Recreate Your Roots: Our Musical History

CU’s American Music Research Center and school of music is hosting a celebration of American music, Recreate Your Roots which brings together musicians that represent a diverse cross-section of American roots music traditions, like banjos, fiddles and drums.

Jayme Stone and Moira Smiley of Jayme Stone’s Folklife, a group that plays old songs that come from field recordings with new contemporary elements, tells KGNU’s Ginger Perry that the event is like a summer camp in the woods with concerts, TED-style talks, creative incubation, and community gatherings that welcome folks of all ages from greater Boulder.

Stone and Smiley say that the communal element of folk music is a major element of the genre.  Stone says that people have been creating music together over the centuries. “It’s like a long game of broken telephone across the generations of earthy songs that we sing for some kind of community purpose.”

Some of the musicians participating in the Recreate Your Roots events include Jayme Stone’s Folklife, Anna & Elizabeth, and Dom Flemons — who all work in collaboration with the past, both honoring and exploring the provenance and social underpinnings of the songs they play.

Recreate Your Roots happens at CU Boulder February 5-8, 2018.

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