"Everyone thought it was a crazy idea," says Dawson with a laugh as she recalls how they came up with the idea of an outdoor concert featuring Newfoundland music. It was "a really novel idea at the time. We started planning the festival in the spring; we raised money for a program, we billeted people and the musicians played for free." She believes that it was a major turning point for Newfoundland music and culture. With Gerald Campbell from Branch and Caroline Brennan from Ship Cove and their Irish traditional style, it was a seeding ground, a pivotal point in changing values, of increasing the importance of Newfoundland culture. Dawson, one of the founding members of the St. John's Folk Arts Council, remembers that weekend in 1977 like it was yesterday. The first Newfoundland and Labrador Folk Festival in Bannerman Park played to an audience of two hundred. Twenty-five years later, at the same downtown venue, thousands are expected to celebrate and enjoy the province's eclectic music scene.

In the 1960s and 1970s a generation of Newfoundlanders was critically examining the impact of Confederation on their culture. This new generation looked for "unheard-in-Canada" traditional music. Performers like Figgy Duff thought that the commonly published songs were insipid partly because they were so well known in the rest of Canada but mostly because they were associated with what was perceived as the "Newfie" stereotype. The members of Figgy Duff did their own research, touring and scouring many parts of Newfoundland for their songs. While professors were teaching students to lose their dialects at Memorial University, the St. John's Folk Arts Council was "discovering" musicians to perform in front of appreciative, albeit small audiences.

In the beginning the festival was small but it's a natural evolution," said Dawson. "The music was more traditional. It was unstylistic, unaccompanied, informal and spontaneous." The earlier festivals had more of an emphasis on non-commercial performers. Back then, there were lots of performers from outside St. John's; the Folk Arts Council received grants to get people from communities off the Avalon to perform. "It's much more sophisticated and organized now," says Atlantic Union's Scott Schillereff. He played the second festival with the CFA Band. Schillereff remembers the plywood stage with the little "St. John's Folk Arts Council" banner. The stage was more or less where the stage is now but wasn't much bigger than a garage - 10 feet by 20 feet. "It was pretty low-key, it wasn't a big deal," he says, "It was a smallish audience and everyone knew one another." There was more banter on the stage and there were fewer "big names". There was also a nod to other cultures; one early festival had an Aboriginal tent camp set up in the park with sweat lodges and food.

Many of the people interviewed for this story couched their words but underlying their comments were reminiscences of more innocent days. Back then, there was no beer tent, no merchandise and no tapes or CDs. Colin Carrigan, a well-known fiddle player and instrument maker, says about the earlier festivals, "The flavour was different. Not better, different." Some believe the festival alienated people when it went to multiple stages and added concession stands, trailers, craft tables and the much-debated beer tent. It may have alienated some up-and-coming performers or those who are used to performing only in kitchens. Neil Rosenberg, a folklore professor at Memorial and performer at the first festival, and many others who weren't brave enough to speak on the record, believes the success of the present-day festival is at the cost of the original ideal. Rosenberg enjoyed hearing old-timers like Rufus Guinchard, Pius Power and John Joe English sing unaccompanied and believes they would never have been discovered in the folk festival of today because people have to submit CDs and CVs in order to get accepted. Schillereff remembers the storytellers, like John Joe English, on the hottest of days wearing suits to perform.

For Colin Carrigan, the festival represents many first-time experiences. He recalls his first performance at the festival in the early 80s in Pippy Park. It was also his first time ever on a stage. "It was the one gig during the year on stage," he recalls. He remembers that the weather was foggy because the Scottish small pipe player complained about the tuning of his instrument. He related his feelings about being exposed to music he'd never heard before, including the Scottish small pipes. "It was a strange experience to be exposed to something you never had a conception of," he says. He also recalls that he was lucky enough to see Emile Benoit for the first time on stage at the festival and that the experience was the inspiration behind the creation of his first band, Twilliger. The after-parties are a big deal; this is where musician-alliances are formed. Bands begin from jams and meetings at the festival. "They're a time for getting silly playing with people you normally wouldn't see," says Carrigan. As he eloquently puts it, "It's the emotional Sheila's brush for musicians."

The folk festival reflects the collaboration of local people and people from other places. "Look at the names," Rosenberg challenges. "There are as many people involved from outside as inside." Rosenberg's band, Crooked Stovepipe, is received well at the festivals but they've always included Newfoundland songs in their repertoire. The ironic thing is, that while non-Newfoundlanders might be granted less stage time than the Newfoundland traditional acts, it was mainlanders who got the festival off the ground. "I certainly enjoy being included", said Rosenberg. He is strongly offended by the term "CFA" and says of it, "We're second-class citizens, written out of the history books. It's racism and it's really strong."

There's always been flack from armchair critics about the types of music played at the festival and there is some disagreement about what is to be considered traditional music. "It's good to have a variety of music and not just to focus on traditional music," said Schillereff. Although country music is very big in the rest of the province, the Avalon-centric festival doesn't include it in the programming. Case in point, Simani has only played once or twice over the years. "That's folk music, too. It's important to embrace it so that the festival doesn't stagnate," said Dawson, "while emphasizing the importance of traditional singing, which many believe isn't heard enough at the festival anymore." Schillereff believes that groups like the Punters are "turbo-charging" traditional music. They're not emasculating it, he says. "They're dedicated and devoted but packaging it to interest the listener."

Professional, well-known acts such as the Punters, the Masterless Men, the Panting Brothers, the Irish Descendants and Ron Hynes will perform at this year's festival along with performers who played at the very first festival. The program also includes up-and-coming young musicians including Judith Morrissey and Sarah, Jessie and Maggie Panting; you know a festival is well established when the children of some of the performers at the early festivals are playing! This year's event features performers from different parts of the country and will include special and surprise guests from Ireland in celebration of the twenty-fifth anniversary.

The festival is successful because of, not in spite of, its critics. This diversity of opinion keeps the music scene in the province alive and well. While new groups like the Punters are keeping traditional Newfoundland music alive, Anita Best is ensuring that recitations don't die out, and groups like Atlantic Union and musicians like Delf Hohmann expose the audiences to music from faraway shores. People like Carrigan think we're growing the next generation of musicians. Musical taste is clearly generational, and represents the values that a particular generation wishes to attain. So, whether your first memory of the folk festival is from one of the early ones when John White, who had tippled a bit too much in the afternoon, fell off the stage, or one of the later ones, when the Ennis Sisters first performed and received the only standing ovation of the weekend, chances are you're going to want to spend the first weekend in August in Bannerman Park, whatever your reasons might be.