Young Tradition Festival is an annual event held on the first full weekend (Friday-Sunday) and the weekdays prior in May. It’s a weeklong celebration of multi-generational relationships from diverse traditional music and dance communities. Children, youth, and young adults are the major focus, as well as those who support them as teachers, mentors, friends, and families. The Festival is an attempt to cultivate and feature intergenerational sharing. Participants share what inspires them, what they have learned, and their ability to perform, and to be inspired by and inspiring to others.
The Festival is scheduled to return to a full set of programs and activities in 2022:
- Monday, May 2 through Friday, May 6, 7 pm evening concerts featuring artists and guests from and inspired by Quebec (‘so near, yet so far’): Grosse Isle (Monday), É.T.É (Tuesday), Zigue (Wednesday), Babineau/Chartrand (Thursday) and the Young Tradition Touring Group and Young Tradition Youth Commission (Friday)
- Saturday, May 7, 1 pm Contest Finals, featuring 10 finalists from dozens of entries and past contest winners, and TBA guest performers
- Saturday, May 7, 6 pm Showcase Concert featuring a wide variety of young musicians and dancers performing with their mentors, teachers and/or parents, including Sarah Hotchkiss, John Mowad, Fiona Stowell, Annabel Moynihan, Romy Munkres, Oliver Scanlon, Gerlisa Garrett, Gopal Niroula, the Butanese Nepali Cultural Heritage Dance Group, Migmar Tsering, Pete Sutherland, Aline Mukiza, Michele Choiniere, Lisa Ornstein, Andrew Munkres, Kristin Bolton, and the YTV Touring Group. Several combinations include those supported by the Vermont Folklife Center’s Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program, celebrating its 30th anniversary in 2020.
- Sunday, May 8, 3 pm Tribute titled 'The Singers/The Songs' honoring Larry Gordon, Tony Barrand, and Norma Waterson hosted by Windborne. Guests include Village Harmony alums (Avery Book, Lila LeFebvre, Ethan Sudan, Anna Trowbridge, Pete Sutherland, Magda Sharff & Fiona Stowell), Heidi Wilson, Robert Resnik & Mary McGinniss, Tim Eriksen, Andy Davis, Arthur Davis, Fred Breunig, and others.
Host musician at most events including post-concert Festival Club sessions is Lisa Ornstein. Other activities include Instrument Petting installations on Church Street Marketplace on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday afternoon, school, hospital, and senior center visits Monday through Friday, Festival Club at Ri Ra, and a flash mob performance on Church Street near City Hall on Saturday afternoon.
The Festival is presented by Young Tradition Vermont with Burlington City Arts and the Vermont Folklife Center with support from Church Street Marketplace, Nelson Family Foundation, Québec Government Office Boston, Turrell Fund, Vermont Arts Council, National Endowment for the Arts and others TBA.
Tickets and reservations are available now on Eventbrite:
- 5/2/22 – 5/8/22 all festival/all events tickets
- 5/2/22 – 5/8/22 livestream tickets
- 5/2/22 Grosse Isle concert tickets
- 5/3/22 É.T.É concert tickets
- 5/4/22 Zigue concert tickets
- 5/5/22 Babineau/Chartrand concert tickets
- 5/6/22 Youth Commission and Touring Group concert tickets
- 5/7/22 Contest Finals tickets
- 5/7/22 Showcase concert tickets
- 5/8/22 Tribute tickets
For more information contact YTV Executive Director Mark Sustic or 2022 Festival Manager Danielle Devlin.
