No need to race out of town and get bogged down in traffic this Labor Day weekend. There’s entertainment galore at Stuart Auditorium on the beautiful grounds of Lake Junaluska when the 30th annual Smoky Mountain Folk Festival welcomes some of the best local and regional authentic mountain music and dance for two nights — Friday, Aug. 31, and Saturday, Sept. 1.

Each night starts off at 5 p.m. with a special performance for young musicians in the Children’s Tent. Then the main stage entertainment in Stuart Auditorium begins at 7 p.m. and lasts until about 11 p.m. While main stage performers celebrate music and dance inside Stuart Auditorium, acoustic musicians of all ranges share informal jam sessions outside. Featured performers will include area square dance teams and string bands, fiddlers, banjo pickers, guitarists, storytellers, dulcimer players, bagpipes, ballad singers and much more. More than 250 performers are invited and some of their tapes and CDs will be available for sale. There’s also free watermelon.

The festival, which started in Waynesville three decades ago as a way to continue the local tradition of music and dance, later moved to Lake Junaluska’s Stuart Auditorium under the direction of Joe Sam Queen, who organizes and emcees the festival. For the past few months leading up the festival, Queen has been emceeing popular street dances every other Friday in downtown Waynesville, where for several evening hours in front of the Haywood County Courthouse a live string band and a local square dance team performs. Queen leads audience members in a few square dance lessons for young and old.

Queen and a group of dedicated organizers work hard each year to keep the festival running on a limited budget funded by grant money, arts council support, ticket sales and donations.

Main show tickets to the Smoky Mountain Folk Festival are $10 at the door, $7.50 in advance.
Advance tickets can be purchased at the Haywood County Arts Council at 37 Church St. in Waynesville or at the Administrative Building at Lake Junaluska. For more information, contact Joe Sam Queen at 828.452.1688 or the Haywood County Arts Council at 828.452.0593.

 

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The Smoky Mountain News