Not strictly song, but a very good use of material from the Carpenter collection by a webcast called
‘Bringing in the May’ presented by Jennifer Cutting of the American Folk Life Center at the Library of
Congress. The fifteen minute programme looks at the history of may customs (particularly the maypole and
morris dancing) through material from England gathered by James Carpenter and its re-assimilation into
the USA as documented by Tony Barrand. As Jennifer says in her covering e-mail ‘It’s low budget, but
sincere’. This is not, of course, cinema quality but I think that it is a pointer to a future in which video will be
an important part of a website like this – or like ours. Go here to see the programme.
