Sisters Folk Festival rolls into Sisters

For the past 14 years, the Sisters Folk Festival has been ushering in fall with the finest music America has to offer.

Legendary artist from Ian Tyson to Eliza Gilkyson, Guy Clark to Natalie McMaster have thrilled audiences, bringing many music lovers back year after year to experience music in the mountains.

Starting as a one-day show in late September, 1995, the Sisters Folk Festival has grown into a multi-day event on the second weekend of each September. Indeed, it has become a year-round cultural arts organization, offering winter concerts; a spring arts event, My Own Two Hands; and the nationally acclaimed Americana Project in Sisters' schools.

As the festival has expanded, so too has the palette of music grown, to include more of the flavors and colors that go into the stew of American music.

"This year, more than ever, we're expanding the genres of the music," said Executive Director Brad Tisdel.

He noted that jazz fans will be particularly drawn to the Alison Brown Quartet. Brown is a banjo maestro with a particular bent for jazz. She is in high demand; she will fly back to Nashville, Tennessee, in between Sisters Folk Festival sets to perform with the Nashville Symphony Orchestra.

The young and energetic group The Belleville Outfit will bring a touch of swing to the show while the East L.A. band Tremoloco will tap Mexican-American roots.

"That mixing part of America is very well represented in this festival," Tisdel said. He advises patrons to "take in as much as you can and be open to seeing artists you've never seen before."

The mix of musical genres is one attraction of the Sisters Folk Festival. Another is the intimacy of the venues, located at the Village Green, Bronco Billy's Ranch Grill and Saloon, Sisters Art Works, Angeline's Bakery and Café, Sisters Coffee Company and the Depot Café.

Whereas most festivals are located outside a town in a big field or are scattered across an urban setting, performers and audiences alike revel in the fact that the festival's six venues are all within walking distance of each other in the midst of Sisters' small downtown.

Even in the largest of the venues, the 1,100-seat main tent, audiences are close to the artists and able to share a unique moment of music.

The performers love the Sisters audience - attentive music lovers who really tune in to the performers.

Susan Werner, coming back as this year's festival encore artist, commented last year that the Sisters audience is the best listening crowd in the nation.

The annual Dave Carter Memorial Songwriting Contest has been moved this year to the Sisters Art Works stage

Festival founder Dick Sandvik said he is "amazed and pleased" at what the event has become.

"I look at the depth and quality of the talent we're bringing to Sisters and I'm just really pleased that things played out as they did."

Tickets are still available at http://www.sistersfolkfestival.org or by calling 549-4979. Complete information on artists, schedule and venues is available on the Web site.