National Folk Fest adds more performers

Published: April 2, 2008

The National Folk Festival - described as a "moveable feast of deeply traditional folk arts" - has landed beneath the Big Sky July 11-13, when it settles in for a three-year stay in Butte.

With historic Uptown Butte as a backdrop, audiences are treated to blues, rockabilly, gospel, klezmer, jazz, bluegrass, cowboy, polka, tamburitza, old-time, mariachi, western swing, honky-tonk, rhythm and blues and zydeco music, as well as traditional music and dance from Cajun, Native American, Celtic, Middle Eastern, Caribbean, East Asian, Appalachian, Hispanic, African and Pacific Islander cultures. Seven stages, ranging in size from a 10,000-seat open-air amphitheater to a small, acoustic-style venue, offer continuous performances throughout the three-day event.

There's a participatory dance area where festival-goers can dance ‘til they drop as well as workshops, regional and ethnic food, puppetry, parades, craft exhibits and demonstrations and a festival marketplace. And the entire weekend is free to the public!

The festival's vast repertoire of music and dance includes: Shemekia Copeland (blues); Wylie and the Wild West (western); The Seldom Scene (bluegrass): Ricardo Lemvo and Makina Loca (Congolese/Cuban); The Oinkari Basque Dancers (traditional Basque dancing and music); Nathan and the Zydeco Cha Chas (zydeco); The Quebe Sisters Band (Texas fiddling and harmony singing); Clinton Fearon (Jamaican reggae); Yuqin Wang and Zhengli Xu (Chinese rod puppetry); Le Vent Du Nord (Quebecois music, song and dance); Alex Meixner Band (polka); Grace Chang (Chinese zither); The Bernstons (Norwegian-American); and the Yuri Yunakov Ensemble (Bulgarian wedding music).

And these artists are only the beginning. Approximately 25 artists/groups will perform on festival stages. Since each National Folk Festival host city celebrates its own regional traditions and heritage, this festival will shine the spotlight on the distinctive occupational, craft and tribal traditions of the region - from cowboy and ranching culture to saddle making, from performance and craft traditions of Montana's Indian tribes to the rich mining, ethnic and labor heritage of Butte and the Copperway that are at the heart of that heritage.

In all, more than 250 musicians, dancers and craftspeople will participate, demonstrate, exhibit and perform at venues that include the Montana Folklife Area, a family area, the Montana Arts Marketplace and the First People's Marketplace.

The festival takes place in Butte's historic uptown district, where an open-air amphitheater is being developed on the site of the original mineyard and headframe, a remnant of Butte's days as the underground copper mining center of the nation. Another stage will be surrounded by historic buildings from the city's heyday as a cosmopolitan outpost on America's urban frontier.

Although the National Folk Festival is free to the public, a significant amount of money is raised in advance to make this possible. The effort to raise $3 million for the three-year run of the festival is well underway. In addition to major corporate gifts, individual gifts are welcome as well. "It takes a community to build a festival of this caliber," says Everett.

Butte won the honor of hosting the National Folk Festivals in 2008-2010 through a competitive process that included municipalities in all parts of the nation. In awarding the festival to Butte, the community and state were recognized as having unique natural resources, cultural assets and strong community spirit.

For more details, visit www.nationalfolkfestival.com, email or call 406-497-6464.