Written by Chris Stone, Co-Artistic Director, National Folk Festival
Sixty years is long enough to get comfortable. It’s also long enough to risk irrelevance. The National Folk Festival has lasted because it hasn’t just tried to preserve traditions; it keeps them moving. And in 2026, as we mark our 60th year, that movement is important.
The Festival began in the late 1960s with a simple idea: culture isn’t something you consume, it’s something you make, together. Songs carried politics and the stories of working lives, and dance floors were social spaces. People gathered not to watch from a distance, but to take part, and give a little of themselves to their ever-changing traditions. That instinct still shapes our program today and remains this Festival’s point of difference.
You’ll see it in the artists taking part this year. Steve Poltz turns storytelling into something gloriously unpredictable and insightful. Irish Mythen brings songwriting that tackles complex themes, powerfully delivered. Trouble in the Kitchen showcases Irish traditions with energy and authenticity. T3HO. take Finnish folk to urgent, exploratory, novel places. Karen Lee Andrews threads her cultural routes through soul and blues, whilst Bobby Alu brings Pacific warmth and cultural perspective to the Festival. Natalie and Brittany Haas entwine fiddle traditions from both sides of the Atlantic, while Elias Alexander stretches piping into wild new sonic territory. ‘Folk’ is not one sound. It never has been. In a sense, ‘Folk’ is less a genre than a way of gathering that connects, celebrates, sustains, and develops traditions, grounded in culture and community, to hand on to the next generation.
This folk gathering has always had sharp edges. Protest music has been core to the Festival since the beginning. This year, the special events Concert for Peace and Songs of Protest don’t treat that history as nostalgia; they lean into it. Music still has something to say about the world we’re living in. It still has the power to question, connect, and unsettle.
Other histories are being acknowledged more directly too. Also, since the beginning, queer identity has been present but rarely named on the stage. In our 60th year, we’re not skirting that story. The special event, 60 Years of Queer, brings it forward, with Judy Small joining as a special guest to share stories and reflect on the shifts she helped shape. Joining Judy will be artists like Irish Mythen, who stands directly in that lineage, open, visible, and uncompromising. When the Queer Ceilidh kicks off, that history lands on the dance floor, where all the best things in life should be celebrated.
First Nations culture runs through the Festival in ways that are educational and inspirational. Maatakitj brings Noongar songs and movement grounded in cultural authority. Wiradjuri Echoes share stories from their community. Richie Allan helps keep the Festival anchored on Ngunnawal Country. Celestial Emu, inspired by the Gamilaroi “Emu in the Sky” constellation, places Mark Atkins’ didgeridoo alongside the young musicians of the Canberra Youth Orchestra, bringing deep cultural exchange, while inviting these young folk and Festival audiences to contemplate the ongoing importance and relevance of First Nation storytelling in our community.
If there’s one thing that keeps the Festival from becoming static, though, it’s participation. Windborne don’t just perform; they lead the Festival Choir, teaching songs by ear before a shared performance in the Farewell Concert. The Festival Strings Ensemble with Apolline and Homebru rehearse daily, bringing community string players of all backgrounds and abilities together. Suara Dance’s workshop will fill the Piazza with first-time Randai dancers, a martial-art-infused dance using Galembong pants that they supply. There are slow, introductory sessions for those new to informal jamming each morning. Bring your instrument. Buy a new one. Join a workshop. Step into a dance. The line between artists and audience is deliberately blurred.
Families and young folk are explicitly welcomed and celebrated with practical spaces like the Family Marquee, and services like the parents’ room and cloak room to make things easy. Kids spin through ceilidhs and trad raves designed just for them. Our Young Folk program gives up-and-coming artists a mainstage platform for their art, while inspiring their peers and those who look up to them to take the stage themselves at the Youth Blackboard at Sam’s Caravan. Older generations return to repertoire in special session Songs We Sang in the Sixties. Over five days, concerts, dance, craft, spoken word, workshops, and sessions sit side by side, and feed into each other like an annual village gathering.
The Exhibition Park in Canberra becomes a joyous Festival Village and you’re invited to be a part of it. With an amazing selection of food and drinks available, beautiful stalls with handmade offerings to browse, time for reunions with friends and family plus new folks to meet, it’s the perfect place to be over the long weekend 2 – 6 April.
In a world that increasingly nudges us towards passive consumption, the National Folk Festival continues to offer something more – inviting, inspiring, and supporting everyone to show up, take part, create something new, and leave transformed. Come and join our Sixty-year celebration, and add your voice, passion, and energy to the collective momentum as the Festival moves into the future.
To learn more or to book your tickets, visit folkfestival.org.au
