Ballad of America preserves and celebrates music from America's diverse cultural history.

Music Library
Articles and videos with fascinating stories of songs, genres, instruments, people, and more

For Educators
Resources to help teachers, both traditional and homeschool, integrate music and United States history

Sing It
Sing-along videos, recordings, lead sheets, and more to facilitate the singing of American folk songs by people of all ages

Live Events
Multimedia programs that entertain, inspire, and inform people of all ages, delivered in-person and online

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America's Music

The music in America today is part of a continuum that reaches back to the Indigenous peoples and stretches across the Atlantic Ocean to the Old World. Music, instruments, and songs tell the story of the ordinary and extraordinary people who have populated the United States and propelled it into the 21st century. The genres of music explored through Ballad of America include traditional folk songs, fiddle tunes, ballads (both Old and New World), sea shanties, railroad and cowboy songs, Appalachian, ragtime, spirituals, work songs, minstrel, blues, jazz, jug band, rhythm and blues, old-time, country and western, Cajun, bluegrass, and rock & roll.

Featured Article

“Young Ladies in Town” is an American folk song also known as “To the Ladies” and “To Our Ladies.” It was first published in a Boston newspaper in 1769. The song encourages women in the colonies to make their own clothing to support a boycott of goods imported from Britain.

Read Young Ladies in Town: About the Song