Kausik Das
[caption id="attachment_4078" align="alignright" width="194"] Oishani Das making rangoli.[/caption] From their home on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, Kausik Das and his family express their heritage in West Bengal, India, when they create rangoli. Derived from a Sanskrit word meaning rows of colors, rangoli is a Hindu art form several thousand years old. It is drawn by hand, using either powders made from...
The U.S. Army Blues
The U.S. Army Blues, an acclaimed military ensemble, carries on the American big band tradition with both precision and style. This nearly 20-member jazz ensemble is one of 10 musical groups that make up the U.S. Army Band “Pershing’s Own.” General John “Black Jack” Pershing founded the U.S. Army Band in 1922, inspired by the example of European military bands...
Salisbury area Filipino community
Starting with a few newly arrived immigrants in the early 1970s, the Filipino community in the Salisbury region of Maryland’s Eastern Shore as well as southern Delaware has continued to grow. The Philippines is predominantly Roman Catholic, and St. Francis de Sales, the local Catholic parish, is where community members first met. Many of these families carry on important Filipino...
Sylvia Stephens
Sylvia Stephens is a fourth-generation quilter in a family of celebrated quilters. Her mother, Mozell Benson (pictured, right), was awarded a National Heritage Fellowship for quilting in 2001, the nation’s highest honor for traditional artists. Despite an interest from childhood in sewing, Sylvia was not inspired to take up quilting until her mother’s recognition. Through Alabama’s Folk Arts Apprenticeship Program,...
Pocomoke Indian Nation
The Pocomoke Indian Nation is a nonprofit organization composed of descendants of one of the Indigenous populations of the Delmarva Peninsula. A large, widespread group that exercised significant influence in the region, they lived along the Annemessex, Manoakin, and Pocomoke rivers and bays, and Chincoteague Bay. Today, the Pocomoke pass on the heritage and lifeways of Delmarva’s Indigenous peoples. Working...
Janice & Anna Marshall
Janice Laird Marshall, a sixth-generation Smith Islander, was born in the community of Tylerton on Smith Island. Like all islanders of her day, Marshall boarded on the mainland to attend high school, and came home at age 15 to marry Bobby Marshall, a waterman. A compelling and charming storyteller, Marshall is deeply connected to Smith Island’s traditional lifeways, including the...
Cumberland Marbles Program
A source of deep community pride, the Cumberland Marbles Program continues a distinctive local tradition of formal marbles competitions that can be traced back nearly a century. Since 1959, the program has participated in a unique partnership with the Cumberland Department of Parks and Recreation and the Allegany County School System; volunteers with the program teach marbles in public schools...
Blacksmith Guild of Western Maryland
[caption id="attachment_3937" align="alignright" width="363"] Erin Aylor (photo credit: John Canan of Mountains & Rivers Media)[/caption] The Blacksmith Guild of Western Maryland was founded by master blacksmith Wallace M. “Wally” Yater. Wally discovered his passion for working with hot metals in college. Relocating to Boonsboro in the early 1970s, he began developing his blacksmithing skills, and also studied under bladesmith Bill...
Washington Samulnori
Samulnori is an age-old Korean percussion tradition that serves as a beacon of Korean culture. Characterized by thunderous rhythms and quick tempos, it is an energetic musical form rooted in Korea’s agricultural past. Samulnori roughly translates as “the art of playing four instruments,” a reference to the four signature percussion instruments: the changoo (hourglass-shaped drum), the buk (barrel drum), the...
Urban Artistry
Urban Artistry, founded by dancer Junious Brickhouse (a past master artist in the Maryland Traditions Apprenticeship Program), is dedicated to art forms inspired by the urban experience. Group members teach a variety of vernacular dance, sharing the history and culture of these sometimes fast, sometimes acrobatic, and always elegant and amazing dance styles. Popping emerged in African American neighborhoods in...
