Folkways Records

This deluxe new large-format hardback book features hundreds of striking and beautiful record sleeve designs from Folkways Records, one of the most iconic independent record companies in the world. Ronald Clyne, the primary designer at Folkways Records, was responsible for more than 500 record sleeves on almost every subject imaginable, as well as for numerous artists including Woody Guthrie, John Cage, Lead Belly, Langston Hughes, Pete Seeger, Angela Davis, Mary Lou Williams, Sarah Webster Fabio, Allen Ginsberg and many more, all of whom feature in this book. Folkways Records was founded by Moses Asch in 1948. Encouraged by Albert Einstein to document all the “sounds of the world,” the record company released over 2,000 records of folk, jazz, blues, gospel, experimental and electronic music, nature sounds, political speeches, poetry, self-help records and more in its almost 40-year history. Asch died in 1986. The following year Smithsonian Folkways was created after Asch’s family donated the entire catalogue to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC. Folkways Records is today part of Smithsonian Folkways Recordings, the nonprofit record label of the Smithsonian Institution. This book is a celebration and visual history of Folkways Records and the artwork designs of Ronald Clyne.