The festival will feature more than 50 musical artists and acts performing daily from 11 a.m. to midnight on Friday and Saturday and from 11 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. on Sunday. Seven stages –including the shady, family-oriented Dulcimer Grove — will offer a diverse array of international, regional and hyper-local performers, daytime workshops, in-the-round sets featuring several artists/acts, and more. As in years past, many artisans will display and sell their crafts, while a wide array of food and beverages will be available for purchase.

This year’s festival headliners are, Gangstagrass (a group whose innovative sound is a fusion of bluegrass and hip hop) John Oates (formerly of the popular Philadelphia-based pop-soul duo Hall & Oates), and virtuosic banjo player Tony Trischka’s EarlJam – A Tribute to Earl Scruggs (in which the acclaimed bluegrass artist and backing band trace the musical story of the American bluegrass legend known for popularizing a three-finger banjo picking style).

Among the other notable artists slated to perform during the festival are Adam Ezra Group, Calvin Arsenia, Cajun band Beausoleil avec Michael Doucet, Craig Bickhardt with Aislann Bickhardt, Johnathan Byrd, Ellis Paul, The Faux Paws, Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer, Dom Flemons, John Flynn, John Gallagher, Jr., The Great Groove Band, Alice Howe & Freebo, Jess Klein, A.J. Lee & Blue Summit, Crys Matthews, Pete Muller and the Kindred Souls, Aaron Nathans & Michael G. Ronstadt, Celtic roots ensemble RUNA, The Secret Sisters, Shanna in a Dress, Alexis P. Suter Band, Stephen Wade, Nigel Wearne, and Windborne. A number of talented Canadian artists are on the bill – including Angelique Francis Band, Cassie & Maggie, J.P. Cormier, Dave Gunning, Miss Emily, and Genevieve Racette.

John Flynn, a Delaware-based singer-songwriter and social justice activist & troubadour, has been a frequent performer at the festival and closes it out this year on the Main Stage. “When people ask me how I’m doing I often say ‘better than I deserve.’ They always think I’m joking but I’m really not,” he told AcousticMusicScene.com. “I am so grateful for the chances I’ve been given in this life and that’s kind of how I feel about the Philadelphia Folk Festival. These folks have supported my music from the very beginning, and it’s a real honor to be getting a chance to appear with so many wonderful artists on the final night of this year’s fest.”

Artists Affiliated with Music Artists Cooperative (MAC) and Xtreme Folk Scene Also Slated to Perform

The Philadelphia Folk Festival also will feature performances by members of the Philadelphia Folksong Society’s Musical Artists Cooperative (MAC) and from The Xtreme Folk Scene, a Philadelphia-based music community dedicated to supporting dynamic and innovative folk music that pushes the boundaries of tradition and celebrates the fusion of various genres.

The Musical Artists Cooperative (MAC) is an initiative designed to support professional musicians who perform regularly in the local area, with many touring nationally as well. Slated to perform on the Lobby Stage on Friday, Aug, 16, between 1-5:30 p.m. are Last Chance, CubiZm, Jefferson Berry & the UAC, Bethlehem and Sad Patrick, Jersey Corn Pickers, Kicking Down Doors, The Hoppin Boxcars, and Meghan Cary. On Saturday morning, Aug. 17, Mara Levine and Gathering Time will perform on the Craft Stage from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m., and on Sunday morning, Aug. 18, The Honey Badgers and The Edgehill Rounders play the Tank Stage from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. Other MAC-affiliated artists set to perform during the festival include Emily Drinker, Aaron Nathans, David C. Perry, Jackson Pines, and Two of a Kind.

The Xtreme Folk Showcase, entitled “Anger, Hope, and Outrage,” will feature performances by Sug Daniels, Anarkkhipov, Persistent Resonators, A Day Without Love, and Matt Pless on the Tank Stage on Saturday from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. The Xtreme Folk Scene also presents Xfest, an annual music festival featuring some of the edgiest folk artists in the greater Philadelphia area.

There’s also a festival within the festival for those who opt to camp onsite and enjoy some late-night musical revelry. The 40-acre campground – chock-a-block with tents – is home to a unique late-night scene, with singing by campfires and jamming into the early morning hours, as well as a Thursday night Camp Stage kickoff performance for campers only.

For more information about the Philadelphia Folk Festival – including stage schedules — and to order tickets, visit folkfest.org.

Nurture the Future is this year’s conference theme. “It was something we felt needed to be communicated as our world is changing every second of the day,” says Jill Kettles, SERFA’s board president. “We aim to uphold the past, mold the present, and project it for future generations; this is not just important but vital.”

SERFA is a regional affiliate of Folk Alliance International (folk.org), a nonprofit organization that aims to serve, strengthen and engage the global folk music community through preservation, presentation and promotion. SERFA (serfa.org) exists to promote, develop and celebrate the diverse heritage of roots and indigenous music, dance, storytelling and related arts in the southeastern United States. It has produced an annual conference since 2008. This is SERFA’s third consecutive year at the YMCA Blue Ridge Assembly, nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina.

The official showcases take place Friday and Saturday evenings, with each artist/act performing a 15-minute set. Unplugged private showcases follow from 10:40 p.m. to 2 a.m. Also on the agenda are daytime panel discussions and workshops, a Wisdom of the Elders session, a few thematic song circles, open mics, mentoring sessions, an awards presentation, an exhibit hall, communal meals, and plenty of other opportunities to learn, share and network –- including during built-in afternoon breaks in the programming. Informal jams and song circles also are apt to break out in the lobby and outside (weather permitting).

Rachael Sage, Award-Winning, Prolific Singer-Songwriter and Boutique Label Owner to Deliver Keynote Address

Daytime Programming Includes Workshops, Song Circles, Think Tanks, and Mentoring Sessions

Besides the workshops and panel discussions, there will be moderated, interactive “think tanks” on House Concerts and Small Venues and Hey, What’s Your Problem, one-on-one mentoring sessions, several thematic song circles, several thematic song circles, and a Wisdom of the Elders session during the daytime hours.

Wisdom of the Elders and SERFA Awards are Among Conference Highlights

The Wisdom of the Elders conversational panel session provides a structured opportunity for conference attendees to learn from and about veteran leaders in the folk community and for the elders to talk among themselves as well. Participants this year are Scott Berwick, Wayne Erbsen and Taylor Pie.

Berwick has long been active in American Federation of Musicians (AFM) Local 1000 (the traveling musicians union), has been attending SERFA conferences for the past decade, and has also been involved with the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, the Hudson Valley Folk Guild, and the Ashokan Center, as well as an informal, weekly song circle near his home in upstate New York.

Erbsen has been engaged in traditional American music for more than 50 years as a musician, recording artist (with nearly 20 albums to his credit), professor at Warren Wilson College and the University of North Carolina at Asheville, author and publisher (who has written and published 40 books), and a public radio DJ.

A Tennessee-based traveling folk minstrel and Americana artist, Taylor Pie (Susan Taylor) helped form the Pozo Seco Singers with Don Williams in the early 1960s and has been a solo singer-songwriter and musician since the folk group disbanded. Many notable artists have covered her songs, while Pie was inducted into the Old-Time Country Music Hall of Fame in 2015. Along with her friend Kathryn Harrison, she launched PuffBunny Records in 2007 to share her music and that of other artists she admires. Taylor Pie, who now handles A &R for the label, also stars in Nobody Famous, an award-winning music documentary that was screened during the 2022 SERFA conference.

Menius, who currently hosts “The Revolution Starts Now” on Hillsborough, NC-based WHUP, has hosted radio shows on four stations since 2007. The first executive director of the International Bluegrass Music Association (IBMA), from 1985-1990, Menius also served as Folk Alliance International’s initial board president in 1990 and manager from 1991-1996, prior to serving as associate director of MerleFest for a decade and then as executive director of Appalshop in Whitesburg, Kentucky and The ArtsCenter in Carrboro, NC. He’s also produced concerts, festivals and conferences and worked as a fundraiser, marketing director, emcee, stage manager, and writer.

Dom Flemons, an Arizona native and Chicago area-based musician who has earned the moniker “The American Songster” since his repertoire covers more than 100 years of American roots music, records for Smithsonian Folkways. He is a songwriter, multi-instrumentalist (banjo, guitar, harmonica, jug, percussion, quills, fife, and rhythm bones), music scholar, actor, slam poet, record collector, and the creator, host and producer of American Songster Radio Show on WSM in Nashville, Tennessee. Earlier this year, he was named the grand-prize winner as well as first place honors for Best Folk/Americana Roots Album (for American Wildfire) in the International Acoustic Music Awards. In 2020, he received the prestigious United States Artists Fellowship Award in the Traditional Arts category. Two years later, he received a degree as Doctor of Humane Letters from his alma mater Northern Arizona University and was the commencement speaker at the graduation ceremony or the Class of 2022. Flemons was a founding member of Carolina Chocolate Drops, a Grammy Award-winning African-American old-time string band.

Junior Appalachian Musicians, Inc. (jamkids.org) is the nonprofit parent organization for more than 50 afterschool programs for children ages six and up. JAM provides communities with the requisite tools and support to teach children to play and dance to traditional old time and bluegrass music. Its program model introduces music through small group instruction on instruments common to the Appalachian region and provides youth with opportunities to learn traditional music with their peers from local teaching artists and to perform in their communities and regionally.

Taylor Caffery, the longtime host of “Hootenanny Power” on WRKF in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, is the recipient of this year’s Kari Estrin Founding President’s Award. His weekly radio show incorporates musical styles and cultural influences from Caffery’s five decades on radio that began when he hosted his first show while in the U.S. Navy and continued with his college radio station KCSL. To that musical gumbo, he mixes in new discoveries from Folk Alliance International and SERFA conferences.

Dozens of Artists to be Featured in Official and Guerilla Showcases

Slated to present official showcases on Friday evening, May 10 are (in order of appearance) Sue Horowitz, Chris Haddox, Ron Fetner, A Tale of Two, Dustin Gaspard, Nicholas Edward Williams, Helene Cronin, and Admiral Radio. Saturday’s official showcase lineup features Jess Klein, Wes Collins, Bett Padgett, Cast Iron Bluegrass, Ruth and Max Bloomquist, Stone & Snow, Couldn’t Be Happiers, and Ordinary Elephant.

Here’s a link to a Spotify playlist that features one song from each of the official showcase artists.

Following the official showcases on Friday and Saturday, as well as an open mic on Thursday, late-night guerilla showcases will take place in various meeting rooms for several hours. AcousticMusicScene.com, which has had a presence at SERFA conferences since 2011, will host a couple of late-night song swaps and a midnight hoot (featuring more than two-dozen artists/acts – each performing one song) on Thursday, May 9, overnight. The AcousticMusicScene.com Midnight Hoot is a pre-arranged round-robin song swap that is intended to provide concert and festival presenters, folk DJs and others with an opportunity to get a small sampling of the music of a lot of artists in a short period of time on the conference’s opening night. It also enables artists to enjoy and each other’s company and music before the conference really gets into full swing on Friday.

Here’s the AcousticMusicScene.com Showcase schedule:

10:40 Brooklyn in the House: Carolann Solebello and Pat Wictor

11:00 Long Island Sound: Hank Stone and Jim Whiteman

11:30 Midnight Hoot, Part 1 (one song each):

Antonio Andrade, Max & Ruth Bloomquist, Dan & Faith, Katie Dahl, Annie Stokes

12:00 Midnight Hoot, Part 2 (one song each, not necessarily in this order)

Taylor Pie, The Farmer & The Crow, Amy Speace, Annie & Rod Capps, Marc Douglas Berardo, Karyn Oliver, Lindsay Whiteman, Miles & Mafale, Rachael Sage, Emma Frances, Nicholas Edward Williams, Noah Zacharin

1:00 Midnight Hoot, Part 3 (one song each, not necessarily in this order)

Jon Shain & FJ Ventre, Erin Ash Sullivan, Robert Bidney, Rob Lytle, Jim Patton & Sherry Brokus, Meg Braun, Alice Hasen, Brian Ashley Jones & Melanie Jean, Couldn’t Be Happiers, Reckless Saints, Siena Christie

NERFA (nerfa.org) is one of five North American regional affiliates of Folk Alliance International, a nonprofit organization that aims to serve, strengthen and engage the global folk music community through preservation, presentation and promotion — and the only one to host its annual conference both in-person and online this year. Southwest Regional Folk Alliance (SWRFA) and Folk Alliance Region Midwest (FARM) held in-person conferences in September and October, respectively, while Southeast Regional Folk Alliance (SERFA) held its 2022 conference in the spring and Folk Alliance Region-West opted not to host one this year.

As in years past, the NERFA conference will feature several jam-packed days and nights of music showcases, song swaps and jam sessions; open mics; one-on-one mentoring and peer group sessions; an exhibit hall; keynote speakers, awards; a community meeting; an open-sing; and lots of informal conversation and networking. The conference is designed to help attendees forge connections and build community, while also providing learning and performance opportunities that can help enhance their professional and personal lives.

Unlike previous NERFA conferences, all of the events will not take place in one location. While the Berkeley Oceanfront Hotel will be home to much of the in-person conference, Formal Showcases will be held at The Stone Pony — a venerable music club located just a few minutes away from it. NERFA Awards will also be presented there, as will two of the conference’s three nightly keynote addresses.

Artists Showcase Their Talents at The Stone Pony, the Host Hotel and Online

The juried formal showcases are considered the premiere performance opportunity during the conference. From among hundreds of submissions, 20 artists/acts were chosen to perform in-person at The Stone Pony, while another 20 were awarded virtual showcase opportunities. All will be streamed online for virtual ticket holders, while Saturday’s in-person formal showcases also are open to the public for $15 plus a service fee in advance via nerfaconference.org/tickets/ or $20 at the venue.

Virtual formal showcasing performers – each of whom submitted a pre-recorded live video – include Deidre McCalla, Emily Drinker, Genevieve Racette, Greg Greenway, ilyAIMY, Joshua Garcia, Justin Farren, Kray Van Kirk, Larry & Joe, Madison Violet, Natalie Price, Palmyra, Peter Calo, Rachael Sage, Rupert Wates, Sam Robbins, Shanna in a Dress, Taylor Abrahamse, and Travis Knapp. In addition to being screened online, all 20 virtual formal showcases will be presented on-site via a theater-sized video wall in the exhibit hall that will be open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on both Friday and Saturday.

Conference attendees will also have the opportunity to enjoy a Saturday afternoon showcase presented by Folk Music Ontario and the opening night’s Suzi Wollenberg Folk DJ Showcase that will feature short performances by seven artists/acts selected by folk DJs, along with a keynote address by Sarah Craig, executive director of Caffe Lena in Saratoga Springs, NY — America’s longest continuously operating folk club. Following the juried and folk DJ showcases each evening, a number of private showcases curated by conference attendees will be held in various hotel rooms from 10 p.m. through the early morning hours on Thursday-Saturday overnight. Some hosts may also livestream their in-person showcases, while others are hosting virtual showcases.

Panel Discussions and Workshops Explore a Variety of Topics

The conference’s programming committee has created a streamlined array of 60-90 minute panel discussions and workshops. These include “Artists & Presenters: Safe Expectations & Boundaries,” “Blurring the Boarder: Do’s, Don’ts and Musts to Ensure a Successful Crossing,” “Bringing Your Venue Online,” “Coming Back from Quarantine – House Concert Edition,” “A Crash Course in Cutting the Cord & Becoming a Full-Time Musician,” “The Current State of Marketing Yourself,” “Defining Success in Your Career,” “Editing Videos for Fun and Profit,” “Export Ready – Preparing Yourself for a New Marketplace,” “How to Return from the Pandemic Stronger,” “How to Seize Financial Opportunities,” “The Ins & Outs of Co-writing,” “Keep the Story Going (The Lifecycle of a Song),” “Lifecycle of Record Production & Release,” “The Reality of Touring for Working Artists,” and “Recording Remotely.”

David Amram (“the renaissance man of American music”) and Vance Gilbert (a veteran touring singer-songwriter and past keynote speaker) will conduct performance critique sessions, while Jean Rohe and acclaimed singer-songwriter Dar Williams present songwriting workshops. Ron Olesko (a veteran folk DJ and the creator & curator of Folk Music Notebook) moderates a Wisdom of the Elders panel discussion featuring Kari Estrin (a radio promoter and artist development & career consultant), Mitch Greenhiill (a musician, composer, producer, and president of the music agency FLiArtists) and Biff Kennedy (an artist manager and radio promoter).

Virtual Tickets Enabling Online Access to the Conference for 30 or 365 Days are Still Available for Purchase

Virtual tickets that afford you online access to all official virtual conference programming (including live-streamed panel discussions and workshops, formal showcases and keynotes, as well as virtual private showcases) for 30/365 days following the conference are available for $35/$50 plus service fees at nerfaconference.org/tickets/.

Scheduled to perform (in order of performance) at the Threadgill Theater on the Quiet Valley Ranch Campgrounds in the Texas Hill Country on May 28, from 1-4 p.m., are Clint Alphin (Nashville, TN), John Brown (Winter Gardens, FL), Mary Bragg (Nashville, TN), Tom Meny (Buda, TX), Susan Cattaneo (Medford, MA), Teresa Storch (Longmont, CO), Dan Weber (Vancouver, WA), Cherie Call (Spanish Fork, UT), Becky Warren (Nashville, TN), Amy McCarley (Huntsville, AL), Chase Gassaway (Austin, TX), Aubryn (Nashville, TN), Andrew Delaney (Plano, TX), Abby Lappen (Claverack-Red Mills, NY), David Berkeley (Santa Fe, NM), and Heather Styka (Portland, ME).

New Folk Finalists slated to perform on May 29 include Hope Dunbar (Utica, NE), Drew Kennedy (New Braunfels, TX), Kerry Patrick Clark (Whitehouse, OH), Mare Wakefield (Nashville, TN), Anna Tivel (Portland, OR), Lisa Nicole Grace (Alberta, Canada), Eliot Bronson (Atlanta, GA), Amy Kucharik (Somerville, MA), Wes Collins (Chapel Hill, NC), Andy Roo Forrest (Seattle, WA), Emily Clepper (Austin, TX), Robert Smith (Roanoke, VA), Man in the Ring (Kansas City, MO), Angela Easterling (Green, SC), Candy Lee (Fayetteville, AR), and Jess Klein (Austin, TX).

Mike P. Ryan (Clifton, VA), Emily White (Chicago, IL) and Meg Braun (New York, NY) were named as alternates.

After performing, six songwriters will be selected as 2015 New Folk Winners by noted songwriters David Wilcox and Ellis Paul, who are serving as judges. The six will receive cash honorariums and other prizes, as well as the opportunity to return the following weekend to each perform 20-minute sets during a Grassy Hill Kerrville New Folk Winners concert at the festival on Sunday afternoon, May 31.

Established in 1972 at the urging of Peter Yarrow, the Kerrville New Folk Concerts have become a highlight of the annual festival that is geared towards singer-songwriters of various musical styles and is the longest continuously running festival of its kind in North America. Being named as a New Folk Winner is regarded as a very prestigious honor.

In addition to concerts each evening, Kerrville features Ballad Tree song-sharing sessions, campfire jam sessions, concerts and activities for children, organized canoe trips on the Guadelupe River and Hill Country bike rides, early morning yoga sessions, a professional development program for teachers, as well as a four-day songwriters school and instrumental workshops. The festival runs for 18 straight days – Thursday, May 21– Sunday, June 7. For a complete schedule and additional information, visit www.kerrville-music.com.