Acts ranging from Inuit throat singer Tanya Tagaq to hip-hop all-stars Arrested Development showcased the diversity of folk music at the 17th annual Ottawa Folk Festival, which ran from Aug. 13–15 and featured over 45 artists from around the world.

“Festivals are definitely akin to summer camp,” said Rolf Klausener, front-man of local indie darling, The Acorn. “You get to see [artists] you wouldn’t really get to see otherwise. It’s generally really relaxed, everyone’s having fun and you’re outside.”

Aug. 13 featured Toronto’s Bruce Peninsula, who combined church-like chants with prog-rock riffs. Tunes like “Crabapples” off of the album Mountain is a Mouth induced foot-stomping and arm-flailing dance moves from young and old alike.

To read more: Ottawa’s 17th Annual Folk Fest as Diverse as Ever

The Supernova Award is presented by the Galaxie Rising Star Program, which provides bursaries to rising Canadian music talent at festivals and events across Canada. Chosen by a jury appointed by the Ottawa Folk Festival, eligible artists had to meet three simple criteria: 1) be part of the 2010 Ottawa Folk Festival line-up; 2) be Canadian; and 3) have released at least one but no more than three albums. Jurors were required to watch performances by all eligible acts over the course of the festival weekend (August 13-15, 2010) and then meet to deliberate and choose a winner after the conclusion of the festival.

Winners Delhi 2 Dublin were chosen for their “dynamic and incredibly high-energy live performance, their innovative fusion of traditional and modern musical styles and instrumentation, and their ability to connect with and inspire their audience,” says Festival Director Dylan Griffith. Formed in 2006 to take part in a one-off club night, Delhi 2 Dublin combine traditional Indian instruments such as tabla, dhol and sitar with fiddle and programmed electronic beats and lyrics sung in both Punjabi and English to create a unique fusion of Bhangra, Celtic, dub reggae, hip hop and electronica sounds. Blending east and west, electronic and acoustic, mainstream and underground, Delhi 2 Dublin “have a broad cross-cultural and cross-generational appeal” says Griffith, “partly due to the various musical elements they bring together but more so because of their incredibly infectious energy and obvious love for creating and playing music.”

The Supernova Award was one of two Galaxie-sponsored awards presented as part of the 2010 Ottawa Folk Festival. The first award, presented in June, went to Ottawa trio The Musettes, winners of the Under 25 category during the Ottawa Folk Festival auditions. Twenty acts participated in the preliminary round of auditions held in March, with three groups advancing to the final round held in June at the Canadian Library and Archives. The winners received a $1,000 bursary from Galaxie, as well as a performance slot during the 2010 Ottawa Folk Festival.

Since its inception in 2000, over 750 artists have directly benefitted from the Galaxie Rising Stars Program. Each year, the Program works with numerous music industry partners across Canada to discover, encourage and promote new artists. Louis Bellavance, Director of the Galaxie Rising Stars Program says “Galaxie has been able to help up and coming artists for over ten years and it has been an incredible journey to follow the careers of artists we have supported”.

For more information on The Galaxie Rising Star Awards, visit http://www.galaxie.ca. For more information on Delhi to Dublin please visit http://www.delhi2dublin.com.

Photo: Pam McLennan of the Epoch Times

As dusk settled on Saturday August 14, Namgar thrilled the crowd at the Ottawa Folk Festival with its amplified versions of traditional folk songs.

Namgar (“white cloud” in Tibetan) was founded in Buryatia, a republic of Russia, by Namgar Lkhasaranova, from whom the band takes its name.

Possibly among the most obscure bands to appear in festival history, Namgar was well-received in the capital city, as it was nights previous in Vancouver, where it sold the last of its CDs. For this reviewer this came as a blow, which was softened greatly however when Bulat Gafarov, the violinist, gave me his own disk, which features an intriguing blend of hand percussion, strings, and vocals.

Read the full review @ The Epoch Times online: White Cloud weaves Mongolian folk with American rock

By Patrick Langston, The Ottawa Citizen

Jim Cuddy performs for adoring fans Sunday night at the Ottawa Folk Festival

Photograph by: Jana Chytilova, Ottawa Citizen

Fans got a whole lot closer to Jim Cuddy than they had expected when he played the Ottawa Folk Festival Sunday night. The Jim Cuddy Band, originally scheduled to play the main stage, wound up performing in a crowded Galaxie Dance Tent, where the stage is low and performers within arm’s length of the audience, after rain forced festival organizers to shuffle performance venues.

Ever gracious, Cuddy — known for both his longtime work with Blue Rodeo and as a solo performer — opened his show by immediately thanking the technical crew for hastily setting up in the new venue. “There will be mistakes, I’m warning you now,” he said disarmingly. Flubs were the least of his adoring audience’s worries.

Read more: Up close with Jim Cuddy

By Lynn Saxberg, The Ottawa Citizen August 16, 2010

Sue Moody of The Old Sods play an impromptu concert for festival-goers sheltering from the rain.

Photograph by: Photo by Julie Oliver, The Ottawa Citizen

The beleaguered Ottawa Folk Festival, which has been struggling to pay down a deficit over the past couple of years, took a significant financial hit yesterday because of the weather.

Heavy rain and thunderstorms forced organizers to cancel some of yesterday’s daytime programming and shut down the main stage. “There’s supposed to be more weather coming in and the field is a swamp,” said festival director Dylan Griffith in a late-afternoon interview. “We’d rather be safe and put things in venues we know we can work with. It’s a better audience experience.”

Most of the evening acts were shifted into either the dance tent or the indoor stage at the Ron Kolbus community centre onsite at Britannia Park.

Read more: Dancing between the raindrops

Ramblin’ Jack lived up to his name, entertaining the crowd with his stories almost as much as his songs Sunday afternoon at the Ottawa Folk Festival at Britannia Park.

Photograph by: Julie Oliver, The Ottawa Citizen

OTTAWA — Folk music legend and veteran storyteller Ramblin’ Jack Elliott proved true to the foot-loose part of his name at the Ottawa Folk Festival Sunday night.

Elliott was scheduled to play the main stage right before the Jim Cuddy Band until the rain forced the closing of the main stage and a lineup shuffle. Cuddy wound up taking the stage after press time, while Elliott was shifted to an earlier slot in the dance tent.

No matter. At 79, Elliott is clearly unfazed by life’s vagaries.

Accompanying himself on acoustic guitar and playing to an attentive audience, he led off with San Francisco Bay Blues. Elliott then got into full rambling mode by playing a few notes from Reuben James, commenting on it briefly, then somehow segueing into Diamond Joe after explaining how he learned the song from a cowboy in Belgium and later taught it to Ian Tyson.

Read more: Lineup shift fails to rattle Ramblin’ Jack

By Lynn Saxberg, The Ottawa Citizen

Jim Bryson (M), of Jim Bryson & The Weakerthans Band, performs during the annual Ottawa Folk Festival, held at Britannia Park, on August 14, 2010, in Ottawa, Ont.

Photograph by: Jana Chytilova, The Ottawa Citizen

Ottawa Folk Festival

When and where: Continues today at Britannia Park, starting at 10:30 a.m.

Information: 613-230-8234, www.ottawafolk.org.

Passes and day tickets: www.ottawafolk.org; 1-866-9-GET-TIX; or in person at the Ottawa Folklore Centre, Ten Thousand Villages in Westboro and all CD Warehouse locations.

OTTAWA — Acts from afar may have been the most buzzed-about at the Ottawa Folk Festival on Saturday, but it was the ones from home who anchored the proceedings, proving how much musical talent there is in Ottawa.

Arizona’s Calexico was the Saturday-night headliner, rising to the occasion with a terrific set of Latin-flavoured roots-rock. Other highlights of yesterday’s jam-packed program included the Celtic tunes of LAU, a Scottish folk group, the showmanship of Namgar, from Mongolia, and the extraordinary sounds that came from the voice of Tanya Tagaq, an Inuit throat singer.

Read more: Home-grown talent shines at FolkFest

More and more festivals are adopting green initiatives, but for the Ottawa Folk Festival, it’s always been second nature, the festival’s director told Metro recently.

“Environmental awareness has always been a part of that community,” said Dylan Griffith. “These festivals are about sharing and community and love of music, and there is always a sense of awareness in the community. Nobody wants a negative impact.”

This year, the Ottawa Folk Festival continues its bottled water-free initiative, said Griffith.

There will be no plastic water bottles sold or distributed on site, and instead, the festival returns its hydration stations so festivalgoers can refill their water bottles with the city’s clean drinking water.

Read more: It’s always easy being green

Learn to play the ukelele at a free workshop.

Folkfest – The 17th annual Ottawa Folk Festival runs at Britannia Park from Friday through Sunday.

Artists – Headliners include Arrested Development, Calexico, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott and the Jim Cuddy Band.

Go green – This is a green festival. Bring your own water bottle and refill at the hydration station, and cycle and leave your bike at the lockup or hop on the festival’s shuttle.

Online – Register for the free lessons at ofcmusic.ca.

Ottawa residents are lucky to be able to choose among lots of music festival offerings.

Earlier this year, there was the jazz festival, Ottawa Bluesfest, Music and Beyond, and Chamberfest.

If all that listening has inspired you to get in on some of the music-making action, you’re in luck.

The Ottawa Folklore Centre is running a series of free music lessons at Ottawa Folkfest, which runs Friday through Sunday.

Read more: Fest offers music for beginners

By Patrick Langston, The Ottawa Citizen

Arrested Development’s frontman Speech says his band’s socially aware, alternative hip hop marries well with traditional folk music.

Photograph by: Gaye Gerard, Getty Images, The Ottawa Citizen

Does a hip hop band from Atlanta belong in the headline slot when the Ottawa Folk Festival opens Friday in Britannia Park? The answer, for many, is a resounding “Yes!”

In fact, by hiring double Grammy-winning Arrested Development, the 17th annual festival is doing precisely what some western folk festivals have been doing over the past couple of summers. And whether folk purists — are there still such people? — like it or not, casting the genre net ever wider seems not only an inescapable survival strategy for festivals, but also healthy for folk music.

Read more: A hipper festival