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A Year-End Letter from Chris Strachwitz

Dear Friends of the Arhoolie Foundation,

In light of the horrific tragedies which have befallen so many fellow Californians as well as people around the world this year, you probably have already given hard-earned money to your favorite charities. But in case you still feel generous, I would like to tell you about a few of the wonderful things the Arhoolie Foundation has been accomplishing.

Our most recent event was a fundraiser called Bridging The Blues with the legendary Taj Mahal and rising star Fantastic Negrito held at Berkeley’s UC Theatre. We had a packed house with an amazingly enthusiastic audience, and gave out four inaugural Arhoolie Awards (we call them Hoolies!) to deserving individuals, organizations, and a journalist.

We have added thousands of songs from the Frontera Collection of Mexican and Mexican-American recordings as videos on our YouTube channel! Fans of this music can now listen to entire songs rather than brief clips. So far we have uploaded 16,000 complete selections, and we are adding ninety-nine more every day with a goal of sharing all 34,000 78rpm recordings in the Frontera Collection by June 2019.

We are continuing to digitally preserve our archives, not only of the Frontera Collection but also previously unheard recordings made by Dr. Harry Oster, and thousands of photographs and videos I shot over the years both at home in the Bay Area and on my song-catching travels in Louisiana, Texas, and beyond! We performed outreach in the community through events and speaking engagements, and assisted with the creation of the Arhoolie Records exhibit now open at SFO Museum.

With our new Executive Director Adam Machado at the helm, in the coming year we will continue to broaden our community outreach, curate and share our collections, and develop new ways to support musicians, teachers, students, documentarians and others devoted to vernacular music.

I’d love you to share this letter with your friends and acquaintances, especially if they enjoy real and tradition-based music. We are grateful to many of you who have generously supported us in the past and hope you can help us out again before the end of the year – remember we are an educational 501c(3) non-profit which makes your contributions tax-deductible!

You can donate directly through PayPal, or by mail:
Arhoolie Foundation
10341 San Pablo Ave.
El Cerrito, CA 94530

Wishing you a cheerful and enjoyable holiday season,
Chris Strachwitz

Photo of Chris Strachwitz by Mike Melnyk
Photo of Mr. Chris by Mike Melnyk

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Comments (3)

Chris,

I’m sure you will appreciate that I can’t donate, because I don’t have any damn money, and it’s because I’ve spent much of what little I did have on records that your company manufactured. On top of that, I have been so captivated by them that I have learned many of the songs off various ones and use them in my so-called act, which nets me tens of dollars.I promise, I’ll send som when I got some.

Thanks for your work, Chris! I will try to give if I can. I love the Blues…tortured my wife (German…lol) on our honeymoon with two straight nights at Legends in Chicago. I am in Schweinfurt, Germany…retired from the US Army in 2012. I met some of your family in Gotha a few years back…had a blast! It was a going away party for the Bundeswehr unit going to Afghanistan and we were invited to attend. Anyway, thanks for your lasting contributions to some fantastic music!

Dear friends,

On Giving Tuesday, we announced the capital campaign to purchase our building at 10341 San Pablo Ave in El Cerrito — home to the Arhoolie Foundation (and before that Arhoolie Records), Les Blank Films, and Down Home Music Store since 1976. We’ve been heartened by the community’s response to our fundraising announcement. To all who have donated so far: thank you. We couldn’t do this without you.

Now, while there is a contract in place to buy the building in partnership with Les Blank Films, we need to raise $1.2 million — our half of the purchase price — by April 15. Donations to the campaign can be made via the link below, by check, or by bank transfer. (To make a bank transfer, please email us at info@arhoolie.org).

In the new year, we look forward to collaborating with Les Blank Films and Down Home Music to bring more public programming to our community. We plan to revive Les Blank and Chris Strachwitz’s tradition of in-store film screenings and will host more informal, free performances and gatherings in the store as part of our outreach work. We believe this collaboration will result in a vibrant community gathering place dedicated to music, film, and deep roots culture.

If you’re interested in donating and would like to discuss our plans for the building, please don’t hesitate to email director Adam Machado at adam@arhoolie.org.

Thank you for your support as we begin this exciting new chapter!

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