Ferrum College’s 38th annual Blue Ridge Folklife Festival presented a variety of new workshops as well as the Ferrum museum’s new operating moonshine still. The festival – a Crooked Road Music Trail “Major Venue” – featured four stages of the region’s best fiddle-and-banjo, bluegrass, gospel and blues music, as well as storytelling. The festival also featured more than 50 old-time crafts, two dozen country foods, hundreds of show cars, horse pulling, mule jumping, coon dog racing, farm machinery demos, heirloom apples and vegetable judging in celebrating the rich heritage and traditions of the region.
“The Blue Ridge Folklife Festival is the largest event of its kind in Virginia, and there’s nothing like it in the Commonwealth,” said Roddy Moore, director of Ferrum College’s Blue Ridge Institute & Museum. “The festival features performers, artisans, foods and activities not found at typical craft shows, fairs and festivals. Our festival participants are the real thing, sharing folk traditions that have been a part of their families and communities for years. ”
We come back to Ferrum for this every year! It is like homecoming to come across campus in the morning of a fall Folklife Festival day!
First time visitor. Stopped by to see the dulcimer exhibit at the museum. Thoroughly enjoyed the festival. Great fun!!