Folk Will Save Us

Folk-punk Yiddishist Daniel Kahn speaks beautifully about community creation, autonomous cultural zones, and future-gazing.

“It helps me to sing songs about the future that people back then imagined. In doing that, you can uncover all of these dreams that people had that didn’t come to fruition - and that didn’t mean that they were bad dreams. It didn’t mean that they were false hopes. A lot of those dreams were useful to the present.”

New Year’s dances and songs from the mountains are what Slavka Slavtcheva says capture the heart of Bulgarian folklore.

Playwright and author Ahmed Ismail Yusuf believes deeply that Somali poetry and song carries the soul of a people. 

Co-founders of Electric Machete Studios, Rebekah Crisanta de Ybarra and Xilam Balam share a tradition of resilience and resistance.

Worlds of resilience, solidarity, and beauty are alive in the work of folk artists and culture bearers. This new podcast tells the stories of artists mobilizing heritage music, poetry, and visual art forms as tools to build community and work for justice.