Button up your flannel shirt and don your overalls for Friday’s Baltimore Folk Fest. The first-ever festival, spearheaded by Alex Champagne of the local label Scenic Route Recordings, will bring soul-searching, foot-stomping folk acts together for a one-night hootenanny right on North Avenue.
The festival takes place this Friday, October 26th at Windup Space and Joe Squared. You can purchase tickets here: www.baltimorefolkfest.com
There’s just something about folk music. It brings people together. It tells our stories. Instead of trying to put our finger on what makes folk music special, we asked the bands performing the festival to tell us what folk means to them.
Their answers range from short and sweet to deep and thoughtful. Here’s their take:
Strange Fur
7 – 7:45 p.m., Windup Space
What does folk music mean to you?
Brent, Tyson, Evan: To us folk music is about using any kind of instrument you can get a hold of or even things that aren’t traditionally thought of as instruments and finding ways to incorporate them into the music. It’s putting together whatever you have around the house and hitting/scratching/banging on them until they make a sound you like. There’s something really tangible and organic about certain instruments in the folk world, it doesn’t make them better than others, it’s just different. That’s what keeps us grounded to our folk base as we broaden our style to include more modern techniques. And we hope that in a way speaks to the diversity and dynamics in the folk music community; it’s not necessarily any one particular sound that defines something as folk; it’s more of a tactility of the sounds and I really believe most people in the folk community can relate with that sentiment. [It’s] the common connection.
Soft Cat
7:50 – 8:35 p.m., Windup Space
What does folk music mean to you?
Neil Sanzgiri: It’s hard to not name some of my biggest influences in the folk category when describing why I play folk music. Duncan Browne, Bridget St. John, Bert Jansch, Nick Garrie, Tucker Zimmerman. Rather than trying to attain something new or groundbreaking, Soft Cat falls in line with what I listen to. It’s kind of like how you shape your own existence based on your experiences.
Why do you play folk?
Neil Sanzgiri: I play folk music because it’s warm. It fills you with something most other genres fail to embrace. The melancholy isn’t dramatic, it’s comforting and peaceful and I guess I just need that in my life. It is, however, something I wish to share with the world and the community at large for whomever wants to listen.
Great American Canyon Band
8:40 – 9:20 p.m., Windup Space
What does folk music mean to you?
The GACB: Freedom.
Ember Schrag
9:25 – 10:05 p.m., Windup Space
Why do you play folk music?
Ember: It is in my blood, but I didn’t know that when I started out. My biological father is a bagpipes master who grew up in Scotland. I would have been the child asleep in an instrument case at traditional music sessions had we been together, but I didn’t find out about his music until just a few years ago. The family who adopted me were more into Old Time Religion than music, but that was a mystical folklore experience that may have prepared me to play folk style tunes better than anything else. My record The Sewing Room looks back on those memories; they’re an even split: metaphysical and pastoral. I came to music from a rural place, through poetry, and through stories that search for understanding and independence.
10:10 – 10:50 p.m., Windup Space
What does folk mean to you?
Corey Zook: “To us, folk music gave us a way to get together with common interests that we can build upon. This gave each member a basic understanding of what a song is and a tutorial on how to write our own songs. We don’t play straight-up folk music but it was the basis of what got our band started in the first place and a main influence to this day.”
Ugly Purple Sweater
10:55 – 11:35 p.m., Windup Space
What does folk music mean to you?
Sam McCormally: Folk music at its purest, I think, is people sitting on a porch, muddling their way through simple songs, primarily for the enjoyment of the players themselves. We have an artistic culture that generally establishes a clear line between performer and audience […] But folk songs are simple and formulaic enough that people who’ve never met can play together. All they need is someone to call out the chord changes. In that kind of setting, music becomes an activity that people do together rather than something that people come to see, and I love that. But then again, I’m about to play at the Baltimore Folk Festival, an event for which people are buying tickets, so folk music isn’t just about people sitting around, drinking moonshine out of a jug and strumming a banjo. […] So, of course, there’s a variant of folk music that takes the trappings of the genre–acoustic instruments, songs about being lonesome and wandering around the countryside, etc–and then dresses them up.
Why do you play folk music?
Sam McCormally: I play folk music because there was a time when I was trying to write really complicated songs, and no one seemed to like them, myself included. So I went back to basics, and decided that my job was to communicate. And I found this to be a productive way to approach writing songs, because it meant I had to trust my instincts and do what came naturally rather than always second-guess myself.
The Alternate Routes
11:40 p.m., Windup Space
What does folk music mean to you?
Tim Warren: Nowadays it seems like folk musicians are trying to bring their own story into the fray so that they can leave a mark, and attempt to be a part of the history themselves. I think Bob Dylan gets a lot of credit for personalizing the genre. Either way, there is something pure about it in theory, and people want to be remembered, artists want to leave something behind, so I think it’s an honest marriage.
Whirlitzer
6 – 6:40 p.m., Joe Squared
Photo credit: Rebekah J. Murray
Happy Hours
7 – 7:40 p.m., Joe Squared
How did you start playing folk music?
Rebecca Messner: We just started playing a song that we learned from some friends of ours— it’s an old time tune, but our friends made their own arrangement of it, and now we’re doing our own thing with it, so it’s changing, and maybe other people will start to play it and make it their own, and soon we won’t know where the song began.
What does folk music mean to you?
Rebecca Messner: That’s folk music to me: The origins of the song aren’t the thing—it’s the life that song leads as it gets played by people over time… Also, whiskey.
8 – 8:40 p.m., Joe Squared
Letitia VanSant
9 – 9:40 p.m., Joe Squared
Manly Deeds
10 – 11 p.m., Joe Squared
What does folk music mean to you?
Brad Cardwell: So many different styles of music are under the tent of folk that its hard to say, “That, right there, is folk music.” There’s folk music from all over the world that use different instruments, different song structures and tell different stories. But at its core, folk music is an expression of culture that everyone can share, and that anyone can perform. You don’t have to be a good guitar player to play folk music, although it can’t hurt. You don’t even need to play an instrument, you can just sing.
Why do you play folk music?
Brad Cardwell: I play folk music because I enjoy writing and playing music that almost anyone can enjoy or relate to, without having to impress them to get there.
Bobby E. Lee & the Sympathizers
11:15 p.m., Joe Squared
What does folk music mean to you?
Folk you we’re Bobby E. Lee & the Sympathizers!
Why do you play folk music?
‘Cause it FEELS good
What is the community that surrounds folk music?
The greatest mother folkers in the U S of A!
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Make your way to the Station North Arts District Friday to experience the hootin’ and hollerin’ for yourself.
Baltimore Folk Festival is Friday, Oct. 26 from 6 p.m. – 1 a.m. at Windup Space and Joe Squared. Visit www.baltimorefolkfest.com for more information and for presale tickets.
