Dust Bowl Ballads
Woody Guthrie · 1940
Dust Bowl Ballads is Woody Guthrie’s first commercial recording, made in two sessions at Victor Studios in Camden, New Jersey — primarily on April 26, 1940, with two additional tracks recorded on May 3 — and originally issued in 1940 as eleven songs across two three-disc 78 rpm sets. Twelve sides were pressed, with 'Tom Joad' split across both sides of one disc due to its length; two other recorded songs were excluded from the original release for the same reason.