Grammy Gold: Folkways Takes Home Two Awards

Congratulations to Smithsonian Folkways for its five nominations, and now two awards from the 55th Grammys.

The birthday tribute to folk icon Woody Guthrie, “Woody At 100: The Woody Guthrie Centennial Collection” won in the category Best Boxed or Limited Edition Package. And for Best Latin Rock, Urban or Alternative Album, Quetzal’s “Imaginaries” won.

From Abigail Tucker’s piece on Woody Guthrie’s 100th birthday:

“Guthrie was one of these solar flares who pass through periodically,” says Smithsonian Folkways producer Jeff Place, who, with Robert Santelli, put together Woody at 100, a collection of songs (including his lullaby to Cathy, previously unreleased), essays and drawings in honor of the centennial of Guthrie’s birth this July 14. “He threw sparks wherever he went.”

And from an interview with Aviva Shen and Quetzal’s founder, Quetzal Flores:

The “imaginaries” are the spaces people in struggle create in order to feel human, to dream, to imagine another world. Cultures of convening around music or other things, they become vehicles, mechanisms, tools by which you’re able to navigate outside of the system. It’s called outward mobility. It is moving out of the way of a falling structure in transit to the imaginary. You find these spaces or vehicles everywhere right now; they’re starting to pop up everywhere. It’s going to be the saving grace of people who struggle.

Leah Binkovitz | | READ MORE

Leah Binkovitz is a Stone & Holt Weeks Fellow at Washington Post and NPR. Previously, she was a contributing writer and editorial intern for the At the Smithsonian section of Smithsonian magazine.