This series of long-playing records of North American Indian music is presented as a living monument and memorial to the American Indian and his spiritual culture. In this rich collection are reflected the inner thoughts and feeling of a people, every aspect of whose life finds it exalted and idealized expression on song. Here are chanted prayers addressed to the Supernatural for the making of rain, the curing of the sick, success in war and on the hunt. Here are songs from the Girl's Puberty Ceremony celebrating the great mystery of "a girl becomes a woman," a phenomenon of nature fraught with powerful supernatural forces. Here are love songs of the most intimate, personal nature, played on the native flute, lullabys caressingly sung by grandmothers to their grandbabies, legends and songs with which grandparents entertained the children during long winter evenings, and gambling game songs with their infectious rhythms, which create and reflect a social atmosphere charged with excitement. The range of emotional expression of this music is as broad as life itself.

The collecting of this music and its subsequent issuance in record form through the Library of Congress are due to the imagination and human understanding of Dr. Willard W. Beatty, Director of Education of the Bureau of Indian Affairs from 1936 to 1951. Keenly sensitive to the beauty of Indian art and its significance in the life of the people, Dr. Beatty recognized the fact that Indian music is not a relic of a dead past but a vital, dynamic force functioning in contemporary Indian life. It was only natural that his program, which regarded education as something more than preparation for earning a living, should have included music, that medium through which the Indian expresses himself so naturally and eloquently.

The songs presented in this series have been recorded by singers whose specialized skill and musical talent are recognized and respected by their fellow tribesmen. This material, issued by arrangement with and permissions of the singers, is musically stimulating and satisfying as well as ethnologically interesting. In attempting to give proper representation to the many diverse cultures of the "first Americans," examples of the old music, sacred and secular, as well as the modern songs have been included. Any omissions are unintentional and due to the limitations of time and funds. It is hoped that the interest stimulated by these records will make possible the continued collecting an study of this elusive art.

WILLARD RHODES, Associate professor of Music, Columbia University.