The Montana Folk Festival: Six stages, 250 artists, and it’s free!
Published: July 4, 2011
So what’s different about the Montana Folk Festival, July 8-10 in Butte?
“Its name,” says director George Everett, “and that’s about it.”
When the National Folk Festival chose Butte as its home for three years, 2008-2010, “We made a conscious decision from the first to learn as much as possible, so we could go forward with a festival on the same scale, and of the same quality.”
Butte is not alone in this endeavor. The National Council for the Traditional Arts, which organizes the traveling National Folk Festival (it moves to Nashville for the next three years), encourages each of its host communities “to create a new traditional arts festival of its own.”
And several towns – including Lowell, MA, Richmond, VA, and Bangor, ME – have done exactly that, forging their own versions of the National Folk Festival experience.
“It’s now ours to embrace and cherish,” says Everett of the inaugural Montana Folk Festival.
Of course, visitors will notice a few logistical changes – among them, the Quartz Street stage has relocated to a larger space on Copper Street, and the Montana Folklife Area moves to roomier quarters on Quartz Street.
“There’ll be some surprises, but a lot that’s familiar too,” says Everett. The festival still offers a brain-boggling array of traditional music from around the nation, performed nonstop, as well as the Montana Traditions Arts Market, the First Peoples’ Market, ethnic and festival foods, a folklife area, family activities, and demonstrations and workshops around the theme, “The Lure of the Land.”
“It’s a unique opportunity to see all these performers in one place, on six stages, and it’s free,” says Everett.
Fortunately, the majority of the festival’s sponsors are following the event through its transition from National Folk Festival to Montana Folk Festival. “I was nervous that some of them wouldn’t come along. I’ve been amazed that almost everyone has stuck with us and continues to sponsor the event.”
The largest donors include the Dennis and Phyllis Washington Foundation, which offered a $100,000 challenge grant, the Paul G. Allen Foundation, which donated $25,000, and Butte Silver Bow County. This year’s event also received $50,000 from the Montana Office of Tourism’s Special Events Grant Program (SEGP).
At the same time, contributions large and small trickle in from individual supporters. “I’ll never forget the one lady in Deer Lodge who sent us $5,” says Everett. And last year, festival participants dropped more than $75,000 in the red buckets that volunteers passed around.
The 2010 festival drew 165,000 people, and Everett is optimistic that this year’s event “will be even bigger and better.”
So far, the biggest challenge has been “rumor control,” says Everett. “Reassuring people that it’s still going on, and will keep going on for as long as it gets the support of the people of Montana.”
The biggest reward for festival organizers and the thousands of Montanans who participate in the festival, as audience, artists and volunteers, “is the sense of community,” says Everett. “The sense of community we get from all these people working hard toward a community goal that’s centered around the arts.”
He hopes that sense of community continues to flourish. “I hope it evolves into a reunion – not just for Montanans, but for people from Wyoming, Washington, Idaho and wherever, who continue to show up year after year.”
Among the performers
This year’s festival will feature up to 25 groups, representing an enticing array of cultural and musical influences. Among them:
The Montana Roots Road Show featuring Wylie and the Wild West, singer/songwriter Stephanie Davis, and poets Paul Zarzyski and Wallace MacRae.
And from further afield: Willie "Big Eyes" Smith, whose traditional shuffle style has been regarded as the heart and soul of the Chicago blues sound; Aubrey Ghent, a third generation lap-steel guitarist, who launched the Sacred Steel Tradition in 1992; Bruce Daigrepont, a native of New Orleans who performs traditional Cajun music; The Kotchegna Dance Company, led by Vado Diomande, which specializes in the regional dance and drumming traditions of Ivory Coast and other West African countries; and Vishtèn, an Acadian traditional group.
Recent additions include Los Texmaniacs, from Austin; the Haitian and Carribbean sounds of Boukman Eksperyans; Blue Highway, a traditional bluegrass band from Nashville; Frank London’s Klezmer Brass Allstars; New Orleans jazz by Kermit Ruffins; and Inuit throat-singing, courtesy of Nukariik.
For details, including bus service to and from Butte from surrounding communities, visit the festival’s website, www.montanafolkfestival.com.
