Subject files, 1944-2015

Series 2 comprises the Foundation’s “subject” files. The files in this series include correspondence, contracts, ephemera, publications, notes, and other types of records, executed and in drafts, focusing on a variety of different activities. The Foundation was actively involved in staging performances—from early benefit concerts at Symphony Space and Duke University in 1983 to the Orchestra Sinfonica Juvenil's performances of the Zodiac Suite in 2014, with dozens of other concerts, shows, festivals, and gigs in between.
The Foundation was involved in multiple recording projects, including the Mary Lou Williams Collective’s Zodiac Suite: Revisited (2006) on the Foundation's Mary Records imprint, and the reissue of the original 1945 Asch Records Zodiac Suite in 1995, as well as the updated Mary Lou’s Mass, in 2005, both on Smithsonian Folkways. The subjects series also includes discussion of prospective projects, including discussions surrounding a definitive recorded edition of Williams's religious works. Materials related to those projects are found in this series.
The Foundation maintained files on organizations and persons with whom it interacted, including musicians Carmen Lundy and Geri Allen (later the Foundation's Executive Director), authors Linda Dahl and Tammy Kernodle, filmmakers Spike Lee and Ken Burns, cultural institutions Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Institute of Jazz Studies, and Alvin Ailey Dance Theater, and record companies and performing rights organizations like Chiaroscuro, ASCAP, Polygram, and Harry Fox Agency. O’Brien also kept tabs not only on Williams's collaborators and contemporaries—Dizzy Gillespie, Gary Giddens, and Honi Gordon to name just some in the "G"s—but also on Williams herself: the Foundation’s “MLW Mentions” files constitute a significant portion of this series. The Foundation also maintained files based on topics, some related to Foundation projects, others based on subjects of interest to Foundation for no established purpose: "copyright," "gay culture," "Jazz women," and "music needing recordings" are some examples.