The underlying intellectual structure of the Archives reflects the vision of its founder, George Herzog (1901-1983), Hungarian-born anthropologist, linguist, and ethnomusicologist. Herzog was educated in Budapest and Berlin, where he served as an assistant to Erich M. von Hornbostel at the Berlin Phonogramm-Archiv during the early 1920s. He studied at Columbia University under Franz Boas, and conducted fieldwork with Native Americans in the southwestern United States for the American Museum of Natural History, and in Liberia for the University of Chicago. Herzog's synthesis of the Berlin School of comparative musicology (with its focus on detailed and systematic analysis of music sound), and American ethnology (characterized by careful attention to field observation and historical processes), became the foundation for the emerging discipline of ethnomusicology.
Herzog regarded archiving as an essential ingredient for the development of an American school of comparative musicology. During the 1930s he undertook a survey of collections of recordings of folk and primitive music for the American Council of Learned Societies. With support from Franz Boas, Herzog began to assemble the Archives of Folk and Primitive Music at Columbia University, including his own field recordings as well as those collected by colleagues. He joined the faculty of Indiana University as a professor of anthropology in 1948.
In 1954, Indiana University hired George List to organize the Archives and make it accessible to researchers. List, an ethnomusicologist and member of the Folklore faculty, supervised a much-needed move to permanent facilities in Maxwell Hall, and formulated policies and procedures for the processing and use of the collections. Frank Gillis, who joined the staff as associate director in 1964, brought a background in musicology, library science, and jazz performance to the position, and was responsible for refining catalog procedures and expanding the collections. Gillis served as director from 1977 to 1981. Discussions to move the Archives to new facilities in Morrison Hall were initiated by Ronald Smith, acting director from 1981 to 1982. The move was completed under the directorship of Anthony Seeger (1982-88). During this time, the Archives secured several grants for preservation and access activities, including online cataloging of all field recordings in the collections. Ruth M. Stone (1988-95) strengthened the Archives' legacy by sponsoring academic conferences and securing state-of-the-art compact shelving for collection storage. Gloria J. Gibson (1995-2000) developed multimedia projects that draw on the Archives' resources.
