Sisters Folk Festival 2024

Lizzie No

Sisters Folk Festival 2024 – What a Hoot!

I’ve been hearing about the Sisters Folk Festival for years. Back when I attended Burning Man religiously – I’d usually come back to Portland and then consider – heading back out for the folk fest and then forget where I left my mind for a couple of months 🙂  So, this was my first year, and what a fun surprise. What a delight! Shades of the Vancouver Folk Festival (which is generally my gold standard for this type of music event) + Central Oregon + high desert = cowboy boots and saloons. Women in dresses – grass growing where it doesn’t belong.

Pics

We started our adventure (Eecole and me) with a sweet visit to my friend Kieran (great picker and good friend) outside of Bend – you can see from the pictures that we got out into a couple of nearby parks and saw some sweet scenery.  We arrived at our weekend home (a parking lot in front of a high school) on Friday, parked Eecole’s camper and then headed into town. Our first venue was The Open Door – an intimate setting – we stayed for 3 acts: Lizzie No, The Pairs (shades of The Wailin Jennies), and San Miguel Fraser – all wonderful and we lucked into front-row seats for the evening! It was a cold night of off-and-on sleep for me – outside in a tent.

Saturday morning Kieran, Erin, Eecole, and I had breakfast and played tunes until it was time to go into the fest. Saturday featured some more intimate workshop-style offerings, so we got to hear more about the background of the performers. I think for me Saturday night was a big highlight – I stood in line to get good seats for a showcase type of performance. That was well worth it as I just loved what we saw Saturday night at the Dave Carter Songwriter Showcase. Everything that followed was equally stunning, too – Especially Kittel & Co. and Vasen.  Vasen, a group from Sweden featured a guy playing an instrument that he built – something ancient. I spent the whole performance watching him play and just wondering what I was seeing. This:

The instrument is bowed. The two men playing also just sent us all into a dreamland and when they were done it was time to bike back to the parking lot (about 2 miles away) in the chilly and windy night. We were battered by a cool wind all night and I didn’t sleep that great.  But hey, you’re at a folk festival, right, so you roll with it.  But boy do I need a new sleeping bag and possibly it’s time to buy/rent a van for these events!

Sunday, breakfast (a hot shower in the High school!), and a few tunes before we packed everything up and drove into town for a couple more performances. I felt lucky to score a great seat at the Open Door where I’d begun the weekend. I watched The Lowest Pair and Peter Mulvey. Peter is someone from whom I want to hear a lot more! What a character.

So, that’s a little bit of my trajectory, but I have to say that the volunteers and organizers really thought this event through in a lovely way. I always felt welcomed. Also – the sound was delicious. I tend to gravitate towards the smaller stages, knowing I’ll get to hear a more intimate experience – and that the sound was so dialed in – I can’t remember a time where I’ve heard such a well-dialed-in mixing. If you’ve ever read my revues of other festivals – I usually complain that the sound is too loud – I’m looking at you Pickathon, Beloved, Strummit – pretty much everything I attend these days – the volume is too loud. This was not that – and I am so so grateful. I might even return just for that aspect. The fact that they also curated a collection of musicians from all over the place that were new and delightful – icing on the cake!

Also, the lighting was lovely. At every stage! The daytime weather was delicious. And though we drove through a fire on our way to the festival, the air was clear all weekend. OK, time for a couple of improvements:

The festival could do more outreach before the festival happens (via an email newsletter) to encourage attendees to:

  1. Be super careful not to have car alarms ready to kick off – this happened a number of times throughout the weekend and was a noticeable disturbance. This could be improved through education.
  2. Learn how roundabouts work – they are yield situations – not necessarily time for stopping

Lastly, I suggest the festival ask the local municipal airport to see if planes can take off and land – not over the town (this didn’t happen often, so I imagine they have a choice). I mean I think they should do this always, but esp. when you have thousands of people outside listening to intimate music. Something tells me the right letter could make this happen. This festival obviously has some presence in town and I bet for one weekend small planes could avoid flying over the town.

Otherwise, wow, kudos to the festival organizers. It was very well done. I had a great time and I learned about a bunch of new musicians I hadn’t heard of before.  Next year I might even come to the songwriter camp that leads up to the festival.

Thank you! Albert Kaufman, 9.30.24

 

If you like photos, here are some of our time there. And here’s the Spotify playlist of all the artists.

MC Mike Meyer welcoming us at the Open Door

If you’d like to try out my writing further, pick a newsletter and hop aboard!

It Sure Beats Working and other fancy stuff – Albertideation March 2018

It Sure Beats Working, by Michael Katz

I finally got around to it

– I bought Michael Katz’s book – It Sure Beats Working

I just got back from a family trip to Philadelphia. Soon after I got off the plane I was faced with soft pretzels. They are everywhere in Philadelphia – and I did not hesitate! The trip was a great time (my Sister’s daughter’s bat mitzvah!) and I came away refreshed and ready to make it through the rest of Winter in Portland. Why am I telling you this? It’s part of what Michael Katz talks about in the book mentioned above – sprinkling in details about your life when you reach out to customers and clients (see Lesson 4: Humanize Your Interactions ). Making your interactions more human is a key factor in his success and you experience it in every newsletter he sends.

I’ve been enjoying this Spring – I’ve picked up a couple new clients and continue to work with many I’ve been with for years.

New: Lucky Mojo Curio Co. in Forestville, CA
2 years: Fern Kitchen , Portland, Oregon
5 years-ish – Alberta Rose Theatre, Portland, Oregon

I’m so grateful to these and other companies who trust me with their newsletters. It’s also been interesting to me to see how businesses change over time – including mine!

I want to mention that the main tool I use – and how you’re reading this newsletter – via Constant Contact – is having a 50% off of 2 months sale – which will end at midnight 3.16.18. You can always start with a 2-month free trial, too. I have all sorts of support for you if you’d like to get started down this path.

Sometimes it makes sense to start something before you think you’re ready. For instance, I wish I’d bought Michael’s book 8 years ago when I started my business – in 8 years you might wish you’d started a newsletter today 🙂 This is one of those instances where you don’t want to put off until tomorrow something you can start today 🙂

Here’s to your success!

Sincerely,

Albert Kaufman
Albertideation

PS – See other books I recommend, here. And other tools I use, here.

Soft Pretzels

Irvington Tree Planting – March 12, 2011

Tree planting 3.12.11 Irvington, Portland, Oregon, USA!

We had a great day planting trees with Friends of Trees on Saturday, March 13th. Starting with our breakfast at the Holladay Park Church early in the morning through a delicious lunch held after the planting – supplied by residents of the Irvington, Grant, Sabin and Alameda neighborhoods.

I want to thank the following people and businesses for their support in our efforts.

Friends of Trees – especially Jesse Batty and Erica Timm who led the day of planting

The neighborhood coordinators for each neighborhood

Neil Davidson – Alameda
Lisa Johnston-Smith – Sabin
Angela Gusa – Grant Park
Albert Kaufman – Irvington

Holladay Park Church – our wonderful host!
Helen Bernhard Bakery – baked goods
Caffee D’arte – Coffee
Starbucks on 15th & B’way – Coffee and more Coffee
Grand Central Bakery – pastries, yum
Costello’s Travel Caffee – pastries, more yum!
Penske Trucks – truck donation
Eric McClelland – Treeform Woodwork – drove to Boring and back to pick up our trees
City of Portland – Bureau of Environmental Services – a huge hand in many ways
Backyard Bird Shop – our main sponsors!

I could write a novella about the task of being a neighborhood coordinator for this event. It’s full of contacting neighbors, reaching out to businesses and interacting with the great staff at Friends of Trees. And, I enjoyed the fun of planting trees even more. Working with great crew leader, Karen, and crew assistant, David, we walked in a 5 block circle and planted 11 trees in 3 hours. This involved pulling the trees out of the truck, unwrapping each, making sure holes were the right size, involving homeowners and their kids, filling the holes in with dirt, and watering and staking them.

It was a rainy day, but our spirits were high. And when we returned to the basecamp, there were all of the other volunteers and crew leaders sitting down to a well-deserved bountiful lunch of soups, chilis, stews, bread, salads and deserts. It was a great time to swap stories, share smiles, and make some new friends beyond the crew that you’d been assigned to.

All in all, I’d say the day was a complete success. We planted 182 trees together and another 30 were planted the following Monday, bringing us to a grand addition of 212 trees for our 4 neighborhoods. These trees will add to the canopy of our neighborhoods – help reduce the amount of water going into the stormwater drains, shade us in the summer, provide us fruit and nuts, look beautiful, increase property values, and increase the safety of our neighborhoods.

If you didn’t get a chance to join us, please consider volunteering with Friends of Trees and see what fun it can be to plant trees in Portland. Also, Friends of Trees is a membership organization and I encourage you to become a member today. They do great work that makes our City more livable and our lives healthier and happier.

friends of trees

One happy tree planter!