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2019 Ferdinand Folk Festival Artists:
Few recording artists are as creative and prolific as Bruce Cockburn (pronounced CO-BURN). Graham Nash calls Cockburn “the consummate troubadour, a musical hero to many who are trying to make the world a better place." To Bonnie Raitt, he is “a huge inspiration”. Jackson Browne praises his "amazing guitar playing" and tells Rolling Stone that “few songwriters have been able to express as coherently the impulse for justice and the quest for moral equilibrium.”
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Based in Minnesota, with roots in Tennessee, Chastity Brown grew up surrounded by country and soul music. In the full gospel church of her childhood, she played saxophone and drums and found her singing voice and a passion for music. Her first show was in Knoxville and then it was on to Minneapolis. She’s been featured on NPR’s “Favorite Sessions,” CMT, American Songwriter, the London Times, Paste Magazine, and others, and has toured the U.S. and abroad. For much of 2016, she toured alongside folk icon/activist Ani DiFranco. Brown melds folk, pop and soul, weaving together a poet’s lyrical ear and a soul-laid-bare quality. Read More.
Crowd-favorite, main-stage artists from the 2015 Folk Fest, The Way Down Wanderers return from Peoria, Illinois, the heartland of America. The band has toured extensively across the US, Canada, and the UK, performing an official showcase at the Americana Fest in Nashville, earning honors from American Roots UK (Top Albums of the Year List 2017), Songpickers' Best Songs Spotify Playlist (2016), and a finalist in the 2016 International Song Writing Competition. Read More.
Nashville, Tennessee-based Amber Rubarth has toured solo across South Africa, Europe, Japan, and throughout America with her “unique gift of knocking down walls with songs so strong they sound like classics from another era.” (Acoustic Guitar Magazine). She was recently cast alongside Joe Purdy to star in the feature film American Folk which won numerous festival awards and was released in theaters January 2018. The film received high praise, the Hollywood Reporter calling it "Superb... A heartfelt homage to American folk music," and Rolling Stone dubbing the first single “Enchanting... beautifully recalls several of the duets that John Prine has sung so effectively with frequent partner Iris DeMent." Read More.
Named Best Folk Artist at the 2018 Boston Music Awards, Honeysuckle is a progressive acoustic trio that blends the traditional instrumentation of bluegrass and folk with modern effects, beautiful songwriting, and masterful, intricate arrangements. Their distinct brand of baroque, elevated Americana has earned the Berklee College of Music alumni appearances at Lollapalooza in Chicago and Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island. The band has received a nomination for Best Folk Artist of the Year and Best Americana Artist of the Year four years in a row at the annual Boston Music Awards. They were also honored to make the Top 10 Bands of 2016 So Far list compiled by NPR. Read More.
Beau Troesch is a locally grown musician currently residing in Aspen, Colorado. Back in his hometown and fresh off a cross country bike ride, Beau will be strumming up original writings with family heirloom harmonicas and lyrics that tell stories of adventure, hometowns, and the people that make up it all. You can’t mistake obvious influences from greats like Neil Young and Bob Dylan, but heavier are the influences of a harmonica-playing grandmother, guitar-playing uncle, and a father blasting Tom Petty in the garage. Beau kicked off the first-ever Ferdinand Folk Festival in 2010.
The Strings of Indian Creek is a folk rock band based out of Southern Indiana playing a mix of originals and covers. They feature a male and female vocal duo complimented by banjo, harmonica, fiddle, and drums. In 2020 they released their full length album 'Tales Untold' and just released their newest album 'Dancing With the Lightning' in Sept 2021. Read More.