Warner, Frank, 1903-1978

Biographical History

Anne Locher Warner (1905-1991) and Frank Warner (1903-1978) were devoted and renowned collectors, preservers, and interpreters of American traditional folk music who gathered, between 1938 and 1969, over a thousand songs and stories. Most of their pioneering work was done in the musically fertile areas of the Southern Appalachians, the North Carolina Outer Banks, Tidewater Virginia, New England, and Upstate New York. The Warners collected nearly one thousand songs and in doing so brought a number of otherwise obscure songs and performers to the attention of the American public, among them North Carolina's Frank Proffitt, from whom the first version of "Tom Dooley" was collected.

...