Richmond Folk Festival to foster culture, musical diversity

Mark Robinson
Assistant Spectrum Editor

The Richmond Folk Festival will return to the riverfront this weekend to showcase the musical and cultural diversity that have endeared it to hundreds of thousands of patrons over the past four years.

Although the festival has become an annual tradition in the past few years, its future wasn’t always certain.

When the National Folk Festival departed Richmond in 2007 after a three-year stint, Lisa Sims, director of the Richmond Folk Festival, was unsure if the local replacement could build on the national festival’s success.

In 2010, an estimated 190,000 people attended the three-day event. Sims attributes the festival’s popularity to its location on the riverfront, quality of programming and its price point: free.

“Rather than becoming old hat to people, the festival is becoming more and more relevant every year,” Sims said. “We’ve been pleasantly surprised with that.”

With more than 30 groups performing on seven stages over a three-day span, this year’s lineup will continue to foster the tradition of musical diversity that has brought the festival success in previous years.

Folk and traditional arts, as defined by the National Endowment for the Arts, are “rooted in and reflective of the cultural life of a community” – more simply, folk is the music of the people.

Although previous years’ lineups have featured more go-go artists, Sims said the 2011 lineup incorporates more doo-wop and funk influences. This year’s festival will feature performances by Larry Chance and the Earls, Magic Slim and the Teardrops with Big Time Sarah and Funkadelic.

“These are really the artists at the top of their genre,” Sims said. “These are the artists that have learned their art from the masters of it that passed it down to them; they’re really experts in their art form.”

Because Richmond Folk Festival is almost entirely funded through donations and sponsorships, volunteers are crucial to the festival.

Sims estimates more student groups have volunteered to work at the festival this year than ever before.

In total, more than 1,200 volunteers will lend their weekend to the Richmond Folk Festival, including VCU student organizations like Alpha Phi Omega, the Vietnamese Student Association and VCU’s chapter of Circle K International.

Avanti Kollaram, President of CKI at VCU, said the community service group decided to volunteer in support of The Children’s Museum of Richmond, which will contribute to the festival’s family area.

“When we found out about the Folk Festival, we tried to make a huge push for our members go,” said Kollaram, a senior math major at VCU. “Aside from the fact that it’s a lot of fun, we tried to tell them to go because there is a huge need for volunteers.”

2011 marks the first year VCU has sponsored the Richmond Folk Festival.

“For a university, it is something they can participate in and express their commitment to community,”  Lisa Sims said of VCU’s sponsorship. “It’s very illustrative of how plugged into the community the university is.”

The Richmond Folk Festival will take place from Friday, Oct. 14 to Sunday, Oct. 16. Performances will be held rain or shine. For more information on the festival schedule, visit http://www.richmondfolkfestival.org.