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Irish Kreis: Tumbleweed Artist of the Year 2023 The Three Rivers Folk Society (3RFS) and the Tumbleweed Music Festival are delighted to announce the winner of this year’s Logo Contest: Richland-based marketing, branding, and design consultant Irish Kreis. You may find more about her at her website, https://www.wildimagination.biz/.
The FREE 2023 Friday Night “New Horizons” Concert began at 6:00pm on Friday, September 2nd, on our North Stage.
The 2023 “New Horizons” Concert performer lineup included:
Train of Thought Ronnie Carrier Lauren Napier
Kaylie Dawes Gwen Good Big Joe
History of the Friday Night Concert
In 2011 the Tumbleweed Music Festival hosted its first “Emerging Artists” Concert (now known as the “New Horizons” concert) on the Friday evening preceding the festival. The concert was hosted by C.A. Hurst, and the non-profit organization called “Catalyst.” “Catalyst is dedicated to helping young people find and develop their areas of creativity and to encourage people of all ages to rekindle their creative fires and revisit their creative wellsprings.” The concert was a big success and the Tumbleweed Music Festival has held this concert every year since.
The Jane Titland Memorial Songwriting Contest, a juried, themed songwriting competition, takes place each year at Tumbleweed. This year’s theme is “Good Times.”
Ten finalists are chosen from the 30-40 applicants by an anonymous committee of pre-judges. The finalists perform their songs before a panel of three judges and an audience of fans on Saturday afternoon; this year the contest is moving indoors to the Community Center Stage to give more people a better listening experience. There are monetary prizes for the top three placewinners, and also a People’s Choice Award. The winner receives the “Tumbleweed Trophy,” and will perform their song between the first and second sets of the Saturday evening concert.
This year’s finalists were:
Sonya Lorelle’s “Whiskey Crying” won the contest, and Sonya performed it between the first and second sets of the Saturday Concert.
May Hartman’s “That Old Bad Old Good Time” was awarded 2nd place, and Sig Paulson’s “Mystic Wine” was awarded 3rd place. The “People’s Choice” award, voted on by the audence at the festival, went to Tim Dauncey’s “I’ll Wait for You.”
The headline performers for the traditional Tumbleweed benefit concert on Saturday evening at this year’s Tumbleweed festival showed a wonderful blending of musical and geographic diversity, while maintaining the strong connections with the Tumbleweed family.
Our opener was new to Tumbleweed: Paula Boggs Band, from Seattle. Frontwoman Paula Boggs is on career #3 with earlier stints in the Army (Airborne!), and law and business. Paula Boggs Band blends jazz and Americana in a blend that’s been called “Soulgrass.” The band has released a steady stream of music since 2010. Five years ago, the band released an EP, Live at Empty Sea, Songs of Protest & Hope, and their third album Elixir, The Soulgrass Sessions. Their 4th studio album, Janus, featuring Carolina Chocolate Drops co-founder Dom Flemons, released in 2022.
Our second headliner was also new to us, and comes from very far away. Sofia Talvik is an Americana singer from Sweden. Unmistakably Nordic in flavor, Sofia Talvik somehow still conforms to American interpretations of her own original music, a North Sea siren blending sparkle and melancholy. Growing up in Sweden, her music has always had a special tint of her Scandinavian heritage, making her a favorite among music lovers, but her 16-month, 37-state long tour through the USA (in an RV, which is bringing her to us) has moved her music closer to the Americana tradition.
Our closer, Wes Weddell, is a very long-time member of the Tumbleweed family. For the past twenty years, Wes has worked multiple shifts in the engine room of Seattle’s roots music scene as frontman, sideman, writer, teacher, and community-builder. Wes is a gifted musician and songwriter who also shares his music with students while making learning music fun. Wes was the 2006 winner of the Tumbleweed song-writing contest, and will (as is traditional) emcee the Jane Titland Memorial Songwriting Contest Finalist performances on Saturday afternoon.
And don’t forget – as ever, our MC for the evening was Dan Maher.
Sunday evening at Tumbleweed saw the traditional “Theme Concert,” in which a variety of performers stepped up and performed a song that fits with this year’s theme, “Good Times.” The theme concert took place on the Jim Honeyman South Stage.
Prior to this year’s theme concert, we took the opportunity to remember and pay respect to a long-time member of the Tumbleweed family whom we lost in May of this year, Jim Honeyman.
Jim was a founding member of the Three Rivers Folklife Society, and of the Badger Mountain Dry Band. He was the lead for Tumbleweed’s Sound Board Operators for many years. He was a wonderful musician, whether on Mandolin, Guitar, Bass, or what-have-you, and we’ll always miss his clear, “high lonesome” voice.
Jim performed with many people over the years besides BMDB – most notably, with Hank Cramer III and Michelle Cameron. They, and more of his friends, memorialized Jim in song and story.
The festival concluded with a Contra dance at 8 PM on Sunday, featuring a live band and caller in the Community Center Stage.
The band this year was “June Apple String Band,” and Gordy Euler (he of “Shanghaied on the Willamette” fame) was our caller.
The dance was well-attended and a good time was had by all!
© 2024 Tumbleweed Music Festival – Sponsored by Three Rivers Folklife Society & the City of Richland | Co-sponsored by Northwest Public Broadcasting, Battelle Memorial Institute, OneWorld Telecommunications, Tumbleweird, Pasco Chamber of Commerce, Pilgrim Media Services, Print Plus, and Artmil Design.