James B. Wright collected a variety of sound recordings reflecting the vocal and instrumental music, literature, folklore and culture of New Mexico and the Southwest in the 1970s and 1980s. He recorded events in Albuquerque, Corrales, Mescalero, Truth or Consequences, La Joya, Tortugas and Tsaile. He captured Native American pow wow drummers and dancers, Native poets, singers, Indian activists and elders who were interviewed during these times. The collection contains discussions of Native American local history, customs, prayers and creation beliefs. The recordings also document views of Native Americans about Christianity, child raising, culture and language preservation, the Custer battle, Wounded Knee, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the Federal Bureau of Investigations, the American Indian Movement (AIM), the Navajo Long Walk, the Hopi Navajo Land Dispute, conditions for Native Americans in Gallup, the importance of the Navajo Community College and the Institute of American Indian Art (Santa Fe), the student movement, Native views of the 1976 Bicentennial, the Vietnam War, the U.S. military, tips on surviving in the White world and other issues affecting them. Performers gave their rendition of popular music of the time and writers discussed Southwestern literary pieces, the poet's place in the region and nation, and problems of writing and publishing. Navajo Indians as well as the Mescalero Apache Tribe of the Mescalero Reservation, the Pueblos Indians, and Zuni Pueblo in particular, the Hopi and the Kiowa of Oklahoma are represented in the collection. Performers include Harold Littlebird, Leonard Bird, Philip Casadore, Joy Harjo, Milford Nahohai, Carol Merril, Simon J. Oritz, Floyd Westerman and Carl Gorman. The collection also contains recordings of work by Southwest Hispanic, Mexican American and Chicano singers, poets, and writers, in Spanish and English, from the Sol y Sangre series held at the University of New Mexico and at the Los Griegos Community Center. Views and comments by professors and students pertain to the meaning of being Hispano, Chicano, and New Mexican, on Aztán, women writers, life in the barrio, La Llorona, political poetry, the Chicano Movement, LULAC, the Vietnam War, the Bicentennial, the United Farm Workers Union and the influence of American society on Hispanic and Chicano culture, life and literature. Literary figures include José Armas, Angela de Hoyos, Naphtali de Leon, Francisco A. Lomeli, Jose Montoya, Orlando Romero, Leroy Quintana, E. A. Mares, Sergio Elizondo and Jaime Chavez. Some of the Native Americans also performed at the Sol y Sangre events. The collection also includes a demonstration on singing and playing Southwest folk music; recordings of traditional Spanish folk songs; interviews with New Mexico Hispanic women about their lives in the early half of the 20th century and at the San Felipe de Neri Church parish; the Christmas plays of Las Posadas and Los Pastores, and Matachines dances and music from the Hispanic Tortuga Indians of southern New Mexico. There is also a performance by the UNM Early Music Ensemble of Medieval Spanish music from the 1300s - 1600s and songs from the various regions of Spain; a Catholic Church Spanish mass and fiesta music from La Joya, New Mexico, and songs from the San Ignacio Fiesta in Albuquerque. Other highlights are a recorded lecture by John Donald Robb explaining how he used his collection of New Mexico folk music in his own compositions; a musical drama about the history of Corrales, New Mexico; old time country fiddle, cowboy and ragtime songs and background stories by Steve Cormier; and Southeast Asian music from Laos performed by members of the Laotian community of Albuquerque. Programs, flyers and notes from a few of these performances are in Box 3.
