Richard Carlin is the author of several books on folk, country, and traditional music. He plays English concertina.
Carlin worked for Folkways Records as an independent producer from 1975 to 1980, before becoming an editor for Music at Pearson Prentice Hall. In 2008, Carlin published Worlds of Sound: The Story of Smithsonian Folkways. In 2016, he published Godfather of the Music Business, which is a biography of Morris Levy.
Carlin lives in Glen Ridge, New Jersey.