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Behind the Building of the House
Andrew Stewart standing next to one of beams of the ty unnos.
As an employee of the Coed Cymru Company in Wales, Andy Stewart has eagerly presented the
ty unnos house that was constructed over the course of a two-day period on the Mall. Contrary to what many of the passers-by may think, "this building process is not a tradition" throughout Wales, says Andy. Instead, Coed Cymru has taken a traditional concept—the
ty unnos, a small house that can be built in a night—and wedded it to a contemporary mission. The ultimate purpose of this house is to present an "alternative use for the abundant amount of timber that exists" in the region. Although there was previously little use for the "soft, brittle" wood that is common in Wales, by creating "box frames about five meters in length," Coed Cymru has created stable beams that can hold "approximately five tons, according to Andy. By building these small houses quickly and from plentiful, renewable materials, Coed has been able to provide low-cost housing, celebrate the
ty unnos tradition, and fulfill Wales’s commitment to sustainability.
Posted July 5, 2009
Storyteller Joni L. Jones
Joni L. Jones (Olorisa Omi Osun Olomo) of Austin, Texas, performs a narrative in honor of a storyteller who had recently fallen ill.
Posted July 3, 2009
Estrellas del Vallenato
Representing several generations and a range of song styles, the musicians in this all-star group hail from small towns and ranches on Colombia's Caribbean coast, a region known as La Guajira. ¡Ayombe! The Heart of Colombia's Música Vallenata, the 2008 Independent Music Award winning Smithsonian Folkways recording, also became a full-length feature film, entitled Accordion Kings, that will air on the Smithsonian Channel in the fall of 2009. See the full schedule for performance times.
Posted July 3, 2009
Mariachi Chula Vista
Members of Mariachi Chula Vista
Mariachi Chula Vista is a little different than the rest of the groups in the
Las Américas program in that most of the members are probably too young to vote and some of them still are not allowed to drive. This mariachi group is comprised of students from Chula Vista High School in California. Here the Smithsonian catches up with program director Mark Fogelquist who started the innovative program in 2001. He talks about the group, where his love for mariachi music came from, and his thoughts on the 2009 Folklife Festival.
Mark Fogelquist: I'm Mark Fogelquist, and the group is Mariachi Chula Vista, and we are from Chula Vista California which is right next to San Diego.
Smithsonian: You guys are probably the youngest group we have here at the Festival. Tell me a little bit about your program.
M: Well, the group is actually part of a high school mariachi program. Our school district in southern San Diego County has mariachi classes that meet every day in about thirteen schools—just like a math class . None of the kids in this group have had any musical training outside of the mariachi class, which is where they learned how to play their instruments: the violin, the guitar, the vihuela.
S: Amazing. At what age did they start to learn?
M: Most of the kids start in middle school. A couple of them have started a little bit earlier.
S: Where did your interest in mariachi music come from?
M: My father taught Spanish at UCLA, and I lived in Spanish speaking countries, growing up Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Spain. I heard mariachi music when I spent a summer in Guadalajara when I was thirteen years old, heard the music and loved it. Then I went to UCLA and got to know Dan Sheehy (curator of the Las Américas program) back in the '60s and early '70s, and started in the mariachi class at UCLA.
S: How do you feel about being here at the Festival?
M: Oh it's fantastic. It's a great honor for a student group to be here, and it's marvelous to see all this other music and all these different styles of music. As a teacher, of course I want my students to see and experience as much as they can.
S: Anything else you would like to add?
M: This is a marvelous Festival, and I hope everyone will enjoy it. The price is right!
Posted July 3, 2009
The joropo llanero tradition
With Grupo Cimarrón, Carlos Rojas Hernández brings together an all-star team of instrumentalists and singers from Colombia. These masters of the joropo llanero tradition, which is practiced along the plains shared by Colombia and Venezuela, astonish their audiences with their melodic and rhythmic virtuosity, percussive drive, and sabor colombiano, or Colombian flavor.
Posted July 2, 2009
Storyteller Victoria Burnett
Victoria Burnett (San Juan Capistrano, California) is a storyteller who mixes stories and music. A graduate of the University of Maryland, Burnett refers to herself as a "story musicologist." A trained vocalist, she has performed at the Kennedy Center and other venues around the world. Here she performs in the Giving Voice program.
Posted July 2, 2009
Cantadoras del Pacífico
The marimba is a vivid legacy of African presence in Latin America. But only on the Pacific coast of southern Colombia and northern Ecuador does it keep its close connections to a strongly African culture. Hailing from small towns along the Colombian coast, the seasoned women singers of Cantadoras del Pacífico raise their voices to the accompaniment of marimba and drums, performing their distinctive styles of music known collectively as currulao. See the full schedule for information on performance times.
Posted July 1, 2009
Music from Wales
Linda Griffiths (Aberystwyth, Wales) and her daughter, Lisa Healy, are accompanied by Ceri Rhys Matthews (Pencader, Wales).Griffiths has participated in Wales's folk scene for more than thirty years. She has released twelve albums of traditional and contemporary folk music, both as a member of the Welsh folk group Plethyn and as a solo artist. She is accompanied by her eldest daughter, Lisa, who is currently studying musical theater at the Arden School of Theatre in Manchester. Matthews is a nationally and internationally acclaimed piper and flute player. As a soloist and a member of the band Fernhill, he has numerous recordings; he also produced the Smithsonian Folkways CD, Blodeugerdd—Song of the Flowers. Matthews has traveled around the world to share Welsh folk music, and has researched and taught traditional music and culture in Wales.
Posted July 1, 2009
Taste of Wales
Angela Gray's Welsh food demonstration.
During the first week of the Festival, Angela Gray demonstrated a traditional method of making fruit crumble and preserves at the Taste of Wales stage of the Wales Smithsonian Cymru program. A native of Porthcawl and Caerphilly, Wales, where her family ran a dairy, Gray’s early experience growing up close to the source of a variety of fresh, high-quality ingredients inspired her love of food. As the aroma of fresh clove, cinnamon, and ginger filled the tent, she told the audience of her memories of anticipating the seasons for berries much as she had anticipated Christmas each year. Gray will be demonstrating at the Taste of Wales stage each day of the Festival.
Recipe for Fruit Crumble
Filling
1 lb. fresh fruit (blackberries, sliced apples, peaches, nectarines)
1 heaping tbs. soft brown sugar
½ tsp. ground cinnamon
½ tsp. ground ginger
Mix gently together and place in a heated proof dish.
Topping
8 oz. whole meal/wheat flour
5 oz. butter
5 oz. soft brown sugar
3 oz. breakfast oats
1 tsp. of ginger
1 tsp. cinnamon
6 tsp. thick honey
Rub butter into flour, stir in sugar, then oats, spices.
Place on top of fruit and drop honey on top.
Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 40 minutes or until lightly brown on top.
Posted July 1, 2009
Las Americas musicians play and talk about the music
High Quality:
01: Vega and Flores
02: Rojas and Prado
Here are two videos featuring participants of the Las Americas Festival program. Jarocho musician Tereso Vega from Xalapa, Mexico improvises lyrics to "Cupido" accompanied by Chicano musician Quetzal Flores on jarana.
Representing two very different harp styles, Marcelo Rojas of Paraguay and Miguel Prado of Mexico fuse their talents to perform this unique duet. This is the first time they've ever played together.
Posted June 28, 2009
A Dash of Tradition
Gareth Johns (center) cooking at the Festival.
Gareth Johns learned how to cook traditional Welsh food while sitting comfortably on the knees of his grandmother. By his early teens he knew he wanted to cook professionally, and years later, after stints in kitchens across Europe, he ended up back in Wales serving traditional dishes with a modern spin.
Gareth is happy to have the opportunity to share his culture and his ways with audiences. "My parents were discouraged from learning Welsh. Everything was in English," Gareth said. During the last five years he has witnessed a resurgence in Welsh pride, especially in the use of the Welsh language. "It's as much a part of our culture as French is to France." Despite efforts to encourage the use of English after Wales joined the United Kingdom, over the decades, many people of Wales have taught their children Welsh, resulting in bilingual teaching throughout the country. His own son, Gareth is proud to say, is learning Welsh and English.
Much like the mixing between the Welsh and English languages in school, Gareth uses fusion techniques in his cooking to pair influences from different places and times. "Food is a living thing, and it doesn't have to be bound by tradition," he said.
Posted June 28, 2009
Smithsonian Folkways Tradiciones/Traditions
Two members of Los Texmaniacs, Max Baca plays baja sexto guitar (left) and David Farías plays accordion (right).
As the Smithsonian Folklife Festival hums along on the National Mall, inside the Festival Marketplace exciting things are happening. Spanish is joyfully used and Welsh words are finding their way into conversations as visitors, staff, and participants alike share their stories and their music. Visitors to the Festival mingle with performers as everyone checks out the goods, including amazing music and a plethora of t-shirts. A visit from Festival participants and newly-released
Smithsonian Folkways recording artists Los Texmaniacs was especially fun. The Folkways staff and band members bonded over a shared love of a particular Smithsonian Folkways
Woody Guthrie t-shirt available in the Marketplace, demonstrating that the newest members of the Folkways family connect with one of the oldest members.
Posted June 27, 2009
Wales in Patagonia
Ana Rees (Gaiman, Patagonia, Argentina) runs the Welsh Tea Room in Gaiman, which was started by her great-grandmother sixty-five years ago. Recently, she won first prize in Chubut's annual Agricultural Festival with the Welsh Black Cake, the most traditional pastry in Patagonia. Through living in a Welsh community, she has learned to speak the language and has started teaching it to other adults. Part of a longstanding Welsh presence in Patagonia, Rees is demonstrating her food traditions at the Festival through July 5. See the full Festival schedule for more details.
Posted June 27, 2009
Ella Jenkins and Christylez Bacon Performances
High Quality:
01: Ella Jenkins.
02: Christylez Bacon.
Two videos featuring participants of Giving Voice. Ella Jenkins, Smithsonian Folkways recording artist, performs for families at the Festival. Christylez Bacon puts a new twist on Go-Go music, merging those sounds with the "Human Beatbox."
Posted June 26, 2009
Highlights from the Opening
The 43rd Annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival opened yesterday to inspiring performances and enthusiastic crowds. To learn more about this year's programs, click on the program links below for videos, participant biographies, and introductions to the traditions presented on the National Mall.
Posted June 25, 2009
Special Concert
Diana Parker with Hawaiian lei maker Marie McDonald.
A tribute concert to Diana Parker, director of the Smithsonian Folklife Festival, will be held on
Saturday, June 27, 2009, at 7 p.m., on the Welsh Dragon stage. The concert features BeauSoleil and
Phil Wiggins and Corey Harris. Phil Wiggins and several members of BeauSoleil are long-time friends of Diana's. They represent some of the work she has both overseen and inspired throughout her career. The concert honors Diana on the occasion of her upcoming retirement.
Phil Wiggins was playing blues harmonica when he met guitarist John Cephas at the 1976 Festival; almost immediately after the two musicians joined forces, the blues community proclaimed them as the new champions of the East Coast Piedmont style of blues.
GRAMMY-award winning BeauSoleil, one of the best-known bands performing traditional Creole and Cajun music, first appeared at the Festival in 1982 with Dewey Balfa, a Cajun fiddler, singer, and National Heritage Fellow.
Posted June 25, 2009
Arpex at the Festival
Arpex demonstrates the tamboreo in conjunto de arpa grande.
The 43rd Annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival opens today, and Las Américas, the final and most broad-reaching program of the Nuestra Música: Music in Latino Culture Smithsonian Folklife Festival "living exhibitions" series, is featuring outstanding artists from the United States and Latin America in an engaging cultural dialogue.
One group that is featured at the Festival this week is Smithsonian Folkways recording artists Arpex. Miguel Prado Mora founded Arpex, a conjunto de arpa grande (big harp ensemble) in Atwater, California, in the 1990s. A predecessor of the Mexican mariachi ensemble, the conjunto de arpa grande has its roots in the towns and ranches of rural Michoacán. Arpex performs for weddings, quinceañeras, festivals, and other social events in the michoacano communities in the region. To create a bigger sound for larger venues, Arpex transforms the acoustic group into an electronic one by adding a drum set, electric bass, and direct microphones for the other instruments.
Posted June 24, 2009
A Voice Ringing O'er the Gale!
In conjunction with the Festival, Smithsonian Folkways releases four albums today. One, A Voice Ringing O'er the Gale! The Oratory of Frederick Douglass Read by Ossie Davis, is part of the Giving Voice: The Power of Words in African American Culture program. The fourth issue in the Smithsonian Folkways African American Legacy series, A Voice Ringing O'er the Gale! features the words of one of the most powerful orators of the 19th century.
The African American Legacy series is a multi-year collaboration between Smithsonian Folkways Recordings and the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture to explore the rich African American musical and oral heritage in the United States. For other recordings in the series, visit the Smithsonian Folkways Web site.
Posted June 23, 2009
Brilliant Bajo Sexto
Texmaniacs play "Marina" on the front porch.
By incorporating blues and rock lines into steady rhythms, Max Baca takes the bajo sexto, the 12-string instrument common in the music from northeastern Mexico and southern Texas, in new directions with his group Los Texmaniacs. You can hear this for yourself at Los Texmaniacs performances during the Festival's first weekend and on their new Smithsonian Folkways album Borders y Bailes.
Los Texmaniacs returns to the Smithsonian Folklife Festival for their second consecutive appearance after performing as part of the 2008 program Texas: A Celebration of Music, Food, and Wine.
Posted June 23, 2009
Blodeugerdd—Song of the Flowers:
An Anthology of Welsh Music and Song
Today Smithsonian Folkways releases 'Blodeugerdd: Song of the Flowers,' an anthology of Welsh music and song recorded in a 15th century gatehouse on the luminous Preseli hills in Wales. Blodeugerdd ("gathering of flowers" in the Welsh language) features intimate musical interpretations by leading keepers of Welsh music today. Each track is an act of remembering something personal and an illustration of how Welsh culture, in the words of producer Ceri Rhys Matthews, "has survived by quietude and tenacity."
During the Festival, six of the musicians featured on Blodeugerdd will be performing, culminating in a CD release concert and dance on Friday, June 26th, at 6:00 p.m. at the Welsh Dragon stage.
Posted June 23, 2009
Music to Your Ears
Music from Smithsonian Folkways Recordings—the non-profit record label of the Smithsonian Institution—will play an important role in Giving Voice: The Power of Words in African American Culture at the 2009 Smithsonian Folklife Festival. Music from various genres, such as blues, jazz, and gospel, will create a soundscape during the periods between scheduled programming. As visitors walk between the Barbershop/Beauty Parlor, the Stoop, Young Wordsmiths, the Radio Station, and the Oratorium, they will hear Smithsonian Folkways artists such as Lead Belly, Mary Lou Williams, Ella Jenkins, and Bernice Johnson Reagon.
When you visit the Festival, be sure to keep not only your eyes but also your ears open. Take in the sounds around you and visit the Festival Marketplace or www.folkways.si.edu to take recordings of some of this great music home.
Posted June 22, 2009
Maiteí América!
High Quality:
01: Marcelo Rojas
02: Oscar Maldanado
Paraguayan harp music is unique and stands out as a favorite for harpists the world over—not least for its driving rhythms, compelling melodies, and rich ornamentation. Marcelo Rojas, one of the master harpists featured on a new Smithsonian Folkways recording, began studying harp with his father at age ten and has gone on to tour in Europe, Japan, Mexico, Central America, the Caribbean, and now, he is playing at the 2009 Smithsonian Folklife Festival. See Marcelo perform with guitarist Álvaro Marazzi during the first week of the Festival, Wednesday, June 24, through Sunday, June 28.
The new recording, Maiteí América ("Greetings, America" in the Guaraní Indian language), boasts three generations of Paraguay's best harpists spinning out classic compositions steeped in more than four centuries of history.
Posted June 22, 2009
What's with all the stones?
Stuart Fry of Beulah, Wales, works on a stone wall that marks one of the three entranceways to the Wales Smithsonian Cymru program. Photo courtesy of Smithsonian Institution.
This week, in addition to the tents and trailers already on the National Mall, visitors have been able to see stone walls being constructed around the edge of the Wales Smithsonian Cymru program site. Welsh workers and Festival volunteers have been lifting stones and arranging them to form walls around the bases of red rugby poles and along the edges of slate fences. Curious visitors have stopped to inquire about the piles of "rocks" and strange slate fences being built. Why are stone walls being built around the Mall? How long are they going to remain on the Mall?
The walls and fences being constructed represent the different types of field boundaries that a person might see when visiting Wales. They are meant to be authentic and give Festival goers, who may not have been to Wales, the opportunity to understand what they might see "on the other side of the pond." As visitors stroll down the Mall, they can imagine they are walking through fields in the Welsh countryside, or along streets lined with slate fences. The stone walls are being constructed by Welsh artisan Stuart Fry and resemble the same walls that have been built for hundreds of years in the Welsh countryside. Be sure to pay attention to the walls as you visit the Festival!
Posted June 22, 2009