Last week, I flipped the proverbial switch and brought the brand new Peterborough Folk Festival website on line. You can check out our line-up, and some of the extended programming we’re doing, as well as learn a little about the 21 years the festival’s been running.
This is my fourth year as Artistic Director and Executive Director for the festival. I first volunteered for the festival in the late nineties, when I got stuck as a parking attendant for hours without water or any clear sense of what I was supposed to be doing. Since then, I’ve coordinated Healing Arts and the Club Crawl, eventually taking on the positions I’m in now.
The festival is run by a small, dedicated, and hard-working group of volunteers, many of whom have been with the festival for years and work, month after month, year-round to bring together three great days in late August. We’ve made a lot of changes to the festival in the past 4 years, changes I’m very proud of because they’ve made the festival infinitely better, and infinitely easier to run. We’ve tightened up, planned carefully, and created a strong foundation for considered growth. But change always angers people, especially when they see it as negatively impacting themselves.
Last year, when I proposed that we cut the Club Crawl, it was not the first time I’d argued that it was a waste of effort that reflected poorly on the festival as a whole. Originally conceived as a fundraiser for the festival, the Club Crawl rarely worked as such, generally losing money despite our best efforts. In my opinion, it was a clusterfuck; paying artists a pittance to play in venues unsuited for live music, running technicians ragged as they dealt with jury-rigged gear and practically no switch-over time. Venue owners didn’t feel they were getting a good deal, either, and as a result, often dropped out or screwed us in some way at the last minute. The final straw, for me, was when one of our funders praised the festival as a whole but suggested in strong terms that the Club Crawl didn’t live up to the standards they expected as a baseline for paid, professional artists. I agreed, and either argued persuasively to the Board of Directors or just browbeat them (they may want to comment on which) into axing the Club Crawl for 2009.
I have to admit I was completely taken off guard by the anger from several local artists. What I saw as a shitty gig or tokenism they (I guess) saw as inclusion. And I’m sorry they felt that way; it reflects poorly on local audiences and venues that a $50 gig with no real soundcheck is considered okay for a skilled artist who’s been playing for years. I know it’s a lot harder to get into the festival now than it was in the past, because there are fewer slots. But I think it’s important for any publicly-funded arts organization to treat artists with respect, and part of that respect is to create opportunities that operate at a professional standard – decent pay, decent playing conditions. Another facet of that respect is to set the bar high and encourage the community to reach it. Read the rest of this entry »
