Homegrown talent honoured to play mainstage set

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Main Stage headliner John Hiatt grooves to his sideman's picking Thursday evening at the 37th Annual Winnipeg Folk Festival at Birds Hill Park.

 Twenty years ago, Romi Mayes learned how to play a G-chord on an acoustic guitar with her thumb in the Winnipeg Folk Festival campground.

On Thursday night the 35-year-old Winnipegger and her band had the opening slot on the mainstage, cranking out a mix of blues-rock and twangy roots for an appreciative crowd under sunny skies.

"I didn’t realize the weight of how select a group it is — to share a stage with John Hiatt and Levon Helm is an honour. I am so honoured to play the mainstage," a humbled Mayes said after her 45-minute set

Her Folk Festival appearance is part of a busy and successful past year for Mayes. Her 2009 album Achin in Yer Bones earned her Western Canadian Music Awards for roots album of the year and songwriter of the year, and she was nominated for a Juno.

On Monday, she and her band — guitarist Jay Nowicki, bassist David Landreth and Ryan Voth — leave for a cross-country summer tour.

"I’m camping this year with my daughter Ashley, 10, and I’m walking past all these 15- and 16-year-olds playing guitar and I want to say to them, ‘You can do it,’" she said with a laugh.

There were plenty of guitarists in the campground, an obscene amount of percussionists  and even a full marching band — the Winnipeg-based Flaming Trolley Marching Band — who led a parade through the site Thursday afternoon. About 300 people walked in the parade, which featured a giant homemade elephant, a yellow taxi, black Chinese dragon  and various characters.

The campsite party was in full swing and the sprawling site was filled with numerous examples of creativity, including a trading post constructed to look like an Egyptian Sphinx, a wooden pyramid, a stage surrounded by covered seating for spectators and a hammock district with a dozen hammocks for people to relax in.

At the music site, festival-goers ate Whales Tails, met friends in the beer tent and sat on tarps with friends while being treated to a roots-oriented night of music ranging from traditional to contemporary.

Tao Seeger put a unique spin on the folk tradition, with elements of Latin, R&B, Creole and ’50s rock ’n’ roll. The dancers were grooving to his set, especially Bring Em Home, a modern reinterpretation of his grandfather Pete’s song Vietnam, which he played on four-string banjo.

"This is what the festival is all about, eclectic folk music, but you usually don’t get it all with one act," said Tim McFadden, an artist-manager from Nashville attending his first festival.

Songwriting legend John Hiatt and his band the Combo was up next and had the crowd in the palms of their hands as they kept the upbeat vibe going, working their way through some blistering blues and laidback roots, offering up tracks like Drive South, The Tiki Bar is Open, Slow Turning and Cry of Love during his hour-long set.

Breakthrough North Carolina trio The Avett Brothers proved the buzz they’ve been earning with their fifth album, the Rick Rubin-produced I and Love and You, is well-earned. The folk-roots trio expanded to a five-piece with each member appearing to be a multi-instrumentalist, adding extra flavouring to their material, including early set highlight, a slowed down version of January Wedding, which allowed the band to show off their bluegrass tendencies.

"We have some very fine friends from this area and we’re starting to realize why they’re so fine. Thank you for h`aving us up here," Seth Avett said.

Attendance wasn’t available for last night’s show, but there were 9,840 paid fans on Wednesday, up from the 7,500 who paid to see Elvis Costello on a Wednesday last year, according to Folk Festival executive director Tamara Kater. Last year the Costello show was an optional charge, but this year the Wednesday show was included in the price of a weekend pass.

The festival kicks into high gear today with seven stages beginning at 11 a.m. Tonight’s mainstage lineup includes traditional Scottish band Breabach, slide guitar guru Sonny Landreth, Columbian indie-rock duo Aterciopelados, acclaimed Irish/Czech Republic folk duo the Swell Season (led by the Frames frontman Glen Hansard) and Scottish Celtic group the Peatbog Faeries.

rob.williams@freepress.mb.ca