45th Annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival

NMAAHC is pleased to continue its collaboration with the Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage in producing Rhythm and Blues: Tell it Like Is, for the 2011 Folklife Festival.  For more than forty years the Folklife Festival has helped millions of visitors remember and celebrate diverse cultures and traditions that fully embody the American experience. Rhythm and Blues: Tell it Like Is follows in that tradition. This year we celebrate the birth of rhythm and blues, its diverse geographical roots, its role as a voice of black communities, and its overwhelming influence on American popular music. Tell it Like it Is, is a natural outgrowth of the Museum’s programming in African American music, and we are honored to preserve and celebrate rhythm and blues as one of America’s most enduring cultural treasures.

About the Festival
The Smithsonian Folklife Festival, inaugurated in 1967, honors tradition bearers from across the United States and around the world. With approximately 1 million visitors each year, the Festival unites performers and visitors in the nation’s capital to celebrate the diversity of cultural traditions. It is produced by the Smithsonian’s Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage and co-sponsored by the National Park Service.