Country Music Sources: A Biblio-Discography of Commercially Recorded Traditional Music

Western Folklore, Spring 2002 by Taft, Michael

My criticisms, however, pale beside the extraordinary achievements of this work and its usefulness. Beyond invaluable information on the discographical history of thousands of songs, Meade's work presents a fine bibliography of songbooks that form part of his annotations. Meade also provides, through both the index and the body of the work, a concordance to the many variations in song titles, and this information is especially valuable in tracking the instrumental music in the discography (e.g., the ten different titles for "Bucking Mule"). Perhaps the greatest compliment that I can give this work is that it is eminently browsable.

Works Cited

Dixon, Robert M. W., John Godrich, and Howard W. Rye, comps. 1997. Blues and Gospel Records, 1890-1943. 4th ed. New York: Oxford University Press.

Laws, G. Malcolm, Jr. 1964 Native American Balladry. Rev. ed. Philadelphia: American Folklore Society.

MICHAEL TAFT

American Folklife Center, Library of Congress

Washington, DC