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All About Montana
PAGE 8 MONTANA SENIOR NEWS • APRIL | MAY 2022

Mike Korn and Montana Music

BY AARON PARRETT

Mike Korn says he’s done five lifetimes’
worth of living in his 70-something years
on Earth. Most recently, he retired from 27
years in Montana working for Fish, Wildlife,
and Parks, including time as a game warden.
But before that, and what brought him
to Montana, was his work as a musicologist
and folklorist. In the 70s and 80s, Korn
archived folk music from Appalachia, put
on folk and music festivals, helped start the
cowboy poetry gathering in Elko, Nevada,
and helped produce two seminal recordings
of Montana musicians for the Arts Council.
He also played a lot of music himself along
the way.
Korn grew up in the San Fernando Valley
outside of Los Angeles.
“My dad was an anthropology professor,
and I took a degree in Anthropology Cal
State Northridge in 1978.”
At college, Korn studied with Bess Lomax-
Hawes, who was a professor at one of the Mike Korn was Montana’s first folklorist, under the auspices of the Montana Arts Council. Under his tenure,
schools where his father taught. She was, like The Montana Folklife Project produced the LPs When the Work’s All Done This Fall (2015) and If You Can’t Dance
her father John Lomax and brother Alan, an to It, It’s Not Old-Time Fiddle (1986), documenting some of the state’s finest folk musicians.
accomplished folklorist and song collector. Photo by Nann Parrett.
In 1977 Korn went to grad school at “We were all at a national meeting in
Western Kentucky University, where he DC in the early 1980s and sort of had an
MONTANA GRANITE continued his work with musicians and impromptu caucus in the Rose Garden,” he
I N D U S T R I E S folklore. He became heavily involved with said. “We wanted to do some kind of folk

DISTINCTIVE MEMORIALS the collection and preservation of all kinds of festival with a real western flavor—that’s
American folk practices, including old-time how we decided on cowboy poetry.”

1010 1st Ave S, Great Falls and bluegrass music, as well as archiving Earlier, in the 70s, Korn worked in
406-452-8129 authentic cowboy poetry, some of which Virginia with Ralph Rinzler, famous for
dated back to the 1870s. his own folk showcases and promotion of
1170 Forestvale Rd, Helena “There’s a long tradition of actual cow- bluegrass and Appalachian folk acts like
406-458-5512
boys writing and reciting poetry,” Korn Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs. In 1976, as
explained. “Some of these guys I worked part of the national bicentennial, Korn
with had been doing their own stuff since helped organize and present the Festival of
A Memorial the 1920s or earlier.” American Folklife in Washington, DC.
is purchased Accordingly, along with a group of other “This was an amazing cultural event
because someone lived... folklorists from western states, including with all kinds of American folk musicians
Not because someone died. Hal Cannon and Jim Griffith, Korn helped coming together outside the perfor-
organize and start the Cowboy Poetry mances,” Korn said. “One evening at a
Gathering in Elko in 1985. jam session, a pretty famous mariachi

Support Wildlife Biology with a Charitable IRA Rollover

The wildlife biology program conducts critical
research and educates the next generation of
wildlife biology leaders working to understand,
protect and conserve species and habitats in
the U.S. and the world.
For those 70 ½ or older, up to $100,000 can be
transferred directly from a traditional individual
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essential program.
Charitable IRA rollovers avoid federal income
tax and count toward satisfying your required
minimum distribution (RMD) for the year of the
gift.*
*The University of Montana Foundation provides information about the benefits of charitable gifts
and does not provide legal, financial or tax advice. Please consult your advisor(s) before making a gift.
For questions and to give, contact Nick Jutila
at [email protected] or 406-243-5424.
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