Joules Graves, Dan Bern headline Willamette Valley Folk Fest
What Willamette
Valley Folk Festival;
a weekend of music
presented by the UO
Cultural Forum
Headlining acts:
Seattle’s Joules
Graves, Boston’s Dan
Bern and Boulder,
Colo.’s The Floodplain
Gang
When: All weekend,
beginning at 1 p.m.
today and ending
Sunday at 8:30
p.m.
Where:
Five different
campus
The annual festival
WILL FILL THE WEEKEND
WITH MUSIC AND FOOD
By Jack Clifford
Oregon Daily Emerald
With three weeks left in spring
term, University students
are probably starting to
think about final exams or
papers. Tony Kullen’s year-end pro
ject will be judged by thousands of
people this weekend.
Kullen is the heritage music coor
dinator for the UO Cultural Forum,
and the Willamette Valley Folk Fes
tival is his undertaking. Although
Kullen admits he got by
with more than a lit
tle help from his
friends, after
sifting
through
more
than
submissions, he enjoyed final say
over the musical line-up.
The revelry, known as the oldest
folk festival in the Pacific Northwest,
kicks off today at 1 p.m. with Kellee
Bradley delivering traditional Celtic
numbers. By the time The Flood
plain Gang closes the show Sunday
night at 8:30, more than 60 acts will
have entertained the crowds.
“I tried to make a program in which
the acts complemented each other,
with a nice blend of music,” Kullen
says. “There’s been some comment
that it’s short on more traditional mu
sic, like cultural music or African
drumming, but part of that is that there
are many definitions of folk music.”
The headliners for the three-day
show, which will be spread out over
five campus venues, are Seattle mu
sician Joules Graves, well known to
Eugene audiences; Boston’s Dan
Bern, who is compared to Bob Dylan
but with a more modem slant to his
social commentary; and The Flood
plain Gang from Boulder, Colo.,
called an experimental bluegrass
band with a blend of rock ’n’ roll.
Graves has played this area innu
merable times, and she wows audi
ences with her mix of music, using a
djembe drum, a guitar and her voice,
which teachers once called “too un
usual.” She’ll close the festival
tonight.
Bern is a wildcard selection,
Kullen says, because his style may
step on people’s toes with his harsh
and wide-ranging critiques.
Nonetheless, he’ll bring intensity
and passion to the stage for Saturday
night’s wind up.
“He pushes the edges sometimes,
but there’s value in that,” Kullen
says. “But he pokes fun at everyone
and doesn’t single out any one
group.”
Closing the event Sunday is a band
relatively new to Eugene. The Flood
plain Gang has played here just
twice, Kullen says, but they arrive
with the title of Best New Band at the
Boston musician Dan Bern and Seattle-based Joules Graves (left) will play at the festival.
1998Telluride Bluegrass Festival.
“There’s this current resurgence of
bluegrass, and this band plays a
unique kind ofbluegrass,” Kullen of
fers. “It sounds as if they have lis
tened to psychedelic music and folk
music, but kept the bluegrass mood.”
The last outdoor concert on cam
pus grounds, the Oregon Grind, met
an early end due to harsh weather.
Kullen accepts the reality that rain is
a likelihood for the folk festival, but
he doesn’t expect more hail, which
did in the Grind. If the wet stuff re
mains as rain, Kullen says the show
is on.
On-site food and craft booths will
satisfy anyone’s hunger and spend
ing urges. Dogs aren’t allowed, and
alcohol is also a no-no.
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with opening bands Juno and Lucky Ha
Whan: Wednesday, May 26, doors open at 6:00pm,
showtime 6:45pm, Sunny Day on at 8:15 following
openers
Whara: EMU Ballroom, UO Campus
Tickats: $14 UO Students, $18 General Public, on sale now at
EMU ticket office, House of Records and CD World
University of Oregon
Cultural Forum
Contact Matt Radocltonski, UO Cultural Forum
National Music Coordinator at (541) 346-4376