Continuing with our Mike Seeger theme today, here is news of a multi-disc retrospective on the recording career of The New Lost City Ramblers.

50 Years: Where Do You Come From? Where Do You Go? was released August 25 by Smithsonian Folkways. The 3 CD box set contains a total of 81 tracks (6 previously unreleased) and an 88 page booklet with notes on each track. Extensive biographical details are provided for each of the three eras of the band, as described in the booklet: 1958-1962, 1963-1973, and The New Lost City Ramblers at 50.

The CDs include the band’s choices from their long recording career (1958-1973), plus field recordings of some of the musicians who had a strong influence on their sound.

Audio samples from all of the tracks can be found on the Smithsonian Folkways web site, where you can also purchase individual tracks for download. There are three free tracks there as well, which can be downloaded as either .MP3 or.FLAC files.

Apropos of Richard’s fine tribute to Mike Seeger, here is some related news.

The Arhoolie Foundation has recently released a DVD of the Yasha Aginsky film, Always Been A Rambler, an hour-long documentary on the New Lost City Ramblers, of which Mike was a founding member.

The film tells the story of this seminal folk group using archival footage of the band from their early days in the 1950s through to rehearsals, performances and interviews with the members (Mike Seeger, John Cohen, Tracy Schwarz and Tom Paley) nearly fifty years later.

Other prominent artists featured in the film include Clarence Ashley, Maybelle and Sara Carter, Elizabeth Cotton, Hazel Dickens & Alice Gerrard, Foghorn Duo, Rayna Gellert, David Grisman, Roscoe Holcomb, Pete Seeger, and Ricky Skaggs.

Here is the trailer…

The DVD can be purchased from Arhoolie online, and is widely available from popular online resellers.

Details about theatrical showings of the film can be found on the director’s web site.

While much of the focus for the past few weeks has been on the IBMA Convention and FanFest, there has been bluegrass activity elsewhere in the world.

For instance in New York last month Tom Paley and John Cohen, two of the founder members of the influential New Lost City Ramblers, were presented with the Brown Jug in recognition of their significant contributions to old-time music in the Northeast United States.

The duo were honored during the 11th Park Slope Bluegrass & Old-Time Jamboree in Brooklyn, New York, which took place on September 13.

In a piece on the Acoustic Music Scene, Michael Kornfeld wrote:

Paley (now 80) and Cohen (now 75) formed the New Lost City Ramblers, along with Mike Seeger, in mid-1958 and presented their first concert on September 13th of that year – exactly 50 years to the day of their performance at the Park Slope Jamboree.

The Brown Jug award was the brainchild of James Reams, a New York-based bluegrass musician and bandleader, who conceived of it as a way to recognize people in the Northeast whose impact on the music deserved to be honored but who might be less likely to be recognized by national organizations since for some of them (unlike this year’s recipients), their impact was only regional in nature.

Previous recipients of the Brown Jug include such notables as the late singer-songwriter and musician John Herald, Bill Knowlton, who was named Broadcaster of the Year by the IBMA in 1997, Stephanie Ledgin, an award-winning folk and bluegrass music photo-journalist and author, and the late Doug Tuchman, a bluegrass promoter who was instrumental in bringing Bill Monroe and other bluegrass music greats to play venues in the city.

You can read more about the Brown Jug Awards at the Acoustic Music Scene website.