If you happen to have an old cassette tape of your grandfather plucking his banjo as only he could pluck, the folks who run the Americana Music Academy would like to make a copy of it for a new archive.

“We’d like to come up with as much recorded material, film, photographs and oral histories as we can,” said Thom Alexander, executive director of the academy, 1419 Mass. The academy is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the appreciation of blues, country, bluegrass and folk music.

Eventually, the group hopes to create a record of northeast Kansas’ musical influence.

“We’d like to start with the people who are here now and see how far back we can go,” Alexander said.

The group is mostly interested in blues, country, bluegrass and folk. Rock, Alexander said, will come later.

Bass teacher Stan Sheldon, left, and executive director Thom Alexander of the Americana Music Academy have started a library of musical history. Academy researchers are hoping to create a record of northeast Kansas' musical history and influence.

“Everything but jazz,” he said. “Jazz has been covered to death.”

The academy has equipment for converting old tapes or records to CDs.

“We’re not asking anyone to part with anything,” Alexander said. “We’ll just record it and give it back to them.”

¢ Information on the Americana Music Academy¢ Americana Music Academy’s official site

In his wildest dreams, Alexander said he’d like to discover a musical style indigenous to northeast Kansas.

“There’s a type of fiddle playing that’s called ‘hard fiddling’ that for a long time was only played in south-central Missouri,” he said. “I don’t know that there’s anything like that here in this region, but I’d like to find out.”