The 66th National Folk Festival celebrates the rich traditional folk, ethnic and tribal cultures of the people of Maine and the United States. The nation’s earliest immigrants and settlers brought the music, arts and customs of their countries of origin to their new homeland, where they encountered the land’s First Nations.

Those people worked to maintain their unique traditions while adapting to new conditions and a rich confluence of cultures. The musical traditions we think of as quintessentially “American” – jazz, blues, gospel, bluegrass, old-time, Tex-Mex, Cajun, zydeco and others – spring from the interaction and intertwining of these varied cultural roots.

Today, renewed immigration from an even wider range of nations brings new sounds, dances, foods and customs to enrich our American cultural landscape. The National Folk Festival celebrates this diversity through performances by our nation’s finest traditional artists.

Dexter Ardoin and the Creole Ramblers

Creole and zydeco music

Friday: 9:15 p.m. Kenduskeag; Saturday: 1 p.m. Railroad, 5:30 p.m. Kenduskeag; Sunday: 1 p.m. Heritage (Accordion Traditions with Dexter Ardoin, Rodney Rodriguez, Mick McAuley, Pastelle LeBlanc and Walt Mahovlich), 4:15 p.m. Kenduskeag

Carrying forward the legacy of one of the first families of Louisiana French music, Dexter Ardoin and the Creole Ramblers bring the irresistible sounds of black French Creole and zydeco music to Bangor.

The band performs versions of the joyous, heartfelt music that has been part of the Ardoin family repertoire for generations. Dexter learned to play the accordion from his famous grandfather, Bois Sec Ardoin, a keeper of the music. He also learned from his father, Morris, and his uncles, whose music is at the roots of contemporary zydeco.

The Ardoin family represents a veritable dynasty of Louisiana Creole musicians: Dexter’s great-uncle Amede Ardoin, whose 1929 recordings were the first made by a Louisiana French musician, played throughout the region with the legendary Cajun fiddler Dennis McGee. Their grandfather Alphonse “Bois Sec” Ardoin began his musical career in his older cousin Amede’s rhythm section but soon became a master of the style’s lead instrument, the accordion. With his friend fiddler Canray Fontenot, Bois Sec Ardoin brought old-style Creole music to the world at the 1996 Newport Folk Festival. In 1986 he received a National Heritage Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts in honor of his skill and work as a tradition bearer. Bois Sec’s sons, including Dexter’s father, Morris, carried on the Ardoin family traditions as Creole music blended with popular African-American sounds to produce zydeco.

Springing from the rich cultural gumbo of South Louisiana and East Texas, zydeco combines traditional black French Creole music, closely related to the local Cajun tradition, with blues and R&B to create irresistible dance music. Zydeco is said to take its name from the idiomatic title of a popular song “Les Haricots (Zydeco) Sont Pas Sale” – “The Snapbeans Aren’t Salty” – which describes the culinary privations of hard times. But even hard times become the inspiration for joyful sounds in Louisiana.

Dexter Ardoin and the Creole Ramblers are unique among younger zydeco bands in that they also perform the black Creole French music that is part of the Ardoin family heritage and a predecessor of zydeco. At the heart of the older Creole music is the fiddle, an instrument now generally excluded from zydeco. The Creole Ramblers have two fiddlers, D’Jalma Garnier III and Cedric Watson. Dexter Ardoin and Garnier showcase the interplay between accordion and fiddle that is central to the Creole style and harkens back to the music of Amede Ardoin and Dennis McGee. Other members of the Creole Ramblers include Blake Castille on guitar, Gus Ardoin on bass and Keith Sonnier on drums.

Vishten

Acadian

Saturday: 3:30 p.m. Penobscot, 9:15 p.m. Penobscot; Sunday: 3:15 p.m. Railroad, 5:15 p.m. Penobscot

Vishten’s music is a hardy mixture of Acadian, Irish and Scottish styles with fiery fiddling and powerful step dancing front and center. Formed in 2000 on their native Prince Edward Island, Vishten is a quintet of young, traditional Acadian musician-dancers founded by twin sisters Pastelle LeBlanc (accordion, piano, dance) and Emmanuelle LeBlanc (bodhran, tin whistle, fiddle, piano, dance). The other group members are Remi Arsenault (guitar, bass, percussion), Megan Bergeron (piano, button accordion, dance) and Pascal Miousse (fiddle, mandolin, guitar).

Their stage show recalls the joy and energy of the Acadian “kitchen party,” informal community gatherings where all are welcome to sing, play and dance. The rhythms and melodies are inseparable and reflect a joie de vivre with flying fingers, tapping feet and an unabashed sense of celebration unique to the Acadian culture of eastern Canada .

Each member sings and contributes to the choreography and musical arrangements. During their enthusiastic performances, they work with wooden “blocs” on which they sit, dance and play, turning them into percussion instruments with their hands and feet.

In 2001, Vishten was awarded the prize for the best musical showcase at the East Coast Music Awards, eastern Canada’s version of the Grammys. In 2002, they were invited to participate in the ECMA’s opening performance. They recently toured with the famed Quebecois band La Bottine Souriante and recorded on La Bottine’s Mille Pattes record label.

In fewer than three years, Vishten has caught the eyes and ears of audiences far from Prince Edward Island. They have played major festivals from Lafayette, La., to Winnipeg, Manitoba, and all through the Maritime Provinces. They are Acadian French and thus keepers of a Canadian musical tradition older than their nation. Like the Cajuns, who are also Acadian, they’ve had to work at keeping their culture. And like the Cajuns, they do it with good humor and passion.

Reeltime Travelers

Old-time string-band music

Friday: 6 p.m. Heritage, festival kickoff; Saturday: noon Railroad, 5:15 p.m. Heritage

The Reeltime Travelers formed three years ago when four folks crossed paths in Johnson City, Tenn. Even before they played together, each had a love for mountain music and a passion to learn the stories behind it.

The old-time string-band, one of the first musical melting pots in America, brought together the African banjo and the European fiddle to create a dance music that was played in homes and at community gatherings for decades before radio or the phonograph. The Travelers learned this music from fieldwork, old recordings and the last generation of mountain folks who remember music before records. Reeltime music adds new songs and tunes to the tradition. Bluegrass Unlimited says of the Reeltime Travelers, “This is first-rate old-time music with a contemporary twist.”

The members of the Reeltime Travelers are dedicated to more than just performing the music. Band members Roy Andrade and Thomas Sneed work at the Archives of Appalachia at Tennessee State University in Johnson City, where they document and preserve old-time music through fieldwork conducted across Tennessee and the Appalachian region. They collect oral histories from tradition keepers and make field recordings of old-time tunes and songs performed by those who still have knowledge of the musical traditions of their relatives and forebears.

Heidi Andrade, fiddler and vocalist, is known for her high-energy fiddling and dancing. She comes from a family of fiddlers and has been performing for more than 20 years.

Guitarist and vocalist Martha Scanlan’s soulful, distinctive voice rings with a timeless authenticity. On guitar, she drives the rhythm of the Reeltime Travelers.

Bassist and vocalist Brandon Story grew up in Bristol, Tenn. He began playing bluegrass in graduate school, where he started the Jelly Roll String Band, a hybrid acoustic-electric roots band.

Vocalist and mandolin player Thomas Sneed comes from a musical family in Oklahoma. The first mandolin he ever saw was his grandmother’s round-back “taterbug” mandolin, which rested atop the family piano. By the time he started attending folk and bluegrass festivals in his teens, a passionate love of traditional American music developed that continues today.

Rounding out the group is Asheville, N.C., native Roy Andrade on banjo and vocals. He began playing music at age 5, when his father introduced him to the accordion. Since then, he has performed at bluegrass and old-time gatherings from North Carolina to California.

The group has performed at numerous select venues and festivals, including the Grand Ole Opry, Bill Monroe’s Bean Blossom Festival, the Grand Targhee Bluegrass Festival, the High Sierra Music Festival, and the Northern Rockies Folk Festival. In 2002, the International Bluegrass Music Association chose the Reeltime Travelers as a showcase band. Two of Scanlan’s original songs were selected as finalists in the prestigious Chris Austin Songwriting Contest at Merlefest. They have performed with National Heritage Award-winning fiddler Ralph Blizard, singer and songwriter Ed Snodderly and old-time music guru John Herrmann. The Reeltime Travelers are performing on the Great High Mountain Tour with Alison Krauss +Union Station, Ralph Stanley and a host of other artists.

The Reeltime Travelers brings five individual voices together to mine a common well of American roots music. Traveling the country, keeping old tunes alive and expanding the canon of old-time songs, the group shows a reverence for tradition while creating its own old-time Reeltime Americana music. As No Depression states, “The Reeltime Travelers are transporting a timeless old-time sound to 21st century audiences of all generations.”

The Birmingham Sunlights

African-American a cappella gospel quartet

Friday: 8:15 p.m. Penobscot; Saturday: 3:15 p.m. Heritage, 5:15 p.m. Two Rivers; Sunday: noon Railroad with the Larry Gillis Band

The members of The Birmingham Sunlights are joyous keepers of a deep American tradition: the art of unaccompanied, four-part gospel harmony singing. This traditional music has an especially brilliant heritage in the group’s home, Jefferson County, Ala.

Organized and led by music director-lead tenor James Alex Taylor, this delightful sextet includes his brother Steve James, who sings baritone; big brother Barry Taylor, who sings bass; and lead singers Bill Graves, baritone; Wayne Williams, tenor; and Reginald “Ricky” Speights, baritone.

Encompassing the cities of Birmingham, Bessemer, Fairfield and their rural suburbs, Jefferson County is the heartland of African-American a cappella, gospel-quartet singing, and home to one of the richest regional traditions in American music.

Local quartet activity began in the period immediately after World War I and was incubated in the steel mills, mines and related industries that provided jobs for a large percentage of the area’s black residents. By 1930, Jefferson County had earned a reputation as one of the nation’s great centers of gospel-quartet singing.

With deep respect for Jefferson County’s musical heritage, the Sunlights sought out and received priceless musical instruction from older local quartet masters, repositories of decades of accumulated wisdom in vocal arrangement, quartet technique and traditional repertoire. Under the tutelage of some of Alabama’s most respected a cappella gospel quartets such as the Sterling Jubilees, Shelby County Big Four and Four Eagles, members of the Sunlights have established themselves as proper heirs to this heritage.

The group, however, does not limit itself to the traditional quartet repertoire. It also brings fresh, original ideas to the a cappella quartet format.

Group leader and arranger James Alex Taylor and the other members have developed a repertoire of impressive original gospel compositions to augment their traditional songbook. Their compositions show the musical influence of some of the classic quartets of the 1950s and 1960s, particularly the Soul Stirrers and Sensational Nightingales.

After making believers of the home folks – not an easy thing to do in Jefferson County – the Sunlights captivated audiences across the United States and abroad. Goodwill tours of Africa and the Caribbean were received with wild enthusiasm.

Of the group’s first festival performance, respected music critic Dave Perry wrote: “There’s always one act that arrives, almost unheard of, to electrify unsuspecting audiences. This year, that group seems to be the … Sunlights … [which has] been earning standing ovations around town for its silky-smooth harmonies and impassioned lead singing.”

The members of the Sunlights are not full-time, professional musicians, though certainly not for lack of talent. They each pursue other careers and are devoted to their families and their religion. All were born and raised in Jefferson County.

There’s a question that is often asked about the Sunlights: Why is the singing called quartet singing when there are six singers rather than four? It is quartet singing because the music has four parts. The Sunlights often “double” a part for depth or emphasis.

Cape Breton Kitchen Party

Cape Breton music and dance

Saturday: noon Heritage, 8:15 p.m. Penobscot; Sunday: 12:30 p.m. Kenduskeag, 2:15 p.m. Heritage

Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, is one of North America’s traditional cultural hearths. Like Southwest Louisiana or Grayson and Carroll counties in Virginia’s Blue Ridge, Cape Breton Island is home to a determined, persevering people who cling to traditions. Their traditional music, dance and Scottish Gaelic language forms have been handed down for generations from their Scottish Highland forebears. They celebrate Cape Breton’s deep, rich musical heritage at this year’s National Folk Festival by focusing on the dancing and fiddling traditions of families in and around the small, picturesque Inverness County community of Mabou. The Cape Breton Kitchen Party consists of Glenn Graham and Andrea Beaton on fiddle, Troy MacGillivray on fiddle and piano, Gerry Deveau on spoons, Patrick Gillis on guitar, and Cape Breton dancer Allison Beaton.

Graham’s roots go deep in the traditional Gaelic music of Cape Breton. Four generations of his family have produced dozens of musicians, including fiddlers, piano players, pipers, Gaelic singers, composers and dancers. Graham is the grandson of Donald Angus Beaton, one of the best known and most revered fiddlers from Cape Breton Island.

Andrea Beaton is an energetic young fiddler who comes from a long line of musical talent. She is the daughter of Kinnon and Betty Beaton, granddaughter of the great fiddler and composer Donald Angus Beaton. She has been playing the fiddle and composing tunes since she was 13 years old.

Allison Beaton, Andrea’s sister, began highland dancing when she was 5 years old and has been step dancing at concerts, dances and festivals ever since.

MacGillivray is a multitalented musician who was born into a rich musical tradition. For generations, the MacGillivrays on his father’s side and the MacDonalds on his mother’s side have been proprietors of the Gaelic tradition in Antigonish, Nova Scotia. MacGillivray began impressing audiences with his step dancing at age 6 and soon developed into a capable piano and fiddle soloist. He is most recognized by instrumentalists and vocalists alike for his unique approach to piano accompaniment.

Hailing from Belle Cote, Cape Breton, Deveau has been an ambassador for Cape Breton traditional music for decades. A Canadian spoon-playing multichampion, he has set the standard for flamboyancy, timing and dexterity on one of folk music’s original accompanying instruments.

From Scotsville, Cape Breton, Gillis grew up with traditional music being played almost constantly in his home. His father, uncle and two older brothers played the fiddle, giving Gillis a great appreciation and understanding of Celtic music. Being left-handed and only having right-handed guitars around, Gillis learned to play upside down and backward.

Buster B. Jones and Brooks E. Robertson

Fingerpicked guitar

Saturday: Guitar Traditions at 1 p.m. Penobscot, 4:30 p.m. Children’s Area; Sunday: 12:15 p.m. Children’s Area with The Quebe Sisters, Young Hot Shots at 2:30 p.m. Railroad, 4:45 p.m. Two Rivers

Buster B. Jones is a master of the fingerpicked guitar. He is known as a blazing-fast and dynamic player, whom admiring fans in France nicknamed “The Machine Gun.” As Chet Atkins stated: “Buster B. Jones is the best fingerpicker I’ve heard since Jerry Reed. He plays like he’s double-parked.” He never took formal lessons but developed his mastery of the guitar through trial and error and by modeling his playing after that of masters such as Atkins and Reed. Not only is Jones a great player, he is also a master teacher. Joining Jones for his performances at the National Folk Festival is his prized student Brooks E. Robertson, who is 14 and hails from Eugene, Ore.

Raised in Ames, Iowa, Jones began playing guitar and mandolin at an early age, following in the footsteps of his older brother Ron, whom Jones idolized as the “best left-handed guitarist ever.” By his midteens, it was apparent that Jones had a special gift for music. He was the 1990 winner of the National Fingerpicking Championship and is often asked to play for other guitar players at conventions such as the Chet Atkins Appreciation Society in Nashville and National Association of Music Merchants. As Dirty Linen magazine states, “Buster B. Jones is, plain and simple, amazing.”

He has produced 10 teaching videos for Stefan Grossman’s Guitar Workshop and is working on a new compact disc and an independent video project, both due out this summer. Perhaps his most impressive recent project is becoming a teacher to Robertson.

Playing for only two years, Robertson is simply astonishing. He was selected as a finalist for Prairie Home Companion’s Talent from Twelve to Twenty contest in May 2004. His teacher, Jones, always had wanted to play on the radio program, so when Robertson entered, Jones lent him his guitar to play. Robertson won the competition. Festival organizers heard the broadcast of the show and were determined to bring this young player to Bangor for the National Folk Festival. Robertson’s goal this year is to win the fingerpicking guitar championships in Winfield, Kan., in September.

In addition to performing at the National Folk Festival, Robertson and Jones will have performed at several high-profile festivals this summer, including the Montreal Jazz Festival. They also have performed at the Nokie Edwards Music Festival in Eugene, the Chet Atkins Appreciation Society in Nashville, the Great Woods Music Festival in Canada and the Guitars for Life benefit in France.

Grace Chang

Chinese guzheng performer

Saturday: 1:45 p.m. Two Rivers; Sunday: 1:15 p.m. Children’s Area

Grace Chang is an expert performer on the guzheng, or Chinese zither, which originated in China more than 2,500 years ago. A plucked instrument with 13 to 25 strings, its earliest known versions were constructed of bamboo and silk. It became popular both in the imperial court and among the common people. Various forms of the instrument appear throughout Korea, Mongolia, Vietnam and many other Asian regions. The Japanese koto is a descendant of the Chinese guzheng.

Ancient Chinese documents describe the sound of the guzheng as “touching the heavens above and the gods and spirits below.” A nimble-fingered player can bring forth from the guzheng the sounds of flowers blossoming or typhoons raging.

The expressiveness of the guzheng, especially in the hands of a master player such as Chang, represents Chinese music at its most beautiful.

Chang arrived in the United States in 1984 and attended the University of Minnesota School of Music, studying music theory and composition. She is director of the Chinese Guzheng Music Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y. Over the last 25 years, she has studied various styles of classical Chinese guzheng music with famous musicians and master teachers, such as Der-Ling Wei, Kuao-Shing Chen, Yan Zhang, Changyun Wang and Weisan Liu. Her performances include numerous recitals in Taiwan, Japan, Korea and throughout the United States.

Chang writes and teaches guzheng music at the Chinese Guzheng Music Center, Southern Westchester and Northern Westchester Chinese School, Rockland Chinese School, and Greensburg Community Center in New York.

At the festival, Chang will provide musical accompaniment for the Chinese rod puppetry shows and perform as a soloist.