B. Miller Assignment Two Collection
Title
B. Miller Assignment Two Collection
Subject
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Description
This collection brings together, for the first time, three different sources for experiencing the traditional folk songs and singing style of Michael Cassius Dean (1857-1931).
Michael Cassius Dean’s repertoire was preserved by three events in the early 1920s:
1. In 1922, in Virginia, MN, Dean published the words to 166 songs in a songster which he titled "The Flying Cloud And 150 Other Old Time Poems and Ballads: A Collection of Old Irish Songs, Songs of the Sea and Great Lakes, The Big Pine Woods, The Prize Ring and Others."
2. In summer 1923, Dean was visited at his home in Virginia, MN by folk song collector Franz Rickaby who transcribed Dean’s melodies for 27 songs (26 of which appear in The Flying Cloud) and took down a few scant notes on where Dean learned some of the songs and what they were about.
3. In September 1924, folk song collector Robert Winslow Gordon made wax cylinder recordings of Dean singing (parts of) 33 songs (32 of which appear in The Flying Cloud) at the home of Dean’s sister Mary (Dean) Bird in Canton, New York.
This site focuses on the 33 songs recorded by Gordon. In all but one case, Gordon recorded only the first verse or two of what were much longer songs.
On this site, full texts taken from "The Flying Cloud" have been matched to mp3s made from the Gordon cylinders to reunite Dean’s full versions of the lyrics with a audio of him singing his melody. In addition, where they exist, Rickaby’s notes have been added to the song description to further enrich this resource.
NOTE: My classification of Dean’s songs as representative of the folk song traditions of both Minnesota and northern New York State is based on my own research into the timeline of his life. Rickaby’s notes imply that Dean learned many songs during his childhood in New York and while doing itinerant work in Michigan and elsewhere in his twenties. He ultimately settled in Minnesota and lived the majority of life there.
-----------General M.C. Dean Timeline----------
---1857 – about 1878: St. Lawrence County, NY
---about 1878 – about 1885: Manistee, MI / Millbank, SD / Other? (Dean was an itinerant logger, farmer and Great Lakes sailor during these years)
---about 1885 – 1907: Hinckley, MN
---1907 – 1917 Pine City, MN
---1907 – 1931 Virginia, MN
The original recordings were made on wax cylinders which are housed in the R. W. Gordon Collection at the Archive of Folk Culture at the Library of Congress. The AFC (then the Archive of Folk Song) transferred them to reel-to-reel tape in in the late 1970s. The tracks here come from a portion of the R. W. Gordon Collection digitized by AFC staff, from the tapes, for Brian T. Miller in September 2012.
Michael Cassius Dean’s repertoire was preserved by three events in the early 1920s:
1. In 1922, in Virginia, MN, Dean published the words to 166 songs in a songster which he titled "The Flying Cloud And 150 Other Old Time Poems and Ballads: A Collection of Old Irish Songs, Songs of the Sea and Great Lakes, The Big Pine Woods, The Prize Ring and Others."
2. In summer 1923, Dean was visited at his home in Virginia, MN by folk song collector Franz Rickaby who transcribed Dean’s melodies for 27 songs (26 of which appear in The Flying Cloud) and took down a few scant notes on where Dean learned some of the songs and what they were about.
3. In September 1924, folk song collector Robert Winslow Gordon made wax cylinder recordings of Dean singing (parts of) 33 songs (32 of which appear in The Flying Cloud) at the home of Dean’s sister Mary (Dean) Bird in Canton, New York.
This site focuses on the 33 songs recorded by Gordon. In all but one case, Gordon recorded only the first verse or two of what were much longer songs.
On this site, full texts taken from "The Flying Cloud" have been matched to mp3s made from the Gordon cylinders to reunite Dean’s full versions of the lyrics with a audio of him singing his melody. In addition, where they exist, Rickaby’s notes have been added to the song description to further enrich this resource.
NOTE: My classification of Dean’s songs as representative of the folk song traditions of both Minnesota and northern New York State is based on my own research into the timeline of his life. Rickaby’s notes imply that Dean learned many songs during his childhood in New York and while doing itinerant work in Michigan and elsewhere in his twenties. He ultimately settled in Minnesota and lived the majority of life there.
-----------General M.C. Dean Timeline----------
---1857 – about 1878: St. Lawrence County, NY
---about 1878 – about 1885: Manistee, MI / Millbank, SD / Other? (Dean was an itinerant logger, farmer and Great Lakes sailor during these years)
---about 1885 – 1907: Hinckley, MN
---1907 – 1917 Pine City, MN
---1907 – 1931 Virginia, MN
The original recordings were made on wax cylinders which are housed in the R. W. Gordon Collection at the Archive of Folk Culture at the Library of Congress. The AFC (then the Archive of Folk Song) transferred them to reel-to-reel tape in in the late 1970s. The tracks here come from a portion of the R. W. Gordon Collection digitized by AFC staff, from the tapes, for Brian T. Miller in September 2012.
Creator
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Source
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Publisher
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Date
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Contributor
Original wax cylinders recorded by Robert Winslow Gordon
Transferred to reel-to-reel tape by the Archive of Folk Song, Library of Congress
Digitized by the Archive of Folk Culture, Library of Congress
Identified and converted to mp3 by Brian T. Miller
Rights
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Relation
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Format
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Language
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Type
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Identifier
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Coverage
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Collection Items
The Clipper Ship "Dreadnaught"
![The Clipper Ship "Dreadnaught"](/application/views/scripts/images/fallback-audio.png "The Clipper Ship "Dreadnaught"")
Summary: A song describing a run on the "Dreadnaught" from Liverpool to New York. Most of the song is a catalog of places the ship visits