A diverse and talented line-up of world class musicians, perfect weather, and great volunteers made the 29^th annual Edmonton Folk Festival the perfect way to spend a scorching summer weekend in the heart of the city.

By: Xanthe Couture (Edmonton Correspondent - Canada)

August 7^th-10^th 2008

A diverse and talented line-up of world class musicians, perfect weather, and great volunteers made the 29^th annual Edmonton Folk Festival the perfect way to spend a scorching summer weekend in the heart of the city.

Set against the backdrop of the city skyline and the river valley, the opening night of the Festival saw performances from the Quebecois group Yves Lambert et Le Bebert Orchestra. Their upbeat set was followed by Cat Power's Chan Marshall who seduced the crowd with her breathy ethereal voice as the sun beat down on the main stage audience.

By the time Amadou and Miriam were on stage at a little over 8 p.m., everyone was settled in and ready to dance along to their buoyant African sound complemented by trumpets, violins and rock guitars. Aimee Mann finished the first night of the Festival with such classic tracks as 'Save Me' and 'Wise Up', both featured in the film Magnolia,  as well as new tracks from her acclaimed album @#%&! Smilers; such as 'Little Tornado' and '31 Today'.

Friday was the first full day of the Festival with workshops starting at 11 a.m. Festival goers looked forward to the headlining act on the main stage, Hawksley Workman, whose regular performances at Edmonton Folk Festival over the past few years have made him a crowd favourite. The hot weather continued on Saturday with plenty of workshops and afternoon concerts to see. Bellowhead hit the main stage at 2 p.m.  and entertained with their frenzied energetic performance infused in a range of instruments from a four-piece horn section, fiddles, oboe, and cello to name a few.

Ron Sexsmith's mellow set followed on the Main stage at 6 p.m. and included favourites such as 'Brandy Alexander' co-wrote with Feist and 'Gold in Them Hills' a tune on which he collaborated with Chris Martin.

Ryan Shaw, who was the replacement for Jakob Dylan, put on an impressive show full of soul and energy which had the audience twisting and shaking to ‘Doing the 45' by the end. Joan Osborne and Michael Franti and the Spearheads were the last two concerts of the night, where the intermission happened to be an impressive show of lightening and a short bout of rain. Michael Franti and the Spearheads made their debut with perfect timing and the night sky cleared with the crowd ready to take in Michael Franti's uplifting mix of jazz, reggae and hip hop tracks.

Fears of cloudy rainy weather were unfounded as great weather kept Festival goers happily traversing the grounds to catch workshops and concerts on Sunday. Martha Wainwright's show at 4 p.m. on Stage Six and the Broken Social Scene 11 a.m. workshop also on Stage 6 with Serena Ryder, The Sadies and Royal Wood were crowd favourites. The Broken Social Scene show at 6 p.m. on the Main stage continued in the same fashion. They started off the final night of Main stage performances at the Festival with their rollicking assembly of musicians, who for this occasion included a trumpet and flutist who had been scooped up that day. The sides of the stage were filled with high energy festival goers dancing away, and even some hula hoops.

The Peatbog Faeries and The Duhks followed with Celtic based tunes, although The Duhks were a bit of a mellow lead-up to Chris Isaak's Elvis style rock n' roll. Isaak capped of the sold-out Festival weekend in grand style in a pink sparkly suit, but adding that, "When you start off in show business you don't get a pink sparkly suit." 

Singing out to the sea of people illuminated with candles that stretched up the hill in front of the Main stage he played signature Isaak tunes including  ‘Wicked Games', ‘Baby Did a Bad Bad Thing' and ‘Somebody's Crying'.

At one point, between songs and the cheering of the crowd Isaak observed, "This is about the coolest place I've ever played.  From where I'm standing it looks like I'm looking into heaven." I think I would have to agree.