The Blue Ridge Institute Museum Store

The Blue Ridge Institute museum store offers crafts, books, recordings, and numerous other items related to regional folklife. Visit the store to find distinctive "heritage" gifts.


BRI Recordings and Publications
Through its BRI Recordings series the Blue Ridge Institute presents the musical heritage of Virginia folk culture. Each recording draws upon decades of field research by folklorists and music collectors as well as vintage performances by the Commonwealth's early commercially recorded artists. Recordings in the BRI series have twice received nominations for Grammy Awards. (See ordering information below.)

When ordering by mail, please make checks payable to Ferrum College.

BRI Recordings
Blue Ridge Institute & Museum
P. O. Box 1000
Ferrum, VA 24088

Each book, LP, or cassette costs $10.00; CDs cost $14.00. Add $3.50 ,postage for the first item ordered and $1.00 for each additional item (within the U.S.).
BRI 001
Non-Blues Secular Black Music		 Twenty selections showcasing African American fiddle, banjo, guitar, accordion, and harmonica traditions.
LP or CD.
BRI 002
Ballads From British Tradition		 Old English and Scottish ballads which have long been a part of western Virginia folk music.
LP or CD.
BRI 003
Western Piedmont Blues		 Seventeen performances by traditional African American bluesmen from Virginia's Piedmont region. Cassette or CD.
BRI 004
Native Virginia Ballads & Songs		 Vintage and contemporary songs about murders, explosions, and other disasters in the western Commonwealth. CD only.
BRI 005
Blue Ridge Piano Styles		 Rags, marches, and string band tunes illustrating the piano's role in old-time music. LP only.
BRI 006
Tidewater Blues		 Sixteen selections by African American bluesmen from the coastal region of Virginia. CD or LP.
BRI 007
Virginia Work Songs		 The work-related singing of watermen, factory workers, crab pickers, and gandy dancers. A 1984 Grammy nominee! LP only.
BRI 008
Southwest Virginia Blues		 Sixty years of blues by black and white musicians from Southwest Virginia. A 1988 Grammy nominee! CD or Cassette.
BRI 010
Early Roanoke Country Radio		 A history of the Roanoke Valley's live string band, western swing, and country radio artists from the 1920s to the 1950s. CD, LP, or Cassette.
Blue Ridge Folk Instruments and Their Makers A sixty-four page exhibit catalog with essays on the instrument-making tradition and over 140 photographs of Blue Ridge-made fiddles, banjos, guitars, mandolins, and dulcimers.