Get your own Free Home Page
Before 1998 the only music festival I'd attended was the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, Kansas. Then that summer an old friend from high school with connections to the northeastern folk music community wanted to go to the Philadelphia Folk Festival. I'd always wondered what other festivals were like, so on August 27th we drove to New Orleans and flew to Philadelphia. My first impression kind of summed up the whole experience: "Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore..."
Needless to say, things are a bit different at festivals near urban centers, especially in the campground. The camping experience really couldn't compare to Winfield. There wasn't a lot of incentive to wander around after the stage shows, and except in the designated "quiet zone" there was way too much "artificial" music (boom-boxes, radios, etc.) for my taste. On the plus side, there was a 24-hour cafe and a well-stocked "country store" within the campgrounds.
The festival events, crafts, and food concessions are all contained within an arena. To enter the arena, you had to have a ticket for the next event on the main stage.
One really nice touch was the special area for children's events. On one of the two paths between the campground and the main arena there's Dulcimer Grove, and there's something for kids going on there during all daylight hours. This also happened to be the only place where there was any shade...
The music was outstanding. Before the "concerts" on the main stage, there were "workshops" on four smaller stages. These were more enjoyable to me, but they were not isolated enough from the main stage to be used when the concerts started, and the sound systems were broken down and re-set up each day. As a result, there were more than a few "glitches" at the workshops I attended. The sound system for the main stage was new this year, and was very high quality.
I really enjoyed the festival, but would definitely plan better for a future visit. It was my impression that all of the logistics were arranged to make things easier for the promoters than for the convenience of the ticket-buyers (long lines for everything, camping entry point about as far as possible from camping parking, etc.).
To be fair, that was kind of made necessary because of the venue's physical constraints and the ticket-per-event format, but having fun and supporting the non-profit organization that puts on this show seemed like more work than I've gotten used to at Winfield.
| Copyright 1998 by Paul Kislanko. All rights reserved. |
| Trip Reports | Paul Kislanko's home page |