50th Alaska Folk Festival is one for the records

It’s been a free-for-all jamboree for a half-century, yet somehow the 50th annual Alaska Folk Festival still achieved the golden feat of a sellout.

Among the many notable numbers mentioned during the weeklong festival — many obviously involving a reference to 50 in some way — was “a record-breaking week at the merchandise table,” said Andrew Heist, president of the festival’s board, as the final performers were getting ready to take the stage on Sunday night. He thanked the audience, as well as the volunteer helpers staffing the tables and performers who lured the audience to the event for that show of devotion.

“This festival — which is the most amazing and unique festival anywhere in the world, in my opinion — would not exist without our members,” he told a standing-room audience of more than 1,000 people in the main ballroom at Centennial Hall. “Where else would you have a weeklong event like this? There’s nobody checking tickets at the door. There are no tickets to be purchased— it’s free for all to attend. It is because our members believe in this and they support us.”

But the week was almost too successful for its own good when a membership pitch was made moments later by Tessany Alrich, a festival board member.

“At the end of the evening if you want to re-up your membership you’re going to have to do it online,” she said. “Our table is closed. There is no merchandise to sell you.”

Those seeking a memento of the landmark festival will get their chance when a 30-minute documentary by local filmmaker Paige Sparks that also features the event’s history is screened.

Other colorful moments with numbers happened throughout the week, some involving folk tales such as “there might be more people on stage than there are in the crowd” when Saturday emcee Kelsey Riker introduced “50 BANJOS!” as that evening’s opening act.

“For those of you who are not seeing what is happening on this stage, we have 54 to 58 maybe more banjos and banjo players on this stage with me,” she said for the benefit of people listening via radio or online. “This number is not arbitrary. It is the 50th Folk Fest. So the group was hoping for 50 banjos and it turns out they’ve got way more.”

Other comfort in numbers was found among about 20 participants learning to play Zimbabwean marimbas — where, unlike first-time bagpipe players, an instructor said more really could sound better — at a Saturday afternoon workshop at the Juneau Arts and Culture Center across the parking lot from Centennial Hall. For those seeking different comfort zones an old-time fiddling workshop, songwriting session, family dance to live music and an instrument swap were all taking place during the same mid-afternoon block.

About 140 music and dance performances were scheduled during the festival that began last Monday, featuring a mix of musicians who’ve appeared consistently throughout the decades, made returns for the golden anniversary after many years away, and first-timers from near and far. Other events and spontaneous jams involving festival musicians popped up throughout downtown during the festival as well as after Sunday’s traditional finale featuring the audience sing-a-long “Goodnight Irene.”

“We started out at The Alaskan and I think we’re going to end it at The Alaskan in a little while,” said Dirk Powell, a four-time Grammy winning fiddler/banjo player who along with fellow Rhiannon Giddens performed together as this year’s featured festival musicians, near the end of their 75-minute Sunday concert.

For their finale, the duo induced the crowd into a sing-a-long of Joe Thompson’s “I Shall Not Be Moved,” with Giddens citing the current times where “there’s stuff happening — I don’t know if you noticed — and it’s like you don’t know whether to laugh or cry every single day.”

“We all have a part to play and if we all do the thing that we’re the best at doing, if we put it all together, we get a pretty freaking amazing choir,” she said.

• Contact Mark Sabbatini at mark.sabbatini@juneauempire.com or (907) 957-2306.