Restrictions to Access

Use of the collection is restricted to library reading room use only until 7 August 2022.

Use of audio or moving image materials may require production of listening or viewing copies.

Access to streaming audio or moving image materials may be restricted to researchers who can authenticate with an ONYEN or who are physically present on campus. For further information about access to streaming audiovisual materials, contact Research and Instructional Services staff at Wilsonlibrary@unc.edu

Restrictions to Use

Duplication or publishing of collection materials requires permission from the seller, Bruce Conforth.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the Bruce M. Conforth Collection on Lawrence Gellert #20552, Southern Folklife Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Acquisitions Information

Purchased from Bruce M. Conforth in December 2017 (Acc. 103300).

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

Processed by: Emma Evans and Anne Wells, July 2018

Updated in June 2020 to remove racist slurs.

Encoded by: Anne Wells, July 2018

Archival processing of the Bruce M. Conforth Collection on Lawrence Gellert was made possible through a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• African Americans--Folklore.
• African Americans--Music.
• Blues (Music)
• Conforth, Bruce M., 1950-
• Folk songs, English--Southern States.
• Folklore--Southern States.
• Gellert, Lawrence, 1898-1979.
• Irish Americans--Folklore.
• Protest songs--Southern States.
• Spirituals (Songs)--Southern States.
• Tales--Southern States.
• Work songs--Southern States.

• Lawrence Gellert Scrapbook (#04442)
• Lawrence Gellert Collection (Archives of Traditional Music, Indiana University)
• Lawrence Gellert Papers (Lilly Library, Indiana University)

Bruce M. Conforth received his PhD in ethnomusicology and folklore from Indiana University. He served as the first curator of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum and was a member of the faculty of the American Culture Department at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor until 2017. Since his time at Indiana, Conforth has researched and helped to release recordings by Lawrence Gellert (1898-1979), an independent Hungarian American music collector who recorded and published African American vernacular music from the American South from roughly 1920-1940. Gellert was the younger brother of the radical artist, Hugo Gellert, who was also on the editorial staff of the American intellectual journal, The New Masses, which Lawrence Gellert often contributed songs, lyrics, and commentary to. Lawrence Gellert was also known for his 1936 publication Negro Songs of Protest, which contained song transcriptions and accompanying musical arrangments of African American vernacular music. Bruce M. Conforth wrote his masters thesis on Lawrence Gellert and his collection of field recordings held at Indiana University's Archives of Traditional Music. Conforth also helped produce two albums of songs from this same collection, including releases under Rounder Records ( Cap'n You're So Mean: Negro Songs Of Protest, Volume Two, 1982, RR 4013) and Heritage Records ( Nobody Knows My Name: Blues From South Carolina And Georgia 1924-1932, 1984, HT 304). In 2013, Conforth published a book on Lawrence Gellert titled, African American folksong and American cultural politics: the Lawrence Gellert story, which includes discussion on how Lawrence Gellert's field recordings were adopted by the American Left and American Communist party as "songs of protest", as well as folklorists' and scholars' assertions that Gellert's field work had been doctored for political purposes.

The Bruce M. Conforth Collection on Lawrence Gellert consists of paper materials and original field recordings related to the independent white music collector, Lawrence Gellert, who recorded African American vernacular music in the American South from roughly 1920-1940. Folklorist, Bruce M. Conforth, compiled the materials as part of his ongoing research on Lawrence Gellert, which culminated with Conforth's 2013 publication, African American folksong and American cultural politics: the Lawrence Gellert story. Collection materials contain papers on or by Lawrence Gellert, as well as original field recordings by Lawrence Gellert on aluminum instantaneous disc.

Papers consist mostly of Bruce M. Conforth's dated research files on Lawrence Gellert. These files include copies of clippings on Lawrence Gellert's brother, Ernest Gellert (1918), and brother, Hugo Gellert (1925); copies of correspondence with Langston Hughes (1931), W. C. Handy (1932), Ben Davis of Negro Liberator (1934), Louis Coleman of International Labor Defense (1934), John Gassner of Theatre Guild (1934), Elie Siegmeister (1934), Lon Adomian (1935), Carl Fischer (1936), and Alice Lightner (1936); copies of publications, including Negro Songs of Protest (Lawrence Gellert, 1936, 1938), Me and My Captain (Lawrence Gellert, 1939), Music Vanguard (1935), and "Federal Writers Project Manual for Collecting Folklore" (1939); copies of Gellert's writings on Nancy Cunard (undated), Stephen Foster (1940), and a Monroe, La. lynching (1946); Gellert's collection of army songs for the Pepsi-Cola Company (1942); and other materials.

Papers also include audiovisual documentation, lyric transcriptions, musical scores, notebooks, writings, and other materials compiled by Bruce M. Conforth. Audiovisual documentation includes an inventory and assessment by Conforth of Gellert's field recordings, presumably held at Indiana University. Song lyrics and musical scores by Lawrence Gellert consist of typed and handwritten lyric transcriptions and musical scores, some of which are annotated. Notebooks by Lawrence Gellert contain writings, lyric transcriptions, and musical scores. Writings and other materials consist of Bruce M. Conforth's liner notes and writings on Lawrence Gellert's recordings, biographical materials on Gellert compiled by Conforth, as well as additional writings and other materials created by Gellert. Writings of particular note include about 290 pages of typed and annotated manuscript of Lawrence Gellert's collection of I'shman tales, which contain folktales told by African Americans in the South about Irish immigrants to the area. Please note that additional I'shman tales manuscript materials can be found in the Southern Historical Collection's Lawrence Gellert Scrapbook (#04442).

Original field recordings consist of 75 aluminum instantaneous disc recordings of African American vernacular music recorded by Lawrence Gellert in the American South, including the states of North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. The recordings are undated, but were presumably created between 1920-1940. They feature African American work songs, chants, spirituals, and blues songs.

• Instantaneous Discs (FD-20552/1-75)