Hmm... I probably don't even know about all of the ten best folk albums but of the ones I know about I'd pick these--in no particular order:

Lead Belly's Last Sessions (I & II)
Dust Bowl Ballads (Woody Guthrie)
Instrumental Music of the Southern Appalachains
Brownie's Blues (?) (10" McGhee album on Folkways) The Weavers at Carnegie Hall
Big Bill's Last Sessions
Elizabeth Cotton's first Folkways album
Old Time Music At Clarence Ashley's
Joan Baez' first album
Your favorite Pete Seeger album


These don't begin to explore the range of folk and traditional music I love but they do set the tone, so to speak. They are also albums that were intended as folk material. They're also the ones that are worn "down to a nubbin" at our house.

- Mark