Providence is known as the Creative Capital because of the many artists and cultural organizations that call this city home. The state also offers an assortment of events throughout the year that includes PVDfest, the Katxupa Cape Verdean Festival, and the National Black Storytelling Festival — just to name a few.
When it comes to music, we are blessed with a variety of venues, as well as a plethora of talented artists to perform in those spaces. And, as luck would have it, there is a new one coming to town on September 20 at Lippitt Park. The Swell Folk Festival runs from 10am to 8pm, rain or shine, and will bring live music, food trucks, and artisans all together for the community to enjoy for free.
At the time of this writing, there are 12 acts scheduled to perform on the main stage and a second stage is being considered. The entire line up and details about the day can be found at SwellFolkFestival.com.
I jumped on a zoom call with founder, Andrew Tagher, to learn more about why he created the festival and his hopes for the event.
Dennise: Why is it called the Swell Folk Festival?
Andrew Tagher: The idea for the festival came to me when I was actually at Newport Folk Festival last year. I was listening to The Swell Season, which is a longtime favorite band of mine. I was walking around and just thinking about the festival more broadly and how it would be great to have something like it in Providence. The Swell Season was playing, and that’s literally how the name came to me. Then I figured it has kind of a nice play on words. Rhode Island and Providence are coastal, so you have that nautical “swell” tie-in. “Swell” obviously also means people are happy, and it happened to be the band I was listening to.
DMK: It was created around the idea of bringing people in Providence and beyond together through folk music. What does community look like to you, and why are you using music in such a powerful way to create it?
AT: Everything is so digital and many people are connecting that way. For me, community is really walking out of your house and knowing your neighbors, knowing the people who own the small businesses in your neighborhood, and being more connected in an in-person, face-to-face way. I think music is a great way to do that because it’s one of the things that kind of forces you to put your phone down. You’re actually there in a group with people, talking, smiling, enjoying the same experience.
DMK: I can totally relate to the point you’re making about being out there and having face-to-face connections. I walk in my neighborhood at least once, if not twice a day, and I’ve been doing it for about eight years. Having a chat with a neighbor and checking in, or exchanging a smile with a stranger as you’re passing on the sidewalk… I don’t know about that other person, but it’s a pretty powerful experience for me.
AT: One hundred percent. Absolutely. I mean, that’s one of the benefits of the festival being in Lippitt Park, right on the East Side. It’s a very walkable neighborhood. Everyone who lives over here is constantly outside, walking around and getting to know each other. So it’s the perfect place for this event.
DMK: What motivated you to bring this to life?
AT: I mentioned Newport Folk Festival, so I’ve gone there 14 years in a row. Since I was in high school, I’ve been going. I’m just a huge music lover and live music fan, and I’ve always, throughout my life, wanted to do something like this. It just kind of took that last push of inspiration to get me over the line to do it. I also got to thinking at that festival that there are some barriers — tickets sell out within 20 seconds of going on sale, and it’s an extremely expensive weekend.
The Newport Folk Festival is iconic and they have some of the best musicians in the world, and it made me realize there was an opportunity for more. There’s so much local talent in Providence and Rhode Island and New England. We can do this and have a great event for people where it removes some of those barriers and helps put artists on stage who might not otherwise have the chance to get visibility and really get their name out there.
DMK: To that point, I am involved with the independent film community and it is bursting with talented people. There’s so much opportunity to showcase those folks, especially since Providence is the Creative Capital, right?
AT: One hundred percent. You got it.
DMK: The festival is not only music. You have food trucks, local artisans, craft circles, vintage vendors, buskers — I love buskers — and family activities. Why is it important to make this more of a cultural gathering, if you will, instead of simply a concert?
AT: I have a young daughter — and I have friends with kids. The older I get, the more important it is for me to make these things family-friendly. I want everyone in the community, whether you’re a big music fan or not, to be able to come out for the day and enjoy themselves. So if you’re not the biggest music fan in the world, maybe you’re a beer lover, or maybe you love food trucks and shopping for vinyl and vintage clothing. We’re trying to have a little bit of something for everybody if you’re not there for the primary reason of hearing the music.
DMK: I love that. And it’s all about the whole element of community. It is free to attend, which is a big deal these days. What kind of challenges did you have to navigate to ensure that it was free for folks to attend?
AT: Yeah, I mean, this has probably been, in addition to the planning and the actual event, keeping it free is probably the other most difficult task. We really wanted to pay artists. We didn’t want to be in a situation where we’re having this festival and saying, “Come donate your time,” and we don’t pay you. It was important to me to pay everybody for their time. The fundraising part over the last year is probably what’s taken up the most time. We had some really good partners through that process. Moniker Brewery is doing our beer garden. We did a series of open mic nights where folks donated and gave us exposure to artists. We did a bunch of fundraising shows at Myrtle in East Providence. We did one at Track 15. And then it’s just been a lot of networking and trying to meet folks who have the means to help bring this to life and are passionate about the community and music. It’s been a lift, but we got there, and we’re going to have our event, and it’s going to be free for everybody.
DMK: You started a nonprofit foundation, which emphasizes building community through the arts. Now, I know we didn’t even have the festival yet, but beyond the event, what kind of impact do you think the Swell Folk Foundation is going to have on Providence year-round?
AT: We’ve talked about it. Just to be straight about it, this is our first year, so we’ve been very focused on planning a great first event. But we have definitely talked about it. There are things like arts programs and music programs at schools in Providence that we think we could help create programming around and be really cool. We’ve talked about, instead of doing — or in addition to doing — one big music festival a year, trying to do smaller music nights and programming that way, to fundraise for certain causes and kind of stay out there and present. And the other thing that I would like to do — I’m a big arts fan in general. Providence has a great mural and artist scene. I think doing music murals around the city would be really cool. I don’t know, there might be one out there today that I’m not familiar with, but I haven’t seen a lot of that. So I think helping make our spaces more beautiful and using music as a way to do that would be really great.
DMK: That’s a great idea. I love it. And so much potential for collaboration. Folk music has evolved quite dramatically over the years. How do you define folk music and how did that influence how you invited the artists to perform?
AT: There are a lot of different genres and artists that would fit into the world of folk. For me, music rooted in storytelling is probably how I would boil it down to its simplest core. Traditional folk was a lot of protest music, and folks were writing music and singing songs about challenges and issues of the day, and things that they were facing, or that certain groups of people were facing. I think that is super important. I think that’s part of it, but I think it’s also expanded past that. So if you want to tell a particular story, or you have a thought or a feeling and you want to elaborate on it through your music, and you can make people connect with it, all of that falls into the folk genre to me.
DMK: For those who attend the Swell Folk Festival, what do you hope that their experience will feel like from the moment they arrive until they’re like, “Okay, we gotta put the kids to bed,” or, “Hey, now I’m going to the next party tonight”?
AT: Yeah, I want everybody to feel safe and comfortable, first and foremost. I would love people to come up and be able to set up for the day, feel relaxed, put out a blanket, and try to, for a few hours, forget about the daily stresses and truly take a beat and just enjoy it. I would also love for people to really try to spend some time listening to some of these musicians who are so talented. Sometimes it’s hard to really focus and listen to the music, so it would be great to have the crowd kind of really get in and sink in and appreciate what’s there. For parents, I want them to be able to relax, let their kids run around, and have fun. For music lovers, I hope they get some self-discovery of some new artists that they might not have heard before. And I would love everybody to leave and just be like, “Wow, that was time well spent. That was a great experience. It was fun, and I can’t wait till next year.”
DMK: What would you say surprised you the most about the planning process? Whether it was how people in the community responded to the idea, challenges, or even specific lessons that you might have learned along the way?
AT: One of the hardest things of getting it off the ground is definitely balancing the fundraising with the marketing and telling people about the event. There’s definitely a gray area where you need to get the community excited and you need to enroll certain people to help, because I can’t do it all myself, at the same time as starting with zero in the bank account. I think that’s what makes a lot of people nervous, and you have to have a little bit of faith. So that was a lesson learned. But generally, since day one, everyone has been like, “This is a great idea. I’m excited for it. We’re supportive.” In the beginning, it was like, “We’re working on this thing. It might come together. It might not.” But we kind of passed that threshold, right? We’re having our event. So that was a big learning experience, working through that.
DMK: Let’s talk about people who are helping you do this — the team of folks who are helping do that. I’m one of your volunteers. You’ve got a whole crew of volunteers. Who are some of the other folks who are helping you bring this to life?
AT: On the day of the festival, folks will meet Juliana, Will, and Mike. Juliana Amin is a close friend that I have known for years. She worked on political campaigns for years, running fundraising teams. She’s just one of the most organized, Type A human beings I’ve ever met, and she’s awesome.
Everyone who’s going to work for the festival on the day of is going to have a really tight plan to work off of, which is great. Mike Capuano is a close friend of mine. He’s actually a musician. He plays in a metal band in Providence and is one of the butchers at Whole Foods. He’s a local bartender and very plugged into the community. He’s been really great for just getting the word out, helping with artist selection, and being present at fundraising events. And then William Arvanites has been really helpful with fundraising. He works down at Mark Allen, the fine clothing store in downtown Providence. He’s just a really great guy, a passionate music fan, and has done a lot to help with the fundraising bit. DMK: Looking ahead five years, what would make you pause and say, “You know what? We have accomplished exactly what I was dreaming of,” not just for the Folk Festival, but for the Providence community overall? What would have to be in place for you to feel and say that?
AT: It’s a great question. I mean, the dream for me is we’ve created something that has enough monetary and fundraising support every year where we have an event that is locked in, that the community can rely on, that gets bigger in popularity, that gets more fun, bigger artists, and that kind of becomes a staple in the cultural calendar of the city. So if we can get to that point, that would be great. And that’s really the vision. It just all starts with having a really great first event.
To learn more about the details of the free festival, visit SwellFolkFestival.com. To connect with Dennise, you can find her on Instagram @TheAdventureBroad.