Textures of a Festival About to Begin
Staff, volunteers and crew are busy this morning: painting a grid for where the main stage needs to be installed, stacking milk crates into towers for supplies, transfiguring digital designs into the real world via printer and laminator. (Where is the weather monitor?? Ah, there it is!)
A year’s worth of festival planning is becoming real this week. The 52nd edition of the Regina Folk Festival is happening THIS FRIDAY, rain, or shine! The summer air will soon be infused with sea-salty folk rock, hip-hop awesomeness, soaring voices, rock psychedelia, gentle acoustic guitar, and lots more!
We are making a MUSIC FESTIVAL, celebrating live performance, and lived experiences of sound, in real time. We think of the musicians who will perform on all the stages and make real the schedules we have planned, artists who have dedicated their lives to this ancient art form:
Alan Doyle, The Halluci Nation, Allison Russell, The Strumbellas
Beau Nectar, Burnt Sienna Boulevard, Celeigh Cardinal, Chad VanGaalen, DJ Ariana Giroux, DJ Dyke Boyfriend, DJ squaresoundroundbody, Eekwol, GRR!, JayWood, Last Birds, Logan Staats, Lyssa and the Try-Tones, Merv xx Gotti, , Nick Faye, Pantayo, Partner, People of the Sun, Polky, Shad, SoCalled, Songs 4 Nature, TEKE::TEKE, TOVA, The Marmalads, The Steves, The Whats, The Weather Station, Wild Black.
Each performance is an irreplaceable act of artistic expression, created in the alchemic triangle of artist + audience + time space.
We think of the emcees guiding us along, sharing the messages: InfoRed, Kris Alvarez, Sabeen Ahmad; our friends at CBC and Play 92.1.
We think of the knowledge keepers sharing Indigenous history and tradition: Elder Sidney Kay, Skyler Anderson, Aaron Tootoosis, Darian Agecoutay, Kevin Bear, Roland Kay.
We think of the artists and galleries who are joining us and engaging in art workshops, talks and film screenings: New Dance Horizons / Rouge-gorge, FadaDance, Cheryl L’Hirondelle, Madeleine Greenway, Erika DeFreitas, Dunlop Art Gallery, Mackenzie Art Gallery and many more!
I am excited for all of it, including Pantayo’s kulintang workshop on the youth stage and TEKE::TEKE’s artist in the Community Commons room at the Regina Public Library.
I am especially excited for the PARADE OF CREEPY CRAWLIES happening each festival afternoon! It’s the perfect excuse to glue multiple googly eyes to one’s forehead to be the best spider one can be!! Make your own parade gear in the Kids’ Craft Tent (bug face masks and bug ring crafts, anyone??).
We think of the volunteers, board of directors, staff and crew who apply their enthusiasm and expertise to making this thing run! Our hearts are filled with gratitude and awe.
The Regina Folk Festival’s 2023 theme is Web of Life: Music and community in harmony with the Earth. This summer we will celebrate the natural world, and the musicians, people and groups working to protect it, with the goal of encouraging greater engagement with environmental issues and to combat climate dread.
We think of our guest curator, Music Declares Emergency Canada, and our friends Indigenous Climate Action and Mother Earth Justice Advocates, who so graciously have been engaging in conversations about the climate emergency, hope, action, kinship, healing justice and the work we all need to help with, including festivals and artists (the recording of the ‘How To We Make A Better World?’ panel discussion goes live tomorrow!).
Finally, it’s no secret that The Regina Folk Festival is struggling. It's no secret that the festival has experienced significant challenges over the past several years, which we continue to feel the effects of.
Here are ways the community can help this festival:
Since 1969, the Regina Folk Festival has relied on the strength of our community. Now, we're calling on you to ensure the festival stays strong for another 50 years. We can't do it without you.
See you soon,
Amber
