NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE FAQ

Did You Know Northwest Folklife is the nonprofit that produces the Northwest Folklife Festival?

WHAT IS THE STORY OF NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE?

Northwest Folklife is an independent 501(c)(3) arts organization that celebrates the multigenerational arts, cultures, and traditions of a global Pacific Northwest. Since 1972, Northwest Folklife has been deeply committed to celebrating the diversity of our Northwest communities and demystifying our differences together, under one roof. To learn more about our organization, please visit our About page.

Northwest Folklife believes that arts and culture strengthen our communities and should be accessible for all. Our year-round programming is produced in collaboration with over 150+ different Community Coordinators and powered by contributions from the community, corporations, foundations, and the public sector.

We have six main programs throughout the year: the Northwest Folklife Festival, the annual Cultural Focus, the Community Coordinator program, Our Big Neighborhood, Youth Empowerment through Arts and Heritage (Y.E.A.H.), and the Crossroads Cultural Arts Series.

Most notable of our events is the annual Northwest Folklife Festival, a community-powered celebration of the music, arts, and heritage of the Pacific Northwest. With over 6,000 performers on 20+ stages, 200 food/craft/import vendors, and 500 volunteers, the Northwest Folklife Festival remains one of the largest access-for-all festivals in the nation since 1972. In 2020, the Northwest Folklife Festival pivoted to an online experience, launching From Home to Home: Northwest Folklife Festival. In 2022 we’ve expanded that programing to be a new hybrid model of programming, and 2022 will the first year of both virtual and in person programming at the Northwest Folklife Festival.

HOW DOES THE CELEBRATION OF FOLK ARTS HELP THE COMMUNITY?

We believe that celebrating arts and culture is a great way for people to share their cultural heritage with the public. Cultural exchange is an opportunity to dissolve misunderstandings, break down stereotypes, and increase respect for one another. It also helps revitalize people and communities. And because culture is always evolving, we facilitate a platform to celebrate the new arts and traditions that communities want to share.

HOW MANY PEOPLE DOES NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE REACH?

We collaborate with all of the diverse communities of the Pacific Northwest–including Washington, Oregon, Western Montana, Idaho, Alaska, British Columbia, and Alberta–to inspire programs and public presentations of all forms of cultural expression practiced in the Northwest. The annual Festival includes over 6,000 participants and 500 volunteers, 200 food and craft vendors, and attracts over 250,000 attendees.

WHAT DO YOU REALLY MEAN BY “FOLKLIFE”?

We’re glad you asked! We have several definitions of “folklife”— it’s a hard concept to pin down! The US Library of Congress says ’folklife’ is “the everyday and intimate creativity that all of us share and pass onto the next generation.” That provides a broad base that enables us to program the many diverse kinds of performers, practitioners, and presentations that are all around us in the Pacific Northwest.

WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE AND THE NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL?

Northwest Folklife is a year-round arts and culture organization that produces the Northwest Folklife Festival, among other year-round programs. Northwest Folklife creates opportunities throughout the year for people to celebrate, share, and participate in the evolving cultural traditions of the Pacific Northwest. You can see a full list of our year-round programs here.

The annual Northwest Folklife Festival is our signature event and is held every Memorial Day Weekend at Seattle Center. The Festival is produced by a small group of staff, over 150 Community Coordinators, and hundreds of volunteers. This event is made possible by the generous support of donors, Friends of Folklife, volunteers, sponsors, and partners.

WHY SHOULD I COME TO THE NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL?

Come to the Festival to discover a wide variety of music, dance, arts, food, traditions, and heritage that thrive in our region. At the Festival you are likely to hear new kinds of music and discover a variety of food, try out a new type of dance, and experience fresh perspectives on the cultures in this area. Join festival goers from all over the world! The Northwest Folklife Festival is one of the largest of its kind–a community-powered, multi-day event, providing multiple opportunities to celebrate all forms of cultural expression.

WHAT IS YOUR PARTNERSHIP WITH SEATTLE CENTER?

For over 50 years, Northwest Folklife has appreciated the long relationship with Seattle Center. In 2019, we renewed a five-year agreement between Seattle Center and Northwest Folklife. The agreement ensures both the presentation of the iconic Northwest Folklife Festival in the center of the city and Seattle Center as the home base for the organization through 2023. The combination of City support, voluntary donations from festival attendees, other donations and sponsorships obtained by Northwest Folklife, the work of hundreds of volunteers, and thousands of performers performing for free allow the annual Northwest Folklife Festival to be presented to the public without financial barrier.

WHY DON’T YOU CHARGE AN ENTRY FEE? HOW DO YOU RAISE MONEY FOR THE NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL?

It is the mission of Northwest Folklife to create opportunities for ALL to experience and celebrate the thriving traditions of folk arts in our community. We believe strongly that arts and culture should be accessible to everyone – not just those who can afford the price of a ticket.

Each year, Northwest Folklife depends on donations from generous individuals, foundations, government and corporate partners in order to offset operating expenses and rising costs of producing the Festival and our year-round cultural programs. For the past several years, it was estimated that only 17% of all Festival attendees made a financial contribution. This was not enough to produce and sustain an event of this caliber. In 2017, following a call for action and tremendous community response, we saw a significant increase in Festival donations.

In 2021, we ask Festival attendees for a modest daily donation of $20 per person, and we are grateful for contributions of any size. Folklife is here for you, but it is also made possible BY YOU. Show your love for Folklife today to help us keep the magic going.

WHAT IS A FRIEND OF FOLKLIFE?

Donations of $120 or more automatically qualify you for Friend of Folklife benefits. As a Friend of Folklife, you will receive a number of excellent benefits to help you enjoy the Northwest Folklife Festival and to keep you connected to Folklife all year long. Benefits include getting a Festival guide delivered to your doorstep, exclusive invitations to parties, a pass to our backstage hospitality area, a signed limited-edition Festival poster, and more. Become a Friend of Folklife!

IF I DONATE TO FOLKLIFE AT THE FESTIVAL, WHERE DOES MY MONEY GO?

As you can imagine, producing our Festival is expensive! Tax-deductible donations help to pay for festival production costs, provide general operating funds to help keep the lights on and the copy machines running. They also help pay salaries for our 15 year-round staff members. Contributions also help us continue to showcase talented musicians, provide fun activities for children, offer community dance venues, and so much more. Make a Donation!

ARE THERE ANY OTHER WAYS TO SUPPORT NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE AND THE FESTIVAL?

The Festival depends on hundreds of dedicated volunteers. Over 700 volunteers contributed more 3,000 hours during the 2018 Festival! It’s a fun, great way to meet new people and it gives you an opportunity to become part of what makes the Northwest Folklife Festival so special.

NORTHWEST FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL FAQ

Festival Hours

WHEN DOES THE FESTIVAL BEGIN AND END EACH DAY?

Festival Hours: 11AM - 10PM Friday - Sunday, 11AM-9PM Monday

Donations

WHY DON’T YOU CHARGE AN ENTRY FEE? HOW DO YOU RAISE MONEY FOR THE FESTIVAL?

We are committed to access for all regardless of background or income and therefore continue to operate without tickets or gates. Each year, Northwest Folklife depends on donations from generous individuals, foundations, government, and corporate partners in order to meet operating expenses, produce the annual Festival, and maintain year-round programs and events. It’s not easy to sustain, and we need your support. Everyone is a bearer of folk? and participants in folklife, and we are committed to make certain everyone is able to come and celebrate with us.

THE FESTIVAL IS COMMUNITY-POWERED – WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?

The Northwest Folklife Festival is created for and by the people. Northwest Folklife collaborates with communities to showcase culturally significant arts and culture experiences and is committed to a model of co-creation and co-curation. We have developed relationships with over 150 unique ethnic and cultural communities through which we have established the Community Coordinator Program which partners individuals, who are active in and are able to authentically represent their communities, with Northwest Folklife program staff to build programming and events that are responsive and relevant to those communities. Being community-powered means that we rely on contributions – community voice and input, monetary gifts, in-kind donations, and volunteerism – from people and groups that come to the Northwest Folklife Festival. Speaking of participants, performers, artists, and workshop leaders all volunteer their time. The largest part of expenses are in the cost of production – stages, sound systems, electricity, tents, etc. – and the labor to operate this enormous event. You can help ensure that Festival remains accessible to all AND remains an amazing representation of our communities’ arts, culture, heritage and traditions for future generations.

We suggest a donation of $20 per person, but gladly accept donations of any amount! You can contribute cash gifts at any gate or Information & Donation station. To find out more or donate online, please visit our Friends of Folklife page.

Buskers and Street Performers

There is a long history of Street Performance as a tradition both at Folklife and throughout history.

Street performers add a vibrant and important piece to the overall feel and concept of Folklife. We are creating opportunities for artists to share their specific cultures with society at large.

Buskers (street performers who solicit tips) are encouraged to share any tips they may receive from their activities. However, Folklife cannot enforce this and the public should be aware they are supporting individuals, not necessarily our organization. We are grateful to those buskers who do choose to share their proceeds and we’re hopeful that trend will increase.

Folklife does not have the right to prevent free speech activities during the Festival. We are operating in a free and open public space. We can not dictate who can perform, assemble, or participate. We do have (and exercise) the right to move street performers/buskers who are interfering with our stages, vendors, or entry/exit points to venues. We also set sonic limitations to how loud buskers can be, but we are prevented from restricting participants based on their messages.

Interested in Busking and/or want to learn more?

Changing Landscape

WHY DID THE CD STORE GO AWAY?

Northwest Folklife regretted ceasing operations of the CD Store during our Festival. It was a significant component in supporting our artists, but ultimately cost our organization more than could be earned by the commissions we received. Silver Platters and other CD retailers tried to run this store and couldn’t make a feasible go of it. As sales declined over time, the CD Store closed for many of the same reasons that many retailers have gone out of business.

People buy music when they hear performing acts, and we encourage artists to sell in relation to their performances. We found it rare that audience members would hear an act, then wander across the campus to a non-adjacent location and sift through titles and find that act again. The number of musical acts that we have and the variety of CD’s that performers would sell made logistics for inventory control difficult. In addition, artists picked their price points, and the random nature of that pricing added to the discord present with the store. With the increase in online sales and downloadable recordings, it has become much easier for artists to sell directly to the public without Folklife’s involvement. In our last survey to performers, we found that more performers preferred selling merchandise next to the stage and online via our schedule listing than in our CD Store. Check our Festival Schedule for performers’ URLs.

CHANGES ON SEATTLE CENTER CAMPUS:

WHY ISN’T THERE A METRO SHUTTLE LIKE IN PREVIOUS YEARS?

King County Metro is unable to provide dedicated shuttle service due to budget constraints. However, fifteen Metro bus routes serve Seattle Center from around the region. Public transportation to and from the Northwest Folklife Festival can be planned by visiting Seattle Center’s website.

About Northwest Folklife

To learn more about our organization, please visit our About page.

PROGRAMMING FAQ

WHAT IS PRESENTED AT THE FESTIVAL?

Traditionally, we program music, dance, storytelling, panels, presentations, and films at the Northwest Folklife Festival. We also schedule workshops, where community performers can teach others about a particular subject. In addition, we try to make room for any new kinds of performance arts that people in the community can come up with. If you have an idea for a different kind of program, or you would like to share what you do in your community, please contact us!

WHAT DOES “HYBRID FESTIVAL” MEAN?

After a quick pivot to a virtual festival in the spring of 2020, we have learned a lot from producing online virtual content for the past two years. While we’re excited to be celebrating in person again in 2023, there’s a lot to love about the online community that has gathered over time. Therefore, like last year (2022) we’re not getting rid of virtual programming but instead are incorporating it into the 2023 Festival. This makes the event even more accessible to folks who otherwise wouldn’t be able to travel to the Seattle Center. For more information about the virtual programming offered this year, visit here.

HOW DOES FOLKLIFE DEFINE “FOLKLIFE?”

The US Library of Congress says ’folklife’ is “the everyday and intimate creativity that all of us share and pass onto the next generation.”

WHAT ARE THE PARTICIPANT GUIDELINES AND CODE OF CONDUCT?

We believe everyone involved in our events including performers, volunteers, staff, and the audience should experience our programs free from any harassment or threats. Please see the following code of conduct to help ensure that we maintain this safe space.

Read the full Participant Guidelines here.

Read the Code of Conduct here.

HOW DO YOU SELECT A GROUP TO PERFORM AT THE FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL?

Ideally, we would schedule everyone who applied. But because we have limited space, and we have more applications than we have performance slots, we have several ways we look at an application: What genre do they represent? How often have they performed at the Festival in the past? What are their tech needs, and can we fulfill them? When can they perform—is their schedule so limited that we can’t fit them in when they’re able to get here? Are they from the Northwest region? And we listen to and look at all support materials sent in with the applications to get an idea of what a performance would be.

WHAT IS A SHOWCASE?

A Showcase is a one-to-three-hour long performance that features a specific genre or culture. For example, we have had the Bulgarian Showcase, with several music and dance groups performing Bulgarian music, and we have also had the Family Stories showcase, with several storytellers performing stories that are suitable for family audiences. Showcases are organized by Northwest Folklife staff or oftentimes by Community Coordinators.

WHAT IS A COMMUNITY COORDINATOR?

Community Coordinators are dedicated volunteers and representatives of their community, who work alongside Folklife staff to schedule performances and showcases at the festival. As experts in their community, their input is an invaluable part of the planning process. More than 150 Community Coordinators work closely with staff to program more than 65% of the Northwest Folklife Festival. For more information about Community Coordinators including a list of current participants, click here.

WHY DIDN’T I GET SCHEDULED?

There are many reasons that applicants may not get scheduled. You may have told us you are only available on a certain day at a certain time, and we do not have a space for you then. Or your technical needs may be such that we cannot supply what you need to perform. Or you may have played for several years in a row, and we need to rotate you to give someone else in your genre a chance to perform. Most often, the reason is that there are so many applications for the genre you represent that we have to limit the number of those performances. For example, we usually have more than 200 applications for singer/songwriters, but we can only program a small percentage of that particular genre. We try to rotate applicants in order to be fair to everyone.

WHY CAN’T I PLAY ON A CERTAIN STAGE?

We schedule performers for venues or stages that have the equipment they need. For example, not all stages have drum kits or amplifiers. Only some stages are large enough for dance groups. If you are a singer/songwriter, we want to schedule you in a venue where people can hear your lyrics. By the same token, we would most likely schedule a brass band on an outdoor stage because of their volume.

SOME OF THE PERFORMANCES YOU PROGRAM DON’T SEEM VERY “FOLK-ISH.” WHY IS THAT?

One of the truly wonderful things about the Northwest Folklife Festival is that we are a community arts festival. We program the kinds of art forms that community members are participating in, and we try to respond positively to all kinds of interesting applications. So the end result is that you can see performances that you might call “folk,” and you can also see new, emerging art forms like 8-bit music.

ARTIST COMPENSATION

The Northwest Folklife Festival began in 1972 with a simple goal of creating a platform to share talents and traditions and to pass them on to those who attended. The first performers willingly donated their performances. The Festival grew immensely from that first year and eventually required a professional staff to organize the event and carry it out.

As part of our commitment to advocate and expand the opportunities for the creative sector in our region, Northwest Folklife is proud to announce that this year marks the first year that we will offer compensation to our performers and presenters! This year, through a partnership with the Office of Economic Development, we are able to offer a modest honorarium to performers for their time and efforts crafting creativity and cultivating traditional arts to share with thousands of festival goers. We want to express incredible gratitude to our participants who have still chosen to donate their time and gifts to the festival. The important truth that we must uphold going forward is that it is, and should remain, a choice to do so. As a ticketless festival, it is not our ultimate goal to provide the kind of compensation that headliner festivals offer, but this is a first step in honoring the work and stewardship that our cultural communities provide and their contributions to a larger creative economy.

HOW CAN I SUPPORT THE ARTISTS WHO DONATE THEIR TALENTS?

We encourage audience members to support the artists they love to see at the festival. Many artists will sell merchandise directly after their show, and that’s a great place to start. We are also providing space to provide digital tips to all performers who have venmo, paypal, or other virtual payment apps so that you can easily drop some money into the virtual tip jar from your phone while enjoying their performance! Each artist has a different preferred method, which you can find in the schedule section of the website .

WHY ARE BUSKERS ALLOWED AT THE FESTIVAL?

The short answer is that Seattle Center is a public park, and buskers can perform at any public park. The long answer is that we value the energy that our Street Performers bring to the Festival. We encourage buskers to donate part of their donations back to the Festival and many do. To learn more about street performing, please click here.

HOW CAN I GET MY COMMUNITY INVOLVED WITH THE FESTIVAL?

Contact our Programming Department! We’d love to hear from you, and we’re always open to incorporating new communities into the Festival.

CAN I APPEAL IF I AM NOT SELECTED?

There is no “appeal process” as such. We program all of the available slots, so the only way you will be assigned a slot if you are waitlisted is if someone else drops out. Please let us know if you are interested in being assigned a slot even during the Festival itself—sometimes slots unexpectedly open up. You can sign up for the waitlist at Performer Registration.

CAN I APPLY IF I AM A VISUAL ARTIST?

Folklife has limited space for exhibiting two-dimensional art and sculptures. Usually, that space is associated with the annual Cultural Focus or in partnership with The Ver(a) Gallery. If you are interested in participating in Folklife as a visual artist, please give us a call and we can determine if there might be a space for you.

I DON’T KNOW HOW TO FILL OUT AN ONLINE APPLICATION, BUT I AM A GREAT MUSICIAN. CAN YOU OFFER ANY HELP?

Sure! We would be happy to send you a paper application. Additionally, if you call the Programming Department by the application deadline, we can fill out the application with you over the phone. But you will still need to send in a sample of your performance and fill out a tech sheet. Feel free to call us at (206) 684-4189.

CAN I APPLY TO SCHEDULE A SHOWCASE?

If you represent a particular genre or community, and you can bring several other groups or performers together to participate in a showcase, we’d be interested in talking with you! Please give us a call or email us.

IF I APPLY AND AM NOT SELECTED, DOES THAT AFFECT MY ABILITY TO BE SELECTED IN FUTURE YEARS?

No! We encourage you to apply again, as the circumstances may differ each year.

IF I MISS THE DEADLINE, CAN I STILL APPLY?

Yes, you can! BUT—we give preference to those applications that make it in by the deadline.

WHY ISN’T THERE MORE ___________________?

If you don’t see enough of your favorite kind of performer at Folklife, let us know!

WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY CULTURAL FOCUS?

For over a decade we have presented what we call the Cultural Focus that features a Pacific Northwest community through special performances, panels, workshops, exhibitions, demonstrations, and activities. It’s a way for us to connect more in-depth with the people that we serve and empower their artistic expressions and cultural traditions. There is a new Cultural Focus each year – for a complete list of past Cultural Focus themes, visit here.

Have a great idea for a Cultural Focus in the future? Email us!

APPLICANT RESOURCES

Stage Plot: Word Version

Stage Plot: PDF Version

Code of Conduct