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April 05, 2006
Suwannee Springfest (and other stuff)
On Thursday, March 23 we left for the Spirit of the Suwannee Park in Live Oak, Florida, for the Suwannee Springfest.
After setting up camp (which went surprisingly smoothly, in spite of my inexperience) we went to the main music hall for the songwriters’ competition.
Sheryl was one of six finalists, and the only female artist in the competition.
She didn’t win, but I thought she did a great job, considering her throat was sore, and the pick-up on her guitar refused to work, forcing her to use a guitar mic, thus limiting her ability to move on stage.
I can’t remember the name of the winner, which goes to show you the ephemeral nature of show business.
Unfortunately, the weather turned cold and wet on our first night camping. We managed to stay dry, but not all that warm.
On Friday, we managed to see some good shows, featuring artists such as Tamerlin, (a local folk group) Uncle Earl (an all-female bluegrass group with a stupendous amount of talent), Buddy Miller and his band (more “Roots Rock” than folk, but a great show), and, before it got too cold, Mavis Staples and her band (definitely not folk, but the crowd loved it).
Our second night of camping proved to be the longest night of my life. The temperature dropped down to the low thirties, and we just couldn’t get warm.
Well I’m not going to dwell on the cold or the lack of sleep.
Sometime down the road I’ll talk about my impressions of the festival and the folk music scene in general.
We traveled home on Saturday, and that evening I played keyboard for our friends Spike and Sandy (Sandz of Time) at the Majestic Restaurant in Titusville. Sheryl and I weren’t feeling too great, but we still had a good time. (And the pickup on Sheryl’s guitar miraculously started working again!)
Now we had one day to get ready to go to Nashville!
Posted by leon at April 5, 2006 03:24 PM