WPA California Ethnic, Cultural, and Language Groups
Anglo | Armenian | Assyrian
| Basque | Croatian | Finnish
| Hungarian | Icelandic
| Italian | Mexican | Norwegian
| Portuguese | Puerto Rican | Russian
Molokan | Scots | Spanish
Anglo
Anglo-American performers in Alameda, Belvedere, Brentwood, Camino, Carmel,
Central Valley, Columbia, Concord, Groveland, Hollywood, Lotus, Oakland,
Pine Grove, Tuolumne County, San Jose, and Turlock singing English language songs and performing
dance music, fiddle tunes, shanties, ragtime, Barbary Coast tunes, music
from the Gold Rush era, immigrant songs, American popular song, and medicine
and minstrel show tunes on the guitar, tenor banjo,
dulcimer, harmonica,
piano, and violin. Includes
photographs and drawings.
Armenian
Armenians in Fresno and Fowler, singing and performing dance music,
immigrant songs, love songs, ballads, children's songs in the Armenian language, and Armeno-Turkish
music on the daph, dumbelek,
saz, clarinet, blul,
qanun, zurna, oud,
kamanche, and violin. Includes
photographs and drawings.
Assyrian
Photographs of an Assyrian from Soviet Georgia who lives in San Francisco
and drawings of his tar.
Basque
Basques in Fresno singing unaccompanied songs in Basque from the Spanish Navarre.
Croatian
Croatians in Woodside, San Mateo, and Mountain View singing and performing
Dalmatian dance music, Serbo-Croatian oral epic songs, and instrumental
selections on the gusle, misnice,
svirala, lirica, and dvorgrle.Includes
photographs and drawings.
English
See Anglo
Finnish
Finns in Berkeley and Central Valley singing unaccompanied Finnish songs
and epic poetry from the Kalevala. Includes photographs.
Gaelic
See Scots
Hungarian
Hungarians in Oakland singing unaccompanied Christmas songs, ballads, and
songs of old Hungary in Hungarian.
Icelandic
Icelanders in Carmel, Berkeley, and San Francisco singing unaccompanied
rimur, hymns, and immigrant songs in Icelandic and English. Includes photographs.
Italian
Italians, including Sicilians, in Concord, Martinez, Pittsburg, and Woodside
singing unaccompanied songs in Italian and Sicilian dialect. Includes photographs.
Mexican
Mexicans in Carmel performing Spanish songs and music at a wedding.
Norwegian
Norwegians in Carmel singing unaccompanied songs in Norwegian.
Portuguese
Portuguese in Oakland and Richmond, performing dance music and singing
fados, Christmas carols, and songs from Portugal and the Azores on the
English guitar, guitar,
mandolin, piano, triangle,
and viola d'arame in the Portuguese language. Includes photographs and drawings.
Puerto Rican
Puerto Ricans in Oakland singing unaccompanied songs in Spanish.
Russian Molokan
Russian Molokan congregation from Potrero Hill, San Francisco, performing
unaccompanied sacred music and preaching in the Russian language. The Russian Molokans, also called
Molokan Spiritual Jumpers, Spiritual Christians of the Sect of Jumper,
or Milk Drinkers, were a Russian peasant group that dissented from the
Russian Orthodox Church at least as far back as the seventeenth century.
The Molokans came to California from the Transcaucausus in the early part
of the twentieth century.
Scots
Scots in Berkeley and Oakland perfoming unaccompanied Scots Gaelic, lowland Scots dialect, and English songs from Scotland and Cape Breton Island, Canada.
Spanish
Spanish Americans in Carmel and Monterey performing Spanish unaccompanied songs
from the Asturias region of Spain and "Spanish Californians"
(a term used by Sidney Robertson Cowell to denote Spanish-language performers whose ancestors in the state settled there before California became a state) performing topical and love songs.
See also Mexican
See also Puerto Rican
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am Jun-27-97