII. Like most Lomax books, these ballads have more verses than are typically found in other collections. This book is found in both hard cover (under both titles)and paperback as "Folk Song USA". If I was to recommend one folk song book only for the average library, this would be it. Highly recommended!

i've had this book for several years. bought it at a discard sale for a library. sometimes people have no idea what they have. this book was originally published in 1947. Thanks to the Lomax and Seeger families, we have these valuable pieces of Americana preserved. I love these songs.

Amazon doesn't understand that they have this book listed more than once. Here is my 1999 review:

"Folk Song USA" (also published under the title "Best Loved American Folk Songs") contains 111 American ballads as collected by John A and Allan Lomax. Many of these songs were first printed in other John Lomax books including "Cowboy Songs and Other Frontier Ballads" as words only or words with melody only. Unlike previous books from the Lomaxes that presented these ballads as poetry (how can one have a song without the melody?), this book was meant to be sung! Each song has simple piano arrangements by Charles and Ruth Crawford Seeger with guitar chords supplied by Peter Seeger. The short description, giving its known history and how John Lomax first encountered it, often offers valuable insights on rural American life before WWII. Like most Lomax books, these ballads have more verses than are typically found in other collections. This book is found in both hard cover (under both titles)and paperback as "Folk Song USA". If I was to recommend one folk song book only for the average library, this would be it. Highly recommended! BTW, this was Pete Seeger's first book, supplying guitar enhancements for his father's and step-mother's arrangements.