SVFF 2014 - And Then It Was Over

All the planning and preparing was done for Friday and the gates to the 2014 Shelter Valley Folk Festival opened at noon for campers to get set up and then the festival gates opened at 5pm to let everyone in.

It's now Tuesday, a full day has gone by since SVFF ended and I'm still bopping along to the music ringing in my head. It seems to echo off all the images in my mind. What a fabulous weekend! I'll go back to Thursday since I didn't get many blog updates during the week.

I had spent the week putting in long days, eating delicious meals, and jumping into the lake at Wiklow Beach when I was able to. That was as close as I got to being refreshed and clean so I was happy to head home Thursday afternoon so I'd be able to have a shower and sleep at home for the night. Our plan was to get up early the next morning and head back to SVFF for 10am. That all worked out fine and it felt great to be able to shave my head and get clean. We got there just past 10 and were 8th in line for camping (they hand out a number when you arrive and then you line up to check-in according to your arrival... very civilized). Our friends Doug and Linda were #2 in line so we knew we'd get our usual camping area and there were enough of us in the early check-ins that we were able to set aside out usual space and keep room for the late arrivals.

Andrea and I at our front-row camping spot

Babe was looking in on the Pine Stage all weekend

 I spent a little time doing some final volunteer work while we waited to get into the camping area but once we were in the only work I did was to set up the Westfalia Way signs that Greg made. This is the 3rd year running for the temporary road to get named Westfalia Way and each year has been a limited edition sign with the year on the sign.

A Westfalia Way sign waiting for the signpost to arrive

Then it was time for the music! Friday night was only at the main stage (the 3 side stages were used during the day on Saturday & Sunday) and right from the start it was awesome. The opener was Union Duke, a Toronto band. Two highlights were Joel Plaskett (who played solo) and Danny Michel with his band to close the night. And then there was great music at the campfire after the main stage was done! More Union Duke along with campers playing their songs.

It all seems like a blur of activity... so much to do and listen to that it would be impossible to describe it all. Instead I'll pick a few of the highlights.

The music: I think this may have been the best line-up in the 4 years I've been coming. Lots of great surprises even from seasoned pros like Plaskett. The Quebecois band The Season surprised a lot people with their music and how incredibly young they are! James Hill (ukulele) and Anne on cello have a great sound and stage presence. The list goes on!

Our good friend Greg (maker of the signs) has also volunteered at SVFF and this year he was accepted to have a booth at the Artists Village for his Slow Lane Music instruments. He had quite an assortment of hubcap, license plate and cigar box guitars on hand plus some beat boxes. And he put on a workshop to show people how to build them. All very cool.

The instrument Greg is playing got a shout-out on the main stage

The Slow Lane Music Workshop

When I first published this I was remiss in skipping over one of the most important things from SVFF which is the opportunity to catch up with a very special family. Many of the folks who make this festival happen are people I only get to see once a year so the time together is both special and fun. So to all... a big THANKS and see you next year!

Other highlights were at some of the songwriter workshops that put a few musicians together with a theme. I think the one with Plaskett & Michel and NQ Arbuckle was the best. Three incredible talents, three huge egos, lots of great music and fun. And as an indication of how "real" this festival is, here's a shot Andrea took of Danny Michel being his own roadie...

Danny Michel being his own roadie

The music went on, the pleasures kept on coming, and then all of a sudden it was over. A few of other performs that I was impressed with include:
Ennis, De Temp Antan, along with Sherman Downey & The Ambiguous Case. Oh... and then there's Ashley McIsaac of course!

I spent yesterday processing images and shared a gallery with the SVFF Living Archives (you can look through them on my new website... it's not done yet but I have stopped using the old one so all new photos are destined for Kraiker.Photography).

Stay tuned for another time-lapse video! That's the one thing I still need to wrap up.

Jorge Miguel & his drummer

Gregory Hoskins with Ray Bonneville

Tune Your Ride is touring on bikes with all their gear

Henna

Danny Michel was a blast... go listen to his music!

Good Food, Great Company, A Little Hard Work

This is the perfect recipe for a folk festival in my mind and Shelter Valley does it like no other that I know of.

Showing up to work is like a family reunion with lots of great banter and playful conversation with friends from previous years as well as lots of stimulating conversations with new folks. And at some point everyone asks each other "so, how many years for you?".

Andrea and I have come to this festival for the past four years (this is the eleventh edition) and I've volunteered three times including this week. I feel like I know a little about what needs doing by now so I've gotten a few crews lined up to work and I think it's gone well. I know I make them work more than they want to but I know what all still needs to be done and I want to make sure we get to the end by Friday.

So my mornings are early (generally up with the sun) and after some tasty breakfast that starts with fresh farm eggs and becomes an omelette, I get the folks organized and away we go.

Sunrise over the remains of last night's campfire

At the other end of the day another fine meal awaits (and yes, there is a wonderful lunch in between). I think at this point there are around 50 volunteers to feed. The total will be closer to 300 during the event so it's no small task. And SVFF pulls it off beautifully. Here's tonights treat...

I'm In The Mood For Music

This extended week, from last weekend until the end of next weekend, is a break from photography and a shift to music. So far so good too!

The weekend behind was highlighted by the Greenbelt Harvest Festival which is the brainchild of Daniel Lanois. While only four years old it has a reputation for having some big names as well as local Hamilton area talent. And this year was no exception. I really enjoyed seeing and hearing Bruce Cockburn and Ron Sexsmith is another artist I really enjoy. The final act was Ray LaMontagne, a band I don't know much about but they were a treat. I'll have to look into their music a little more as they were really on top of it and performed brilliantly on stage.

We got to the Harvest Festival early... front row parking

<insert your caption here :) >

This week I'm at the Henkel family lavender farm, the site of the Shelter Valley Folk Festival. I've gotten one day of hard labour in (and my body feels it!) and three more days ahead of me as I volunteer to help get everything set up ahead of the festival which starts on Friday and runs until Sunday noon.

Headed out to SVFF. With a bike of course

It was a hot day with lots of sun and sweat so after we were done I headed down to the lake for a quick dip to wash of the day's grime. And then I drove up to the volunteer camping area on top of the hill.

Parked at the beach for a quick dip

This last shot is my view down over the festival site with the lake in the distance. And with that, I'll wrap up the blog entry as the campfire is about to get lit now that the sun is gone.

At home on the hill with SVFF as a view

From a Rock Star to a Legend and then a Folk Festival

My last entry was all about Lance.

Since then another Armstrong has been in the news as he passed away, the one who was the first man on the moon. Don't confuse the two, or mix them up with Neil Young as some of the media did as the news broke. I see people tripping over themselves in the rush to get news out and having made the same sort of mistakes (on much smaller stories!) I do have compassion for them even as others point a finger.

So on that note I'll move on to Grafton and the Shelter Valley Folk Festival. This past weekend saw the 9th edition and from all accounts it was the smoothest to date. The weather co-operated and the talent they had lined up was awesome.

I volunteered at this event last year and enjoyed it. I volunteered again, as part of the advance site crew and enjoyed it even more. I was there setting up the big-top tent for hospitality. And I was there for most of the week leading up to the festival setting up tents, cleaning chairs, distributing tables and getting the main stage ready. And camping at the top of the hill during the week as we all got it together.

Meeting some of the other volunteers was awesome. The electrical crew, security, and other parts of "advance" are filled with dedicated folks! The people who work in hospitality and make sure we all eat well deserve extra credit... the food alone is worth the volunteer time! And the evening campfires are too. It was great to listen to some of the other volunteers (like Jordy) who muscle their way through the day and still have the energy to pluck a guitar and sing a song as the evening unfolds.

And then there's the festival itself... last year I missed a lot of it and so I only had a few photos and a small selection of videos to put on YT. This year I had all my time done and got to enjoy the event to the fullest. For me that included taking lots of photos and some videos, I'm still going through them all but I have a small early gallery to share. I'm off to Quebec City and then Montreal this week so I won't finish this all up until I get back in a week or so.

And for the record, I'm looking forward to this last major work trip... I love QC and look forward to spending some time there. I know I'll go to my favourite crepe spot!

Gregory Hoskins

So... some photos. These are a few of the 1500+ I took and don't include any of the video work, stay tuned for more!

Ariana Gillis

Mighty Popo

Ariana Gillis

James Keelaghan and Oscar Lopez

Kim Churchill

A good workout

It's been a while since I've had a reason to use a sledgehammer, my body is reminding me of that fact today. The occasion was the start of my volunteer time for the Shelter Valley Folk Festival that I mentioned in the previous blog entry. The grass has all been cut so the field looks like a large empty canvas waiting for something to happen.

The Henkel Family Lavender Farm

One of the early steps in the setup is to get the big-top tent setup. This is where the volunteer kitchen and dining area goes and next to it is the dish-washing station (another tent but much simpler to set up).  There are hundreds of volunteers so this is an important part of the overall setup.

At about 80 feet long, it's no small task. The tent is made up of 5 large sections, about 30 side poles (each with a 3 foot anchor stake and tie-down) and three huge poles in the middle. Measuring it all out was a challenge and it took the team a few tries to get it right. This led to stakes being hammered in only to be pulled out and moved and hammered back in. Definitely hard work. Erecting the large center poles is also a challenge as they need to lift the heavy tent and get the poles centered correctly based on the sides and ends. All in all it was about 5 hours from start to finish. I didn't have much time to photograph the process but here's an early photo and the end result.

Twenty more hours of volunteer time to go :-)

An abandoned truck

Volunteer time: SVFF

Last year some VW friends went on about how great the Shelter Valley Folk Festival was and I thought it would be worth checking out. Early bird tickets were gone and camping spots weren't available any more in the main area so I decided to volunteer. Andrea and our friend Liz bought tickets and came up a little later on the first day.

Turned out to be a good choice: it got us into a spot with the rest of the group, got me in free, and I got to meet lots of great people as I did my volunteer time in the parking crew. The one downside to it was that my volunteer time took place while the event was on so I missed seeing some of the performers. Still, I got to enjoy a bunch of amazing performances and took lots of photos plus a few videos last year. Here's one of Vance Gilbert singing "My Bad" (as Billy Holiday).

There are a few more videos on YT that I put up, it was shortly after I got my Rode mic for the DSLR and I was testing it out. The one of Luke Doucet singing Sundown is pretty good (I think). I thought I'd written a blog entry about it but seems I didn't. No gallery on my website, no photos on Picasa either... odd.

Anyhow, that was last year. The 2012 edition of SVFF will be happening the last weekend of August and this year I signed up early to arrange my volunteer time. I bought Andrea an earlybird ticket as a birthday present so she's all set as well.

I expect to have my volunteer time all done as part of the advance crew so I will get to enjoy the full time at the festival. It does mean I'll be driving to the Henkel Family Lavender Farm "in the heart of Northumberland County" Wednesday to do my first bit. I will also be there the week before the event to see what I can do to help. And look for the town of VW-land if you're going to be there :-)

Looking forward to it! I'll definitely be bring all my camera gear to see what gems I come up with this year. And I'll be sure to post something here.