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Fall 2007
Nathan Salsburg keeps oral tradition
alive, well and digital on 'Root Hog or Die'
BY ERIN KEANE
In any given episode of
Nathan Salsburg's Internet radio show "Root Hog or Die," you can
hear a variety of roots music, from classic artists like the Carter
Family and
Lightnin' Hopkins to obscure Jewish minstrel show recordings, with
traditional world music interspersed throughout.
Sometimes Salsburg
uses the music to illustrate a theme, such as chain gang chants in
honor of the dog days of summer or carnival and livestock songs for
state fair season. Salsburg approaches traditional music as
something greater than art — it's an integrated piece of culture as
essential to a people, a place, a time and a way of life as food,
clothing style and ceremony.
"Folk music is not as
self-conscious as art is, which is not to say it's backwards or
un-self-conscious. It's not an accessory — it's specific to a
lifestyle," he explained, citing the great string band musicians
from West Virginia who played in the background of farm auctions, as
well as the laborers in fields and on railroads who created and
cultivated work songs.
"Root Hog or Die,"
named from an old saying that roughly translates to "hard times,"
describes itself as "folk, vernacular, traditional, regional,
endangered, extinct music —good time, old time, hard time, end time
music — from around America and the world."
As production manager
for the Association for Cultural Equity, Salsburg is developing a CD
series anthologizing the work of folklorist and musicologist Alan
Lomax. He recently moved back to Louisville, Ky., where he continues
to host the show he launched in downtown New York City.
With a new home in
Aron Conaway's Barking Dog Studio in Louisville's Germantown
neighborhood, Salsburg broadcasts "Root Hog or Die" on Tuesdays at
10 a.m. on East Village Radio, giving new voice to old recordings
that otherwise might languish in scattered collections.
"American roots music
isn't something that's past or primitive," Salsburg said. "It's a
living thing, though harder to find in an authentic form as
lifestyles change."
Before he started
broadcasting, Salsburg's work with the Alan Lomax archives in New
York City had him housed in the isolated top floor of a building
near Port Authority and the Lincoln Tunnel off-ramp, sandwiched
between a homeless shelter and a drop-in center for troubled youth.
"I'm in the worst neighborhood in the world —" Salsburg recalled,
laughing, "— with no air conditioning, listening to recordings all
day, getting emails maybe once a week from, you know, record
collectors in Ohio looking for some obscure Champion release from
1927.
"It felt so obscure,
so removed, so impotent."
He jumped at the
chance to work with East Village Radio and make the recordings
available to a wider audience — an audience with disposable income
and an interest in traditional and outsider art. Unlike popular
music, traditional music was not created solely for consumption;
Salsburg is working to introduce obscure folk recordings to more
people. And that audience, led often to older music through a love
for contemporary musicians like Will Oldham and Gillian Welch, is
listening.
"It feels like
diplomatic work," he explained. "I'm lucky to be able to play this
hard-to-find material for an interested audience."
Salsburg relates a
renewed interest in folk art and culture to the rise in the organic
and slow food movements and the growing concerns of sustainable
living. Rejection of the synthetic aspects of contemporary American
culture creates a need in people for art that doesn't feel
manufactured or contrived. And as the rural American landscape
shrinks and morphs, those who are concerned with local culture and
history look toward traditional arts as a way of preserving their
communities in the face of change.
The availability of
digital media has opened new channels for traditional music,
allowing both more transmitting and more receiving. With commercial
radio dominated by media conglomerates, internet radio is emerging
as a new cultural equalizer. Salsburg's show can be heard by anyone
in the world with an internet connection and is available as a
streaming feed and in podcast form. By broadcasting this archival
material for free, Salsburg and East Village Radio are ensuring yet
another generation can avail themselves of meaningful and enduring
music. In its new digital format, the oral tradition lives on.
Erin Keane is
the author of
The Gravity Soundtrack.
She lives, works and writes in Louisville, Ky.
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