Thirty-Fourth New Jersey Folk Festival Celebrates German-American Music, Culture

NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. – The New Jersey Folk Festival will feature German-American music and culture when it convenes for the 34th time on Saturday, April 26, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., but visitors can find a smorgasbord of folk music, from Celtic to bluegrass to gospel when they visit they gather in front of historic Woodlawn on Douglass Campus of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey. The festival will happen, rain or shine, and admission is free.

The Folk Festival is the yearlong project of the folk festival management class in the Department of American Studies at Rutgers, taught by folklorist Angus Kress Gillespie. Those enrolled in the course as first-year students or sophomores end up, as seniors, literally running the show. It is held the same day as the Ag Field Day at the School of Environmental and Biological Sciences on the adjacent Cook Campus.

Among this year’s acts are the Goschenhoppen Strolling Fiddlers, the Bayern Verein Dancers and Bernie’s Orchestra – all dedicated to German and German-American music. The Goschenhoppen Strolling Fiddlers take their name from a region of Montgomery County, Pa., settled by German immigrants in the 18th and early 19th centuries, and are part of the Goschenhoppen Historians, a volunteer group founded 40 years ago to preserve Pennsylvania German culture. They specialize in German and German-American music of the 18th and 19th centuries.

The Bayern Verein Dancers are based in Clark Township in Union County. Since their founding by a group of Bavarian immigrants in Newark in 1930, the group has performed traditional Bavarian dances at folk festivals throughout the eastern United States and Germany.

Bernie’s Orchestra, a five-piece, German-American dance band, has been entertaining audiences since 1967. Bernie’s Orchestra, led by Bernie Bunger of Piscataway, combines an accordion, trumpet, percussion, guitar, trombone, saxophone, clarinet, flute, baritone horn and alpine horn to produce its unique sound.

While the New Jersey Folk Festival features music and culture from a particular tradition each year, it includes a rich mix of music on each of its three stages – Skylands, Pinelands and Shore.

The Skylands Stage is the largest stage of the festival where the featured acts will perform and awards will be presented. This year, the New Jersey Folk Festival Lifetime Achievement Award will be given to Jim Murphy, the bluegrass singer and songwriter. Singer and story teller Jim Albertson and Celtic harpist Kathleen McCool will emcee the Skylands Stage.

The Shore Stage is home to the singer/songwriter showcase, emceed this year by Kathy DeAngelo and Dan O’Dea, both Rutgers alumni and former members of the folk festival management class.

The Pinelands Stage is the workshop stage, where musicians, folklorists, singers and story tellers gather to jam, swap stories and discuss the tricks of their various trades. Spook Handy, the well-known folksinger and songwriter and New Jersey Folk Festival veteran, will perform on the Pinelands Stage.

The festival and field day together typically draw tens of thousands of people. The 90th annual Ag Field Day includes animal shows featuring student exhibitions of dairy cattle, goats, horses, pigs and sheep; the New Jersey 4-H Dog Show; plant and flower sales; student club activities; and tours of Rutgers Gardens. More information about the New Jersey Folk Festival is available at www.njfolkfest.rutgers.edu; more information about Ag Field Day is available at agfielday.rutgers.edu.