English Folk Dance and Song Society
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The English Folk Dance and Song Society formed in 1932 when two organisations merged: the Folk-Song Society and the English Folk Dance Society formed by Cecil Sharp in 1911.
The Folk-Song Society, founded in 1898, focused on collecting and publishing, primarily folk songs of Britain and Ireland although there was no formal limitation. Participants included Cecil Sharp, Ralph Vaughan Williams, George Butterworth, George Gardiner, Henry Hammond, Annie Gilchrist and Ella Leather.
The English Folk Dance Society was founded in 1911 by Cecil Sharp. Its purpose was to preserve and promote English folk dances in their traditional forms, including Morris and sword dances, traditional social dances, and interpretations of the dances published by John Playford.
One of the greatest contributions that the EFDSS made to the folk movement, both dance and song, was the folk festival, starting with the Stratford-upon-Avon Festival in the 1940s and expanding later to festivals in Whitby, Holmfirth, Chippenham and elsewhere.
In 1998, with the folk movement strongly supported by a number of other organizations and the seeds planted by EFDSS thriving, the EFDSS altered its strategy to focus on archiving, with its primary goal the development of the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library as the country's national archive and resource centre for folk music, dance and song. Their regular scholarly publication is Folk Music Journal.
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