The American Folklife Center of the Library of Congress has announced the availability of this new American Memory collection of recorded music. Now What a Time provides access to over 100 sound recordings and related documentation from what may have been the "first folk festival organized entirely by and for African Americans." The recordings feature guitar, banjo, harmonica, and choral...

The Black Archives of Mid-America, located in Kansas City, Missouri, was founded to collect and preserve the cultural history of African-Americans in the Midwest, particularly in the states of Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, and Oklahoma. With funding from the Missouri State Library, the Black Archives have collaborated with the Kansas City Public Library to digitize its collection. Heretofore, the...