Every year I go up to the Winnipeg Folk Festival. This year will be my 8th year in a row, and it’s turned into this grounding point of the year for me. I run around like crazy during the year, photographing concerts and models and babies and families and everything I see in front of me. I constantly have my phone by my side and my laptop not far, and it’s usually mass-insanity mode for me until 4 days in July when I drive up to Winnipeg and as I hit Birds Hill Park my phone loses all signal and I can finally breathe.

For 4 days I walk around and am completely surrounded by incredible music and incredible people. It’s perfect, always rejuvenates me, and acts as a reset button so I can jet back down to Minneapolis and jump back into photo mode.

The highlight of the festival for me, by far, is the workshops. Somehow 5+ musicians that have never met before jump on stage and make magic happen. They take turns playing one of their own songs, and most of the time the rest of the musicians jump in and fill in the gaps. At the 2007 Folk Fest I decided to check out a workshop called “Go Go Gadgets”, mostly because I didn’t see anything else that compelled me more, and because I was curious. I sat through one of my most memorable concert moments as the musicians played a 15-minute jam session of Cortez, The Killer on a saw, muck bucket, theremin, harmonium, concertina, digeridoo, a set of border pipes, bouzouki, an Irish flute, and a tabla. No joke.

So far I haven’t seen a theremin at the Hoot, but the magic of the WFF workshops is still there. Every week Jim Walsh pulls together some amazing local musicians (the musical talent in this city is unbelievable) and instead of waiting for that 1 weekend in July every year I get to experience little pieces of it every week.

If you’re in Minneapolis, you need to experience it, too. Every Thursday at The Beat Coffeehouse in Uptown. If you’re not in Minneapolis, don’t cry, it’s ok! HowWasTheShow has you covered because they’re live broadcasting every Hoot, just for you! Check out last Thursday’s here.

And now, the photos: