Calgary Concert Alert: Calgary Folk Music Festival

This one is a no-brainer for me…come on, Calgary Folk Fest. As most folk fests tend to do, these festivals attract a good sized crowd, great selection of artists and in particular, provide Slowcoustic the opportunity to see many, many artists in one music packed weekend.

The festival is set in Prince’s Island Park, and while working for a few years in the Eau Claire area of downtown, I always saw all these yahoos walking to the park with their blankets, lawn chairs and smiles on their faces every July. This year, I will be Mr. Yahoo, to you.

I am originally from Winnipeg, so if you are Canadian, you will know that the Winnipeg Folk Fest in one that can be hard to beat as the WFF is world class. So, now that I am a Calgarian, where do we stand? I think we are standing tall on our own if I may say so. Let’s take a look at what I am personally looking forward to (courtesy of the great “My Folk Fest” section of the CFF site).

You might see some overlap above as you never know the exact time each artist will play, so you have to kinda “double book” to ensure you see favourite artists.  The Slowcoustic nominees for “Most Looking Forward To” are:

~Timber Timbre
~Laura Marling
~The Avett Brothers
~Jordan Klassen (Calgary!)
~Samantha Savage-Smith (Calgary!)
~OX
~St. Vincent

Well, look for lots of pics and features on the Calgary Folk Fest on these pages in the upcoming week, through the weekend and after!  Anyone want to meet up – just let us know!!

Aaaaaaand, as this is a music blog, let’s have a few tracks from artists performing at the 2010 Calgary Folk Music Festival.  While all these tracks have been on Slowcoustic already, they are neatly placed in one convenient place for your listening pleasure below:

Bella Donna – The Avett Brothers

Black Ice – Ohbijou

Falling Slowly (live) – Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová

If The Creeks Don’t Rise – Sunparlour Players

In These Arms – The Swell Season

Lay Down In the Tall Grass (Live on Camera Music) – Timber Timbre

Now, Now – St. Vincent

Road Regrets – Dan Mangan

Steep – Ohbijou

Weaving – OX

Enjoy the rest of your Friday – See you all in “Cow Town” next week.  Visit the site HERE for more info and get tickets!

~Smansmith