FOLK ALLIANCE AUSTRALIA YOUTH AWARD 2016
Showcase held at the National Folk Festival in Canberra on Sunday 27 March 2016
The FAA National Youth Awards Showcase Concert was once again be hosted by The National Folk Festival in Canberra. Thank you to the National Folk Festival for their support and partnership in hosting our Youth Showcase Concert, our AGM and workshop. This year we were overwhelmed by the interest in part of our showcase program and awards – and unfortunately were only able to program a third of the number of applications. The diversity of talent and quality of the all artists made the task of selecting acts to receive our awards very challenging – well done to all the acts who will stay involved in FAA activity across the year – Terri Young, The Mulberry Collective, Chloe Nott, The Squeeze Box Trio, Bean Project, Aden Quinn, Hayley Stone and Drowsy Maggies.
This year’s Young Artist of the year is the duo The Bean Project – Ben Langdon and Bryce Turcato are based in Melbourne. Singer Songwriter Hayley Stone, from ACT was chosen by the panel as the running up. Congratulation to these acts and all the Showcase artsists this year – we look forward to working together this year.
Festivals, folk clubs, groups and arts organisations from around Australia are asked to nominate an outstanding youth act. FAA considers all nominations that fall within the genres of traditional folk to contemporary folk. Solo acts and small bands between the ages of 14‐25 will be considered. Cross‐cultural performances are encouraged.
Selected nominees perform a 10‐12 minute showcase at the Folk Alliance Australia Youth Award Concert held at the National Folk Festival in Canberra. The FAA Youth Performer of the Year is announced at the conclusion of the Awards Concert. All showcase performers receive a free festival pass to the NFF (including camping), as well as some support towards travel.
FOLK ALLIANCE AUSTRALIA YOUTH AWARD 2015
The Folk Alliance of Australia held their annual Youth Awards at The National Folk Festival on Sunday 5 April. A total of eight young acts took part being nominated by festivals and like folk organizations all round the country. This year we had 3 acts from Tasmania, 2 from Victoria, and one each from NSW, QLD and SA. This was probably the best national spread of representation we’ve had for the Awards. The two acts judged the most worthy of FAA support over the next year were Kaurna & Tom Kneebone from SA and The Raglins a duo from Victoria. Honourable mention was made of Frumious from Tasmania. The overall standard of musicianship of all participants was highly encouraging and many of them portrayed levels of composition and originality that spoke mountains for our music education system, and indeed for the future of folk and its branches in Australia.
The larger groups, which played mainly instrumental music, were Frumious, As The Crow Flies from Tasmania, and Paddy and The Wonderland from NSW. Frumious played music in a Eastern Euro/Gypsy swing style, whilst as The Crow Flies with a three girl all fiddle line up had a more Celtic feel to their compositions. Paddy and the Wonderland very clearly based their material on jazz roots featuring improvisation on fiddle and baritone sax. The winners Kaurna & Tom Kneebone were a guitar duo with strong original songs; The Raglins are Rob Hillman and Hannah Pelka-Cavan with an interesting mix of originals with trad roots; and the other acts, Wayfare from Victoria, Anna Armstrong & Jordon O’Farrell from QLD, and Matthew Dames from Tassie all performed their own original songs and tunes.
The 2 hour plus concert was concluded by a short performance by the excellent Oh Pep! who were the recipients of the 2014 FAA Youth Award. The band also made a big splash when they performed at the 2015 Folk Alliance International in Kansas City earlier this year. During the past year Oh Pep! and several other young acts performed at special FAA showcase concerts at Woodford Folk Festival, Blue Mountains Music festival and were included in the Port Fairy Folk festival program. Folk Alliance Australia much appreciates this valuable support and is especially grateful to The national Folk Festival for its continuing support for young and developing folk artists.
