This project is now complete! You can visit the catalog page here:
http://librivox.org/folk-ballad-collection-001/
After helping out with the Christmas Carol Project, I thought of a new idea. A lot of folk ballads are in the public domain but most recorded versions of them are copy-righted (think Bob Dylan, Pete Seeger, or Joan Baez). It’s rather unfortunate that you have to pay to listen to these great traditional pieces of oral literature. So…
This is a both a poetry and musical project.
It works just like any poem or short story collection.
We’re look for:
8 spoken ballads
8 musically performed ballads
(It’s fine if there are both versions of the same ballad.)
What counts as a ballad?
1) a narrative song with a recurrent refrain
2) a narrative poem of popular origin
*Note: This might be part of children's literature section. Nothing too vulgar please.
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WHERE TO FIND BALLADS
Here are some good sites to find folk ballad sheet-music in the public domain:
http://www.ezfolk.com/library (voice, piano, guitar, banjo sheet-music)
http://www.traditionalmusic.co.uk/ (very extensive)
Here are some good sites to find ballad texts:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_ballad (Wikipedia’s page on Child’s Ballads)
http://www.theotherpages.org/poems/poemtrad.html (Poets’ Corner traditional ballad page)
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/7535 (Project Guntenberg's A BOOK OF OLD BALLADS by Beverley Nichols)
Recording Information
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FOR SONGS
At the beginning, read the abbreviated "librivox disclaimer":
"[TITLE OF SONG] performed for LibriVox.org by [your name]" or some variation on that, adding date, location, your personal url, if you wish.
At the End say: End of song; this recording is in the public domain.
There's are many ways you can record the song:
1) solo a cappella
2) solo with accompaniment (with piano, guitar, or banjo as long as your voice is louder than the music)
3) duet, trio with other people (with or without accompaniment)
You don't need fancy recording equipment. Lo-fi music works great; the library of Congress releases them all the time.
If you are new, please check the Recording Notes thread before recording:
http://librivox.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=6427#6430
If this is your first recording, you'll also find this useful:
http://librivox.org/wiki/moin.cgi/NewbieGuideToRecording
(I'm not sure if will totally help. Experiment with it a bit.)
Technical Details
Please be sure that your recording software is set to the following technical specifications:
Bit Rate: 128 kbps
Sample Rate: 44100 kHzs
Save your recording as an mp3 file using the following filename and ID3 tag format:
File name � all in lowercase: [song's title]_[your initials].mp3
(e.g. oldsusanna_abc.mp3)
ID3 tags (version 2):
Title: Song Title (e.g. Old Susanna)
Artist: Composer Name or Traditional (e.g. Stephen Foster)
Album: Folk Ballad Collection
Genre: Folk
(You can put "Recorded by ...." in the Comments section if you wish)
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FOR SPOKEN BALLADS
At the beginning, read the abbreviated "librivox disclaimer":
"[TITLE OF BALLAD] performed for LibriVox.org by [your name]" or some variation on that, adding date, location, your personal url, if you wish.
At the End say: End of poem; this recording is in the public domain.
Technical Details
Please be sure that your recording software is set to the following technical specifications:
Bit Rate: 128 kbps
Sample Rate: 44100 kHzs
Save your recording as an mp3 file using the following filename and ID3 tag format:
File name � all in lowercase: [poem title]_[your initials].mp3
(e.g. barbaraallen _abc.mp3)
ID3 tags (version 2):
Title: Poem Title (e.g. Barbara Allen)
Artist: Composer Name or Anonymous (e.g. Anonymous)
Album: Folk Ballad Collection
Genre: Speech
(You can put "Recorded by ...." in the Comments section if you wish)
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What To Do With Your Recording
You may either post a link to your completed files here in the thread or email them to me via http://www.yousendit.com/ at this address: zbaobao at hotmail dot com. If you use yousendit, please post the link it generates in this thread as well.
When you post your link, please also include the following information:
* your name as you would like it credited on the catalog page and any URL you wish your name to link to (Note: This is necessary only if your information is not yet in the wiki: http://librivox.org/wiki/moin.cgi/ListOfReadersCatalogNames#preview)
* a link to the source of the song
Deadline: June 30, 2007
THANK YOU!
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