vintage

I’ve decided to change my review format for the rest of the folk fest stuff, because quite frankly, I like making lists and you probably like reading them. If not, tough luck: here’s the Folk Festival List of Lists, Part I!

For those of you who are unaware, the festival’s all-day portions (Saturday and Sunday from 10:30 until 5:30) are made up mostly of workshops, which throw together a few different artists and make them play together for an hour or so. They are by far the most interesting, intriguing, and often surprising parts of the festival, and all of them have a theme attached to them which the musicians can draw from as much or as little as they like. To convey the theme, the clever festival staff assign them really great names. I went through them all and picked my favourites.

Best workshop names

Some Country for Bold Men
Start Making Sense
All Rebel Rockers
The Harder They Strum
and the crowning glory: Strum und Twang!

In that vein, my list of best workshops (at least out of the ones I managed to take in: the schedule is a real feat of organization!):

Some Country for Bold Men
(Danny Barnes, The Deep Dark Woods, Luluc, The Good Lovelies)
As you might expect, a whole heck of a lot of country. Danny Barnes’ blazing bluegrass was a major highlight, as was the fact that all the musicians actually joined in everything — sometimes workshops turn into awkward “you play a tune, now I’ll play a tune” sessions, and then the whole point is lost. Thankfully, none of these musicians could keep themselves from playing along, and it turned into a pretty boot-stompin’ party, tempered by the occasional downtempo folky tune in exactly the right places. The final jam tune, “I Saw The Light,” not only had everyone on stage singing but everyone in the audience too. Not bad for a Sunday morning!
(I actually bought CDs by both Luluc and The Deep Dark Woods purely on the merit of this one workshop — I hadn’t seen either before, but their measly three songs each convinced me. It was that good. I’d have bought the Good Lovelies’ CD too, but my sister beat me to it!)

Cooking With Brass
(Tarhana, Bell Orchestre, Mirah, Bellowhead)
This stage contained everything from fiddles to Sousaphone to saxophones to accordions. It was like Broken Social Scene if they had gone through high school band together or something — I think I counted twenty musicians stuffed onto that little stage. Tarhana led everybody in raucous Turkish folk jams with a ridiculous amount of groove, and Bellowhead reviewed a few of the previous night’s mainstage favourites. It was loud, brassy, and a hell of a lot of fun. The “dancing section” along the side was hopping, which is a good a sign as any that you probably picked the right stage.

The Yonge & The Restless
(Sarah Harmer, Steven Page, The Good Lovelies, Justin Rutledge)
A Toronto-centric workshop in Alberta? Potentially risky, but it just seemed to justify everybody making jokes about the garbage strike and constant rainstorms. The musical combinations of all those voices was, however, totally fantastic. Steven Page was awkwardly on edge, although not as badly as he was during his later mainstage performance — he even broke out “Jane” later in the session! Justin Rutledge led everyone in a singalong of his adorable “Don’t Be So Mean, Jellybean”, which never gets old.

Another World
(Pacifika, The Acorn, Tarhana)
Pacifika’s members come from Peru, Barbados and Canada. The Acorn is an Ottawa mainstay, and Tarhana base themselves in Amsterdam and play Balkan and Oriental folk music. The sheer number of different folk traditions included in this session is astounding, and I’m sure you can imagine the sounds that emanated from the stage once things got cooking. The afternoon was just full of infectious groove and danceability … is that even a word? To be honest, I think this session created it. That was a combination I would love to see happen again.

Guided By Voices
(Akron/Family, The Good Lovelies, Umalali, Dry Branch Fire Squad)
Again, as you might expect from the clever titling, this one was meant to be voice-guided. I don’t think they even needed to prompt them with that, though, because the voices in this combination of artists are so strong that it would have been the standout point anyway. The Good Lovelies are just, well, lovely — their Boswell Sisters cover was delightful — and Umalali are one gigantic party. Pair the latter with Akron/Family and you get something fairly out of this world. Since this one was in the festival’s final round of workshops, it was especially difficult to leave: I could have listened to that for days!

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Coming tomorrow: List of Lists Part II, featuring the best mainstage performances and new musical discoveries of this year’s festival. Complete with tunes for your auditory enjoyment! See you tomorrow.

Tags: akron/family, bell orchestre, bellowhead, calgary folk music festival, danny barnes, deep dark woods, dry branch fire squad, good lovelies, justin rutledge, luluc, mirah, pacifika, sarah harmer, steven page, tarhana, the acorn, umalali