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This winter, she decided she was too ill to go, so five of her students organized their own band.
Slightly Askew - the five fiddlers, a drummer and a girl playing an ice-cube tray - formed a month ago and plays at 3:15 p.m. Saturday, April 17, at Centennial Hall.
"We knew that we definitely wanted to go," said group ringleader Collin Stackhouse, 16, a junior at Monroe Catholic High School in Fairbanks and a fiddler for the last 10 years. "We remembered how much fun it is just walking around everywhere and hiking around Juneau, and of course, the music. There's so much stuff to do. It's always a blast."
Slightly Askew includes Stackhouse, 16; Jody March, 15; Katie Sousa, 17 this month; Aurora Bower, 13; Kyla McGroarty, 13; Ryan Bowers, 16; and Louise Foster, 15. Their parents are paying for the trip. They plan to play traditional versions of "Angus Campbell," "Tam Lin" and "Texas Swing," then sing, a first for the group, on "Out of the Woods," popularized by Nickel Creek.
"We're still trying to figure it out and make it a little bit different," Stackhouse said. "All the other times, it's been with Susie and she's always very organized. Everyone's in a line and we're all ready to go. It's kind of cool seeing all the faces looking up at you on stage."
Hallinan was a freshman at the University of Alaska Fairbanks in 1990, when one of the musicians she jammed with, Lynn Basham, waxed poetic about the festival.
"He got this ecstatic look in his eye and said, 'You have got to come to Juneau,'" she said.
It was her first road trip. Hallinan bought a plane ticket for $175 and stayed at Jeff Brown's house.
"I think I lived on bagels and ice cream bars," she said. "It was magical. I came down and learned later that a lot of the stuff is planned out. At the time, it seemed spontaneous, like jam sessions and concerts rose out of nowhere."
   
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