John Duncan was a scholar of Central California Indian ethnology who persuaded several other researchers of California Indian music to donate their research materials to the University of New Mexico. Duncan was a student at Sacramento State College when he did his Maidu interviews. Some of the interviews and songs were recorded by student anthropologists from the University of California-Berkeley. This collection includes extensive information about the role of songs within the Maidu culture. These materials document cultural traditions that now have disappeared.
From the guide to the John Duncan Collection of California Maidu Oral Histories and Music and Plains Indian Music, 1960-1965, (University of New Mexico Center for Southwest Research)
