Historical Portrait
John Selleck playing fiddle, left profile, portrait, photograph
Archive record
Photograph caption: "A dance fiddler & 5-string banjo picker." Forms part of a group of field materials documenting John Selleck performing Anglo-American music on the fiddle on October 2, 1939, collected by Sidney Robertson Cowell in Camino, California.
About this photograph
John Selleck was photographed in left profile playing the fiddle on October 2, 1939, in Camino, California. The caption identifies him as both a dance fiddler and five-string banjo picker performing Anglo-American music.
Sidney Robertson Cowell made the photograph as part of the W.P.A. California Folk Music Project, which recorded and photographed traditional musicians across Northern California from 1938 to 1940. Cowell worked across the state's immigrant communities rather than focusing on a single tradition, resulting in a collection that documents Armenian, Icelandic, Italian, Portuguese, Mexican, Irish and Serbian musicians alongside performers of Anglo-American material.
The photograph and related field materials from this session are held by the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress.
Compiled from the catalogue record and reference notes on the formats and events involved. The archive record above is the primary source.
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