EFN Newsletter September 2026 #46
Here we are for another month, and you can feel activity returning, to some extent, to its usual rhythm after the summer. We have a wealth of content for you, created through many hours of dedicated work by everyone featured in these pages. If you enjoy it, let us know, share it and forward it on. |
WELCOME AND SUMMARY
Welcome to the new edition of this communication and outreach initiative of the EFN. Feel free to forward it to your friends and colleagues. Receiving this newsletter is open to anyone for free, here. Read to the end to find out how to submit content for future editions.
This is what you'll find below:
🔹News from EFN:
▫️EFN Talking Points Online #1 - 15 September - reminder
▫️REMINDER: 2026 EFN Conference - reminder
▫️The 4th European Folk Day
▫️Meet us in Budapest for the first Hungarian Heritage Days
🔸New members:
▫️Stella Papalamprou (artist from Greece settled in Barcelona)
▫️Georgia Folk Life (NGO from Georgia)
🔹Our next featured member is Band on the Wall, from Manchester🔸News from the members:
▫️From First Songs to Familiar Faces: Music, Play and Discovery at the University of Glasgow Nursery
▫️Junge Klangwerkstatt: A New Generation Brings German Folk Music to Life
▫️Conference Folk Arts as Intangible Cultural Heritage Conference, by English Folk Dance and Song Society
▫️Jo Freya Leaves the Artistic Director for the National Youth Folk Ensemble (NYFE)
▫️Transglobal World Music Chart: Hall of Fame nominations & new album submissions are open
🔹Special content:
▫️Saraï: with Occitan poetry and bal folk at its heart
▫️Gárur: Icelandic songs as a living, shared tradition
✍️ Do you want to participate? At the end of the newsletter you will find how you can contribute to future editions, whether you are an EFN member or not. And of course EFN is always looking for new members and at the end of this newsletter there is a note about how and why to join, with links to the membership pages of the website and the application form.
Thanks for your attention, have a fruitful reading and, please, forward this to any person who could be interested! |
News from EFN
🔸EFN Talking Points Online #1 - 15 September - shorter reminderEFN Talking Points Online is a new series of online conversations bringing together different voices to explore issues that matter to the folk community.
Our first session, “Too Much Supply, Too Little Demand?”, will examine the imbalance between the growing number of artists and projects and the opportunities available to present them. The speakers will be David Sierra (Sierra Contratación Artística), Anne-Mari Hakamäki (Kaustinen Folk Music Festival) and David Agnew (English Folk Expo), with Araceli Tzigane Sanchez Mapamundi (Mapamundi Música) as moderator.
➡️ Save the date:
▫️EFN Talking Points Online #1 "Too Much Supply, Too Little Demand?"
▫️When: Tuesday, September 15, 2026 11:00 (UK), 12.00 (CET), 13.00 (EET)
➡️ Register in advance for this meeting: 🔗 https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/EJvTL4fZSpqXpg8RYS6low - After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.
🔸REMINDER: 2026 EFN Conference: registration now open!
Almería (Spain), 13 & 14 November 2026
The conference programme will feature expert speakers and panels, working groups, breakout discussions and traditional music performances. Click here for CONFERENCE REGISTRATION – there is a special discount price for EFN Members. The two Conference hotels are now holding rooms for delegates. To see the details and book your own room with special EFN Conference reference go to the EFN website Conference page HERE.
🔸European Folk Day 2026
The 4th European Folk Day —Wednesday 23 September 2026Celebrating the traditional arts that unite Europe and beyond18–27 September 2026
The website www.europeanfolkday.eu is now ready to register your events.
European Folk Network (EFN) is proud to announce the fourth edition of the European Folk Day, taking place on Wednesday 23 September 2026 — the day of the autumn equinox in the Northern Hemisphere — with a full programme of celebrations running from 18 to 27 September 2026.
🔸Meet us in Budapest for the 1st Hungarian Heritage Days
From 24 to 30 September, the Hungarian Heritage House, a member of the European Folk Network, will welcome international guests for several days of professional exchange, performances and encounters with the living folk traditions of the Carpathian Basin. Several members of the EFN Board will also be there, making it a valuable opportunity to meet, exchange ideas and strengthen connections across the network. Learn more about this event and discover the program, here.
EFN WELCOMES TWO NEW MEMBERS
By EFN editors
🔸Stella Papalamprou, Greek singer settled in Barcelona
We first got to know her in the edition of July 2026, through the in-depth interview on traditional music and issues such as identity, displacement and endangered languages. It is a pleasure to welcome Stella now to this network. Welcome!
In response to the question “what your organisation does and how it is organised”, Stella explained that she “is a Greek vocalist and composer, based in Barcelona, with an international presence in the world music scene. Deeply committed to Greece’s authentic musical traditions, she brings to life rare vocal idioms and musical heritage from Pontus, Epirus, and Macedonia, building meaningful bridges between cultural heritage and contemporary international audiences.”
The picture is from Stella's Facebook profile.You can learn more about her on her website.
🔸Georgia Folk Life, and NGO from Tbilisi, Georgia
We are also very happy to welcome our first member from Georgia. In the edition of July 2026, we featured the Georgian singer Hamlet Gonashvili as our Featured Artist and addressed this question: “Why a featured artist from Georgia in the European Folk Network newsletter?”
The answer is relevant now as we welcome Georgia Folk Life. Let us recall what we explained in that edition, because it says a great deal about the spirit of EFN:
"Because Europe is not only a political map. It is also a cultural space made of borderlands, routes, shared memory and musical continuities that do not always fit neatly into administrative categories.Georgia lies in the Caucasus, at the crossroads of the Black Sea, Eastern Europe and Western Asia. At the same time, its historical, cultural and institutional ties place it within a broader European framework, including its membership of the Council of Europe since 1999.
It also has one of the most extraordinary traditional music cultures connected to this wider European landscape. Featuring an artist from Georgia is not an exception to the spirit of EFN. It is a reminder of what that spirit can be: curious, open, attentive to living traditions and willing to listen beyond the most obvious borders."
In response to the question “what your organisation does and how it is organised”, Georgia Folk Life explained that it is a "NGO dedicated to the study and promotion of traditional culture. We approach traditional culture with fresh perspectives while remaining faithful to its roots. Goals: to research traditional music, choreography, oral heritage, and applied arts of Georgia; promote tangible and intangible cultural heritage; implement educational projects; share and introduce the experience and innovative approaches of scholars engaged in cultural studies worldwide."
And to the question “what you and/or your organisation think you can give to the European Folk Network as a member and what you think will be the benefits of membership”, their answer has been: "Folklife Georgia will contribute expertise in Georgian traditional culture, especially polyphonic singing, alongside research, educational initiatives, and innovative approaches to safeguarding intangible cultural heritage. Through the European Folk Network, we look forward to exchanging knowledge, building international partnerships, sharing good practices, and collaborating on projects that strengthen and promote Europe’s diverse folk traditions."
Learn more on their website.
FEATURED MEMBER
🔸Band on the Wall, a venue in Manchester, UK
Band on the Wall is an iconic venue for folk concerts, and much more, in Manchester. They joined the EFN in 2021 and, after a couple of years away, have now rejoined. So, with this piece, we warmly welcome them back.This is how they introduced themselves when they became members: "A venue and charity enriching lives by enabling everyone to access, enjoy and participate in the best music of many cultures. Home of heritage and music learning and research programme 'World of Music', building lasting partnerships with social change organisations and education trusts, delivering workshops, volunteer opportunities, and community outreach events which celebrate Manchester’s migrant communities and their musical legacies."
And about "what you and/or your organisation think you can give to the European Folk Network as a member and what you think will be the benefits of membership?" this was their answer: "We work with many international artists in performance and education, and we are a tier five visa sponsor. We aim to build relationships with artists and organisations throughout Europe to develop opportunities, and to learn. We bring years of experience in many areas of the music industry, from programming and promotion, to project management and learning initiatives."
You can find more details on the website.
NEWS FROM THE MEMBERS
🔸From First Songs to Familiar Faces: Music, Play and Discovery at the University of Glasgow Nursery
By Malena Persson, Communications Manager of Live Music Now Scotland
Over eight visits to the University of Glasgow Nursery, Live Music Now Scotland musicians Mairi McGillivray and Katie Allen shared traditional Scottish tunes and Gaelic song alongside familiar nursery repertoire, creating opportunities for children to sing, move, listen, play and explore together.
Through stories, songs and hands-on instrument play, children contributed ideas, requested favourite songs and interacted naturally with the musicians. Returning regularly helped build trust and confidence, with children increasingly making the sessions their own. Mixed-age sessions encouraged peer support, while staff involvement helped create a warm and inclusive environment.
The project shows how traditional Scottish and Gaelic music can support play, creativity, self-expression and connection, while introducing young children to Scotland’s musical heritage through shared musical experiences. You can find more details on the website.
🔸Junge Klangwerkstatt: A New Generation Brings German Folk Music to Life. From 1 to 4 April 2027. Applications open on 15 September 2026
By Gudrun Walther
The Junge Klangwerkstatt (“Young Sound Workshop”) brings together up to 40 young musicians aged 12 to 27 from across Germany. It is an initiative developed by the team behind the country’s Youth Folk Orchestra. Unlike the orchestra, however, the workshop is open to participants without a video audition.
Playing instruments ranging from fiddles, accordions and guitars to bagpipes, hurdy-gurdies, nyckelharpas and double bass, participants explore songs and dance music from German-speaking regions. Much of this repertoire has survived in archives and historical collections and is now being rediscovered and creatively reimagined by a new generation.
The Youth Folk Orchestra works largely by ear, without a conductor or predetermined arrangements. The young musicians share responsibility for rhythm, dynamics and ensemble playing, contributing their own ideas to the arrangements. The results are presented to a large audience at Germany’s Rudolstadt Festival.
Organised by PROFOLK e.V., Germany’s national association for folk, song and world music, the project is supported by the Amateurmusikfonds des Bundes (Federal Amateur Music Fund), financed by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and Media.
Further information: www.jugendfolkorchester.de
🔸Conference: Folk Arts as Intangible Cultural Heritage Conference, by English Folk Dance and Song Society. Tickets on sale
By Liberty Rowley
Location:
The Vaughan Williams Memorial Library, Cecil Sharp House, London SW1
Date: Saturday 24 October 2026
This one-day conference explores the current place of folk arts in England in relation to the UK-wide implementation of the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage.
Organisers: Vaughan Williams Memorial Library in collaboration with Esbjörn Wettermark and Access Folk (University of Sheffield).
Buffet lunch, tea and coffee are included in the ticket price.
Tickets on sale. Book now: https://www.efdss.org/whats-on/61-conferences/16270-folk-arts-as-intangible-cultural-heritage-conference
🔸Jo Freya leaves the position of Artistic Director of the National Youth Folk Ensemble (NYFE), making way for a new appointee
By Jo Freya
There have been some fabulous things that I have been involved in and one of which has been the role of Artistic Director for the National Youth Folk Ensemble (NYFE). I have had the privilege of being in the driving seat for the last 3 years and now it is the turn of a new Artistic Director to take the reins. I was also awarded a gold badge by Folk England for services to education in folk music.I hope to continue sharing the music.
This link takes you to a concert by the ensemble in April 2026.
🔸Transglobal World Music Chart: Hall of Fame nominations & new album submissions are open
By Araceli Tzigane
For the latest editions of the newsletter, we have been receiving news about album releases from some of our members. I wanted to let everyone know about the Transglobal World Music Chart, a network of more than 60 music journalists and broadcasters around the world specialising in world, traditional and folk music. We produce a monthly and an annual chart, as well as a number of other initiatives.
Submitting an album is free. We work with digital content, and through the form on our website you can send us your music, booklet and any other useful materials. Everything is then forwarded to all our panellists.
We have also just opened our annual call for nominations for the Hall of Fame. Since it began in 2021, many personalities who will probably be familiar to you have been inducted. In Europe, for example, these include Janusz Prusinowski, Valya Balkanska, Martin Carthy, Petroloukas Halkias, Erik Marchand, Mari Boine, Elena Ledda, Birgit Ellinghaus, Muziekpublique, Simon Broughton, Paco de Lucía, Antonis Dalgas and Benjamín Escoriza.
Learn more about both of these and more, in the website.
Special content
Saraï: with Occitan poetry and bal folk at its heart
By Araceli Tzigane with answers by Juliette Minvielle
Picture of Saraï, by Marion Gambin
Saraï is a project by Compagnie Baltazar Montanaro, a member of the European Folk Network almost since its inception. The trio brings together Juliette Minvielle, Sophie Cavez and Baltazar Montanaro around a repertoire in which Occitan language, poetry and social dance are closely intertwined. Their new album, Miratge, is entirely devoted to bal folk and draws on poetry written by women, from the medieval trobairitz to contemporary authors.Questions around minoritised and endangered languages, transmission and the relationship between tradition and contemporary creation have appeared repeatedly in recent editions of this newsletter. We explored some of them, for instance, with Stella Papalamprou when discussing Pontic Greek and the gradual loss of native speakers. Occitan raises some of the same questions, but from a different historical, social and musical context.In our previous edition, we announced that Saraï would present Miratge at Fira Mediterrània de Manresa, itself a member of the European Folk Network, on 17 October 2026. This time, we wanted to go a little further: to ask how a minoritised language can function as a creative tool, what bal folk offers as a social space today and how poetry written across several centuries can become music made to be danced.
Listen Miratge while you read the interview, here.
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AT: Miratge is entirely dedicated to bal folk. What changes in the way you compose and arrange music when the audience is not only listening, but also physically responding to it through dance?
SA: When it comes to a concert repertoire, there is a great deal of creative freedom at every level.
When creating a ballroom repertoire, the process is more labourious as several factors must be taken into account: the structure of the dance, whilst respecting its form. The tempo and cadence must be in harmony with the dance. The length is also important; it needs to be just right. And rhythmically, the dancers need to feel at ease and be able to emphasise the key beats clearly. A lot also happens spontaneously during the ball, depending on the dancers’ reactions.
AT: Saraï brings together Occitan poetry by women across many centuries, from thetrobairitzto contemporary writers. What did you discover by placing these voices side by side, and did any unexpected connections emerge between women writing hundreds of years apart?
SA: These are intimate stories, constructed under different variants of Occitan. Here, for "Miratge," all the poetry is in Provençal or Gascon. In the first album, there was also Languedocien. It’s a challenge all the more difficult than punctuating the poetry of Provençal, which is not familiar to me (I speak for myself, Juliette. Baltazar is fluent in Provençal). Occitan is a well of music. To dissect this language so that it invites dance is pure delight. We, as musicians, must also become one with the language metric.
AT: The texts at the heart of the project speak about love in many different forms. How do you turn poetry, with its own rhythm, language and intimacy, into music that also needs to work collectively on a dance floor?
SA: Occitan allows you to go everywhere, in every corner. It is a "cooking" language. Very, very pictorial. She is a wonderful companion on the road, like an infinity of possibilities. It may also be a vector of optimism for thought, a disposition of mind far too absent from our human heads.
AT: Occitan is central to Saraï’s identity. Beyond preserving or celebrating a language, what possibilities does singing in Occitan give you as contemporary musicians?
SA: It is a source of inspiration and as Occitan has a lot of different dialects we can use all the different prononciation as a musical diversity. The language is also very adapted to poetry and for us is a very open playground.
AT: Occitan is at the heart of Saraï’s work, but it remains a minoritized language. What is its situation today, both in everyday life and within the music scene? Do you feel that a new generation of artists and audiences is developing a different relationship with the language?
SA: The artistic scene is giving to Occitan language a new beginning as many artists use it in their music. Meanwhile the number of native speakers is decreasing. Fortunately the music brings some of younger generations to learn to speak, which gives hope in the preserving of Occitan. But the native way to speak is slowly dissapearing.
AT: Bal folk has a strong participatory dimension: musicians and dancers create the event together. What do you think this kind of social dancing can offer people today, particularly at a time when so much music is consumed individually and through screens?
SA: It is a place for freedom, where people can meet and get in touch, it has always been such. Nowadays is it more and more a safe place for people withing a large diversity, genre or sexual orientation. My personal hope is that it would open more ethnically speaking, because it is still a very white community.
Musically speaking it is a space for liberty where we can experiment in many direction as long as it is good to dance.
AT: You will present Miratge to international professionals at Fira Mediterrània in October. Do you feel that bal folk still carries a distinctly regional or French/European identity, or is it becoming a musical and social language that can travel much further? The showcase is scheduled for 17 October 2026 at Fira Mediterrània.
SA: I think the freedom and safe interaction that we can find in bal folk can travel very far and resonate with many different cultures. Our hope is to travel in many places as possible because we know by experience that the people are welcoming this in many different countries. Throughout our lives, the three of us have travelled to many different places: New Zealand, Canada, Turkey, Mali, Soudan … and in all of this places people found our dances interesting.
Special content
Gárur: Icelandic songs as a living, shared tradition
By Araceli Tzigane with answers Chris Foster, with Bára Grímsdóttir – FUNI 5 September 2026
Pictures of FUNI by Gísli Egill Hrafnsson and Floris van der Meijs
When Chris Foster, an EFN member since the network’s beginnings, wrote to us about Gárur, the new album by Funi, one of the things that immediately caught our attention was his description of Icelandic traditional singing as a rich and distinctive tradition that remains relatively little known, both within Iceland and abroad. As he pointed out, Iceland does not have a large folk music scene and new recordings devoted to this repertoire are relatively rare.Gárur brings together songs spanning several centuries, from older traditional material to texts from the 21st century. Music that would historically often have been sung unaccompanied is surrounded here by instruments including the Icelandic langspil and kantele, as well as field recordings made in the Icelandic landscape. In Chris’s words, the natural world becomes, in a sense, the duo’s “third member”.
But the album also raised broader questions that seemed particularly relevant for the EFN community: how songs change as they pass from one generation to another, what ownership means in a traditional culture, how family memory becomes part of transmission and what is needed for a musical heritage to remain a living practice rather than something simply preserved.
So, we invited Chris Foster and Bára Grímsdóttir to explore some of these questions with us.
Listen Gárur while you read the interview, here.
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AT: Gárur brings together texts written across several centuries, some set to traditional melodies and others to new ones. When working with this material, how do you decide what should be preserved and where you feel free to intervene, reshape or add something of your own?
GÁ: The Icelandic singing tradition is very much text driven. In particular, the rímur, also called kveðskapur tradition, with its hundreds of verses long, epic storytelling (think Hollywood adventure block buster) has highly disciplined poetic meters and rhyming schemes. These texts were written to be performed, but they were not written with specific tunes in the way we normally think of a song being composed with words and music together.
Individual performers have always selected or made up the melodies that they use. While the long texts were written down, melodies have been passed down through oral tradition for generations. Over time, with the composition of new poems, melodies became interchangeable with these new texts. Today, this means a singer can pick any tune that fits a particular poetic structure and might even choose a different tune for the same text on different occasions.
The way we tend to work is that we choose texts that we like for one reason or another and we then either use a tune that is already associated with it, or pick another tune that we think carries the text well, or we make something up, just like people have always done.
New texts on our album, for example Ekki menga nátúrruna (Eng. Don't polute nature) are written in the old rímur poetic meters, so we went through some archive recordings of traditional tunes that fit that meter, and, as the song was going to be sung with children, we found one that is also good for kids to sing.
Bára is a composer, especially of vocal music. She also grew up surrounded by the kveðskapur tradition. Her grandparents and parents all wrote poems and sang, so she is completely steeped in the intricacies of the form and makes great tunes in the style. Litli Lækurinn (The Little Stream) is one example of an original melody by Bára.
"For most of its existence the people who performed it never heard mechanically reproduced music. Every time they heard a song it was a unique event, every time it was slightly different from every other time."
AT: The album includes field recordings made in locations connected to the songs, to the point that you describe the Icelandic landscape as almost becoming a third member of the band. How did listening to those places change the way you approached the music itself?
GÁ: Historically, Iceland had a very small population that was spread between farms around the coast. The population has grown rapidly since World War II, but it is still only around 400,000 people, including 20% immigrants, and there are maybe around half a million Icelandic speakers in the whole world.
This form of vocal music is rooted in an unbroken tradition that has been going on for the past five or six hundred years. For most of its existence the people who performed it never heard mechanically reproduced music. Every time they heard a song it was a unique event, every time it was slightly different from every other time. That also applies to people born in the second half of the 19th century who were in the first archival recordings. They were well into adulthood before they heard a recording or a radio. The sound world they were familiar with consisted of a mixture of things such as the weather, the sea, wildlife, livestock, human manual activity and so on.
We don't choose songs as re-enactment or nostalgic museum pieces, because to us these songs are relevant and speak to us now. We thought it would be fun to surround the songs on Gárur with examples of the kinds of sound world that the songs were born and continued in, so the songs came first and then we went sound hunting.
Twenty-first century recording technology enables us to add the natural sounds and enrich the aural experience of today's listeners, and we hope that they add an extra dimension of mental pictures to the overall listening experience.
AT: You describe traditional songs as something constantly evolving, which no individual or group can really claim to own. What does that idea mean to you in practice, particularly at a time when questions of authorship, ownership and cultural heritage are increasingly present in the folk music world?
GÁ: We believe that traditional songs are the common property of the communities where they are known and sung. But, just as has been the case all along, individual performers have their own versions of songs and ways of singing them, which people recognise as 'belonging' to them. The point is that someone else can take the same song and make their own version of it too. Thus songs can become dynamic constantly evolving things, passing through many hands and generations, shaped and re-shaped by the people who learn and perform them, and of course new songs are constantly being written.
This traditional music culture is obviously quite different from today's professionalised mass-market music business, which in very large part stems from the mechanical replication of music performances. Ownership of various stages in a song's existence, from composition through arrangement to publication, live and or recorded performance and exploitation via various mechanical processes aims to generate financial reward for many people and institutions. The arrival of AI on the scene is definitely raising a whole lot of new questions about what ownership really means and who exactly owns what.
As far as we're concerned, we register our versions of the songs we perform and record, and we gratefully receive royalties accordingly. In turn we are happy to pay royalties to living writers. But we are not dependant on this activity for our living, and given the nature of what we do, we never could be. We live and operate in a cottage industry, based on our kitchen table, which exists in a parallel universe to the music biz. We are keen to pass on our music and hope other people will continue to enjoy performing it in their own way.
AT: Four generations of Bára’s family are present in Gárur, and the album was released on what would have been her father Grímur Lárusson’s 100th birthday. How has that personal thread of family memory shaped the album, and does it change the way you think about “tradition” itself?
GÁ: As we said above, Bára grew up in a rich, living family tradition. So it is natural for her to just carry on doing what she grew up with and to want to pass it on to her kids and grandchildren, but you can't force these things on people and you never know whether future generations will continue them or not. Out of seven siblings, Bára is the one who has been the most deeply involved with this tradition from her generation.
Bára's father was a very good poet and singer, so it is nice to have his text about the autumn sheep round up, with the tune he used to sing it to on the album. For me, as a non Icelander, it is an honour to be able to participate in this tradition. It's rewarding to be a part of a continuing process that connects past, present and future, and to learn from those who went before us and those who are active now.
"We think it is important that we have really listened to a lot of traditional singers, learned the 'tricks of the trade' and absorbed the spirit of how it has been done."
AT: Many of these songs would once have been sung unaccompanied, while on Gárur you create a new sound world around them with instruments such as langspil, kantele, Icelandic fiðla, shruti and pibgorn. What can instrumentation reveal in an old song that the voice alone cannot — and what do you have to be careful not to lose?
GÁ: As musicians, our lifetime listening experiences, which extend way beyond Icelandic and European folk music, inevitably, subconsciously shape what we do. We like the effect of having voices and musical instruments together. In this day and age, it sounds normal to us and we particularly like the possibilities of using the instruments that we do, with the songs we sing, because somehow the textures and colours they create feel right with these songs. The key thing is to support the singing and the delivery of the text. To contemporary ears that are not used to listening to long songs, instrumental accompaniment can help focus attention, bring out key parts of the text and so on. We think it is important that we have really listened to a lot of traditional singers, learned the 'tricks of the trade' and absorbed the spirit of how it has been done. From that foundation we can build our own interpretations and hopefully they will interest other people.
"We are just scratching the surface of this huge legacy. Unlike most other countries in Europe, Iceland has never really had folk music scene over the past sixty years."
AT: You have spent more than twenty years bringing lesser-known Icelandic songs back into circulation. From your perspective, what does Icelandic traditional music most need today in order to remain a living practice rather than simply a preserved heritage?
GÁ: We have spent our time with this music because we totally believe it is unique and very rich in very many things. We are just scratching the surface of this huge legacy. Unlike most other countries in Europe, Iceland has never really had folk music scene over the past sixty years. There is a very low level of awareness of this music in the wider community. There are no venues promoting folk music in any form on a regular basis. It is almost never heard or seen on mainstream media and it is largely abscent from music education throughout the country.
We sense that there is a growing number of people, many in their 20s and 30s, who for a variety of social, political and environmental reasons are becoming interested in this stuff that we do and who want to get involved in doing it too. Obviously we think this is a good thing.
What we need is multiple entry points where people of all ages can get involved in singing, dancing, playing instruments in a welcoming, inclusive atmosphere. Maybe we should call it social music rather than folk music. At the end of the day, it's all about community.
The idea is simple really, but it is a huge amount of work on may levels to bring it about. Some revenue funding to pay salaries to a some skilled development workers would be a big help.
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