HELP! Need testimonials

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Amergin
Date: 11 Apr 01 - 02:11 PM

Just make sure that folks know not to send in their withdrawal stories......

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: wysiwyg
Date: 11 Apr 01 - 11:47 AM

OK. I'll send you any other URL's where I insert something like it, as described in a post up above. OK? With Subject Lines that reflect School Project, etc., appropriate to the occasion. Then all you have to do is save any e-mails with those subject lines to a folder where you can pile up the news for use later. OK?

~S~

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 11 Apr 01 - 11:36 AM

Works for me.

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: wysiwyg
Date: 11 Apr 01 - 11:24 AM

---

(Click HERE to e-mail Dick Greenhaus of Digital Tradition. Please use Subject Line: D.T. TESTIMONIALS.)

---

Dick, how's that?

~S~

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 11 Apr 01 - 12:28 AM

Keep them cards and letters comin'

and many sincere thanx

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 10 Apr 01 - 11:36 PM

Sorry Dick, didn't see this earlier. What I sent tonight was:

To whom it may concern

I have been a professional musician for 33 years, mostly working and recording in Canada. For the last 12 years I've been taking students, from beginners to full-time musicians, and have tried to show them the "background" of the folk music they play, as well as "the notes". The Digital tradition has been invaluable in this pursuit. Long may it be at our disposal.

Rick Fielding

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: wysiwyg
Date: 10 Apr 01 - 11:25 PM

Dick,

I been thinking further... you could collect testimonials on an ongoing basis by posting your e-mail as a clicky like I do, in threads where you say hi to researchers or kids doing projects. See, you are a Public Figger.... inviting them to e-mail you about the things they are doing may seem a bit, ahem, intimidating! The clicky makes it so easy and inviting. I could send you the HTML template I use to do mine, with yours inserted.

Or how would you feel about my posting something like "DT co-founder Dick Greenhaus is very interested in just the kind of thing you are doing. Could you let him know how it goes?" Then I could post a clicky to YOUR E-MAIL!

Whaddaya think?

I'll go find the Help Forum threads I remember tomorrow. Some included e-mail addresses for the requestors as I recall.

~S~

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 10 Apr 01 - 09:51 PM

Susan- That would be great! dick

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: wysiwyg
Date: 10 Apr 01 - 06:43 PM

Dick, did you see threadid=33022?

Do you want me to watch out for these in future and let you know? They appear in the Help Forum too-- several in the last few months.

[school project] came up in the SuperSearch with several threads too. I tried [research] but with this 486 it would not load, so maybe there were a "few."

If you have not been tracking statistics on that sort of thread, and would like to, let me know, OK? And do you want me to try to find the ones in the Help forum I was thinking of?

~Susan

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 10 Apr 01 - 04:54 PM

refresh

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: bet
Date: 10 Apr 01 - 12:18 PM

Dick, Sorry it has taken me so long to respond. As Kat said I was on spring break. I am an elementary school music teacher and occasionally performer. I live in a small rather remote community that has few musical opportunities other than what we create ourselves. I have found the DT very help both professionally and personally. Not only can we find song words but also the history of songs which makes it more meaningful for my students. Last year, with the help of the DT, I compiled a song book of the 50 states, following the 4th grade curriculium guide. This book has made their social studies more meaningful and easier for our 4th graders to remember important facts. It is a quick, easy to use resourse and if the answer is not immediately available all you have to do is ask and someone will be there with the answer whatever the subject is. The effort that has been made to put together this sight is remarkable. A truely valuable tool.

betty.landon@moffatsd

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: katlaughing
Date: 09 Apr 01 - 03:16 AM

Dick, I just sent my sister an email about this, now that she is back.

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: SeanM
Date: 09 Apr 01 - 02:12 AM

Refresh lest it fall from the page.

M

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Naemanson
Date: 08 Apr 01 - 10:06 AM

Here's what I sent:

My name is Brett Burnham. I sing with Roll & Go, a sea chantey group on the coast of Maine. We take our music very seriously, seeing it as a view into the history of ships and the sea, and the men and women who made the sea their livelihood. We are listed on the Maine Arts Commision's list of touring artists. Our venues includes schools and museums.

I have found the Digital tradition to be one of the best tools for researching lyrics and tunes of traditional sea song anywhere. The effort that has gone into the site, and the authorities that contriibute to the site, make it a fine example of what the Internet and the World Wide Web is striving to be. When coupled to the Mudcat cafe it adds its vast treasure house of songs to a site to a wonderful store of traditions, information, and advice.

Brett Burnham [e-mail]

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: alison
Date: 08 Apr 01 - 09:45 AM

To whom it may concern,

I am an Irish girl living in Australia. My background is in playing and listening to many kinds of music but especially Irish.

The Digital Tradition is without a doubt the most useful site on the net for finding any information about folk and blues music. Whether it be looking for lyrics, tunes, guitar chords, or finding out background info on a particular song.

The people who frequent this site have a wealth of information on all things musical. The difference between this and other sites is the generousity with which they share this knowledge and experience.

slainte

alison

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: SeanM
Date: 08 Apr 01 - 12:47 AM

Well, here goes.

To whom it may concern;

My name is Sean Mitchell, and I'm a performer in a performing arts troupe that specializes in living history representational theater. My group sings primarily traditional sea shanties and related folk songs, much of the research of which has been done through the Digital Tradition database, with accompanying research through the Mudcat Cafe website.

I have personally used this as a resource, enabling me to create a website (http://www.geocities.com/muckscrapper/index.htm) which is used as an educational, preparational and promotional resource for our performances. I have also been able to use this resource to broaden my personal musical horizons as well, utilizing both the lyric database for 'new' traditional songs to learn and the 'Mudcat Cafe' for advice and support in my attempts to master a new instrument.

(Hope this is what you're looking for. It's the least - and I do mean the absolute-least-damn-I-wish-I-had-money-to-donate thing I can do.)

Sean Mitchell, otherwise signing normally as

M

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Joe Offer
Date: 07 Apr 01 - 04:45 PM

If you sent your testimonial privately to Dick or Susan, might you consider posting it in this thread also? It would be interesting to see what people have to say.
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Amergin
Date: 07 Apr 01 - 04:45 PM

There have been countless times, since I first discovered the DT, that I have heard a song and searched everywhere for the lyrics only to find it there. The resources this database provides is invaluable and I have no idea what I would have been doing if it were not in existence. Besides there are many songs in there that I have changed for my own ends, and I would not have been able to do so if it were not for the DT.....

Oh, hell let me think on this so I can come up with something a wee bit better.....

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Susan of DT
Date: 07 Apr 01 - 04:23 PM

refresh!

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 26 Mar 01 - 11:22 PM

refresh. The more the better

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Amos
Date: 24 Mar 01 - 05:54 PM

Well said, Garg.

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: GUEST,_gargoyle
Date: 24 Mar 01 - 04:13 PM

The Digital Tradition has been a valuable resource to me since 1995. It has permitted easy access to folk lyrics and tunes for students and researchers.

More importantly, it has served as a central location where songs that have been orally passed from generation to generation within a family can be permanently catalogued and shared.

It is this unique ability to gather songs from around the globe; songs which otherwise might be lost to posterity, that makes the Digital Tradition a valuable resource worthy of funding.

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Joe Offer
Date: 24 Mar 01 - 03:24 PM

Ted, I don't think I'm going to be able to find a copy of that Interactive Week issue. Is the article available online, or is it something somebody could post?
-Joe Offer-

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Susan of DT
Date: 24 Mar 01 - 02:41 PM

refresh

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Joe Offer
Date: 23 Mar 01 - 05:48 AM

I have used the Digital Tradition database several times a week since 1992, and many times a day since I started serious folk music research a couple of years ago. It's an old friend that I know very well, and it's a friend I'm very proud to know. In using the Digital Tradition and contributing to it, I've met singers from all over the world and learned the fascinating stories behind many of the songs. I've worked as a Digital Tradition volunteer for the last year, processing lyrics and melodies that are submitted to the database. It's one of the most interesting jobs I've ever had.
-Joe offer-

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: M.Ted
Date: 22 Mar 01 - 03:15 PM

Your proposal packet ought to have a copy of the articles in the Interactive Week magazine of (I think) the week of January 15. The subject is other types of music downloading from the internet, and it is mostly about Mudcat and the DT database.

I mention this because it is great press coverage (in an really slick, glossy, magazine) and not simply because there is a nice little interview with me, accompanied by a big color picture of me, with my little ukulele in my hands (incidentally, just to show you what the priorities are, for the article, I talked to the writer for about 10 minutes on the phone, for the photo, they sent two people out to the house for half a day, complete with lights and backdrops).

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: GUEST,Irish Sergeant
Date: 22 Mar 01 - 02:28 PM

Dick: You should have my testimonial in your e-mail box by now. Hope it helps, Kindest reguards, Neil

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 22 Mar 01 - 05:14 AM

refresh

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Burke
Date: 21 Mar 01 - 06:27 PM

Librarians who use the Database are unlikely to be reading the forum. I suggest you send your request to the Music Librarians mailing list: [e-mail]

For feedback from reference librarians try: [e-mail]

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Hollowfox
Date: 21 Mar 01 - 06:06 PM

To whom it may concern: I am a public librarian. That means that people come to me for information, from current events and stock market quotations to half-remembered songs and materials for teachers to supplement their curricula. I have found the Digital Tradition to be invaluable for any questions regarding song lyrics in the English language; often finding material beyond the stated venues of folk and blues. The database is clear and easy to use, and I can find the answer to my patron's question faster using the Digital Tradition than telephoning my library system's Main branch and having someone search through the music books. As I have explored the Internet, I have noticed that the Digital Tradition is one of the most common, and most highly recommended "links" for searches of this sort; not only on websites that are based in the United States, but throughout the English-speaking world.
In addition to this, questions may be posted to the forum associated with the Digital Tradition for lyrics not found in the database, as well as questions relating to folklore and other related subjects. Many experts in the field, both performers and scholars, post answers, often with citations for their answers.
In short, I know of no other website so useful and easy to use for musical and folkloric questions as www.mudcat.org

Mary Hermance, librarian

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: AllisonA(Animaterra)
Date: 21 Mar 01 - 05:46 PM

Dick, I have to say that the Digital Tradition has become the single most valuable source for lyrics and information that I have found on the web. Where else can one post a frantic request at 8:30 am about a song needed by 10:30, only to have the request fulfilled 15 minutes later from someone in Australia? I've gotten information about folk and blues that I use regularly in my music teaching, and also in my choral directing. I've learned new verses to songs I've known for years. I've taught these songs to children and members of my community. I've met regular contributors to this forum and they are without exception some of the finest people of my acquaintence.
Good luck with the grantwriting. I am not at all well-versed in the skill, but I wish you all the best!

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: katlaughing
Date: 21 Mar 01 - 04:09 PM

Dick, the elementary music school teacher sister of mine, aka "bet" is away on vacation. I will be sure she sees this when she gets back next week. I know she has found it to be of great value.

kat

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Kim C
Date: 21 Mar 01 - 03:28 PM

As one who performs mostly pre-Civil War music, the Digital Tradition has been an invaluable resource in helping me track down some of those tunes that were popular 150 years ago, but were eventually lost to the mists of time. Thanks to this database, these songs can live again and be enjoyed and treasured by generations to come.

Cheers---

Kim Caudell Nashville, TN

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: wysiwyg
Date: 21 Mar 01 - 01:07 PM

Dick, feel free to edit and use the following in any way.

You may also find some useful things in the current Folkbabies thread. See the words of the grown-up folkbabies there.

~Susan

---

My husband and I live in and serve Tioga County, PA. This is a poor, sparsely-populated rural area where resources are usually in short supply unless home-made. The rates of suicide, alcoholism, illiteracy, spousal abuse, sexual assault, child abuse, child sexual abuse, and child pornography are extremely high here. Yet at the same time our communities live out the good old values of family, farmfolk, and mutual aid that were once the way of life in most of our country.

A current project I could not be doing without the Digital Tradition involves presenting and teaching one of the positive aspects of their culture-- folk music-- to boy scouts too poor to have uniforms. You see, these songs are no longer taught to our children... the porch pickers and homespun teachers are mostly past. (We are working on this as well.)

Barney, and other current cultural icons beamed into the hollows via cable TV, do not relate to life experience here. They do not sound like, look like, act like, or feel like either our problems or our values. They can neither help with our problems nor call us to our values. The Digital Tradition has provided me not only with reproducible songsheets, but historical notes on many old favorite folk songs that previous generations take for granted. These notes come alive when the young people are asked to make up their own verses to thse wonderful classics-- and thus they see that they are actually connected to what we so casually call "the folk process." They see that they are connected to something older and bigger than Real Life looks around here these days.

The project has already been described in the discussion forum that accompnaies the Digital Tradition. Thus, through ongoing discussion, projects like this can serve as a living model for others as long as the site remains open.

The Digital Tradition provides me with something else, too-- a place to contribute the songs that are still sung here, many never collected before. I post several new songs each week, many of them not available in retail songbooks. I hope one day these will be included in the Digital Tradition. There are any number of places I could post them... but I choose to support what is already more wonderful than I could have imagined.

My hope is that the Digital Tradition and all its resources will be available for a long, long time, in homes and schools. One reason this is SO important is that as music education is cut from school programs, we have fewer and fewer young people who learn to read music as they grow up. The Digital Tradition contains thousands and thousands of hearable TUNES. And for so many in this neck of the woods, real, stick-to-your heart learning still comes through HEARING.

All of this happens with the tools of today's technologies, which are also a reality even in this place and time.

The Digital Tradition must flourish and grow amid the cacophony of the Internet, if we expect to keep the voice of our people from vanishing.

Susan Hinton
St. Paul's Episcopal Church
Wellsboro, PA

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 21 Mar 01 - 10:41 AM

Dick, this is copied from Mike Raven's website (see Nic Jones Perma-data thread) on his experience in getting grants for a folk festival:
The Ten Arts Grants Commandments

Here, then, are the Ten Commandments according to Chris "Moses" Smith, the Cultural Secretary, as given to him by Tony, "The Lord God" Blair and applied by their Anointed Disciples in the Provinces:

Put on international artists "like Boy George, whom we funded at the Hay on Wye Festival." (True, folks: could I have made that up?). Extend your festival to at least two days because that would encourage people to stay overnight and so help the 'regeneration of the area' - people pay for food and accommodation. Hire professional actors to work with young children in schools to create and perform a show to present to their proud mums and dads. This is rather cynically clever because it fills two priorities: involving young people and developing new audiences. Try to involve at least two acts of Indian, African or other ethnic minority origin. This is a major 'priority' criterion, even if the whole point of your festival is to celebrate and develop your regional culture in which such minorities have no part. Form a company with Articles of Association. Do not use the word Folk or Regional in the name of the festival and, if possible, use the word International. Commission a 'new work' to be performed by professional actors, dancers or musicians. This does not include contemporary songs or dances in the traditional style because, although most folk singers and morris dancers write or adapt much of their material, they would do this anyway, without grant aid. A healthy, living tradition does not need support. It is the 'uncommercial' contemporary art forms that need help. (I've seen a few of these "written-to-get-the-grant" works and have been singularly unimpressed. Most have one performance and are never heard of again, justifiably so.) There must be community involvement. However, just what this means I do not know. I was turned down last year when I had input from the Town Council, the Parish Church, Twinning Association and the British Legion, amonst others. To pay for the 'priority' events I should not apply for a measly £500 but for more like £5,000 and, what is more, I should apply for more than one of the several possible kinds of grant, even though it might mean I end up with more than I either want or need. If I persist in restricting my festival to being a one-day celebration of regional music by regional artists I should not waste my time applying for regional arts funding, but should approach local industry for sponsorship. (In Market Drayton we have two major food processing plants, namely Muller and Palethorpe.) "Socrates is Dead; Long live Socrates"

The professional, state-authorized arts funders all work to this shibboleth of codes and priorities which seem unrelated to the real world. They are not so much concerned with the relevance or quality of the work they subsidise, rather as to how their money can function as a social.

This is UK experience of course, but I hope you have better luck!
RtS

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: GUEST,Irish Sergeant
Date: 20 Mar 01 - 07:45 PM

Dick, you shall have the testimonial. I'll relay to you personally Kindest reguards, Neil

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: Sorcha
Date: 20 Mar 01 - 07:38 PM

OK, I am not a teacher, librarian, or "academic professional", but I do demonstrations is schools quite often. I use the Digital Traditon to find lyrics and tunes to use with school age children that are relative to the Unit Topic they are working on, such as the American Civil War, or the High Middle Ages. The Digital Traditon is an invaluble resource for this. Thanks, Dick Greenhaus, for maintaining it!

Mary Wise

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: wysiwyg
Date: 20 Mar 01 - 07:28 PM

REFRESH!

Subject: RE: HELP! Need testimonials
From: wysiwyg
Date: 20 Mar 01 - 01:17 PM

Dick, I have done quite a bit of grant writing. If you'd like another pair of eyes, let me know. For a copy-editing reference, see Amos.

~S~

Subject: HELP! Need testimonials
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 20 Mar 01 - 01:14 PM

Hi -

This is a repeat of a request I made a couple of years
back. I'm seeking a grant for The Digital Tradition, and
I have to convince some skeptical people that it's a
worthwhile thing. I'd much appreciate comments (favorable,
I hope) from any people who are involved in academic
pursuits-teaching, researching, writing, library work
etc.-who have found it to be a useful tool. Even if
you responded previously, I'd be very grateful for a
repeat (computer crashes can do terrible things to
data).

My E-Mail address is: [e-mail].

Thanx much!

dick greenhaus