Issue 6 10/98

The FolkWorld Editors' column

The online editorial from the Mollis

There we are again with a new issue full of words about great music. As always it took longer than we actually have planned to complete the new issue, but we hope that you find as well that it was well worth the waiting...

Drawings by Annegret Haensel, more infos in the editorial Though the weather in most of Europe was not really the way you would expect it to be in summer, it seemed to have been an all in all successful festival summer. We have had loads of joyful hours at summer festivals, and have heard of several other festivals that they went very well.

We have not found the time for many festivals in Germany - although we discovered a few of those smaller folk festivals, free and open air in town centers; it is unbelievable that we have never heard before of these festivals though we are close 'neighbours': The Micro Festival, a world music festival in Dortmund or that one day festival in Krefeld...
From the bigger and more established ones we have heard good things: Rudolstadt was a huge success again, and Kemnade International, though it suffered by the poor weather and low turn out the first night, is said to have been a success.

From Belgium we have the news that the folk festivals went very well this year, with very good numbers of people attending (read the belgian news column!). Meanwhile, France seems to have had the problem of the WM this year - most sponsoring went into the football event, while there was not much left for the folk music festivals. Several musicians reported from Northern Spain that the festivals over there were just superb this summer, with huge crowds and lots of craic.

Tønder Festival had this summer a new record for selling more tickets on the first day of sales than ever before - all in all more than 20.000 making up more than 70 % of all tickets on sale! That festival is just amazing, showing what interest you actually can create for folk music!

Crossing over to the British Isles, the bad weather has been a problem for several festivals - the sadest affair was the Continental Ceilidh in Scotland, that suffered that much that the organisers had to cancel some concerts. Also, for the Scottish festivals, the sudden loss of one of the most popular organising festival guy, Danny Kyle, dampenened the spirits and made organisation more difficult. Still, reports show that there were lots of successful festivals - Bute, Stonehaven, and and. The Heart of Scotland Festival, taking place the first time this year, had the good luck to have superb summer weather, and though too few people were there, it was great fun for all participants - the success calling the festival to become a regular festival.

photo by The Mollis In this issue, you can find already festival reviews of Tønder, Lorient and Warwick; in the next issue will be a report from Aberfeldy. If you had a festival you enjoyed very much, you might take the time to write a little review for FolkWorld, to share your experiences with interested persons around the world, and spread the message to join the festival next year...

Now the autumn is coming on the Northern side of the world, for Germans that means the best concert season in the year...

It is just strange thinking that quite a few of our readers are now looking forward to their summer, while we can look back to our summer. To all those from down under and the rest of the Southern end of the world - have a great summer, send in your reports from the festivals. To the readers in the Northern part of the world - Enjoy the autumn, catch many folk music concerts, and we'll see us some time later this year in the net!

Michael & Christian.

Drawing by German artist Annegret Haensel; for more info on the artist, look at the editorial page
Photo Credit: The Mollis


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© The Mollis - Editors of FolkWorld; Published 10/98

All material published in FolkWorld is © The Author via FolkWorld. Storage for private use is allowed and welcome. Reviews and extracts of up to 200 words may be freely quoted and reproduced, if source and author are acknowledged. For any other reproduction please ask the Editors for permission.


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