Digital Folklife

I don’t have much to say about digital technology this weekend, having spent most of the last three days at the Folklife Festival. Except for a conspicously out-of-place (but very popular) Wii-Fit booth, there wasn’t a whole lot at the festival that reminded me that we live in a digital age. For hours and hours in a crowd of thousands, I hardly saw anyone talking on a cellphone and absolutely no one tapping away at a laptop.

Very much in evidence, by contrast, was the multi-culturalism and internationalism of our era. I floated happily from culture to culture as I drifted around the Seattle Center. I also saw what seemed like every type of human being mingling, dancing and playing music together. There were strange combinations and juxtapositions, such as a dreadlocked guitarist and mohawked punk playing together in a traditional Irish band, a huge white woman in her late sixties leading an African highlife and reggae band, and a little East Indian man dancing ecstatically by himself, first to a bluegrass combo, then to a Greek band, then to a Flamenco ensemble.

It was nice to be able to take home CDs from virtually any band I saw — even from many of the buskers. I was entranced by a playful jug band from Eugene, OR, called the Blair Street Mugwumps, who dressed in dirty clothing and played dirty blues and fun old-time music on washtub bass, ukeleles, kazoo and musical saw. I bought their $5 CD, not expecting much, but found it to be a very well-recorded live performance that almost perfectly reproduced what I heard at the festival.

I was also fascinated by a group of buskers called “Abandon Ship” from Santa Cruz, CA, who looked like homeless punk teenagers and played original polka songs on accordion, banjo and washtub bass. Their home-made, hand-labeled CD was also excellent. Talking to the bass player, I learned that they are in the middle of a Northwest Tour, which consists of playing for tips at various street fairs, farmers markets and house parties around the region, and staying at the homes of other small bands they have met through Myspace.

Except for an ugly vibe on Saturday that culminated in three people getting wounded by a nut with a gun, the festival was wonderful. It’s been a while since I heard so much laughter and saw so many people enjoying such simple pleasures. It’s also quite surprising, in this day and age, to find out how many people actually still know how to square dance.