10 Facts About Hally Wood

Harriet Elizabeth "Hally" Wood was an American musician, singer and folk musicologist.

Hally Wood worked with John and Alan Lomax and participated in the publication of songbooks for the works of artists like Lead Belly and Woody Guthrie.

Hally Wood performed as a singer and recorded solo and collaborative albums with folk singers such as Pete Seeger.

Hally Wood was born Harriet Elizabeth Wood in Washington, DC, in 1922.

Hally Wood was the daughter of a US Army doctor who had worked in Hawaii and the Philippines before settling in Texas in 1935, when she was 13 years old.

Hally Wood's father was a versatile musician, who taught Hally songs and how to play them on organ, piano and guitar.

Hally Wood was a classically trained musician and singer and, while studying music at the University of Texas at Austin, she met John and Alan Lomax and became interested in folk music.

Hally Wood later researched and transcribed several books of songs: one by Lead Belly, then the New Lost City Ramblers Songbook, and two books of songs by Woody Guthrie.

Hally Wood worked on a book with Joseph Lomax about songs written by Townes Van Zandt, published in 1977.

In 1980, Hally Wood brought out a self-produced album in Houston, Songs to Live By, and was beginning work on another in the mid-80s when she was diagnosed with cancer.