CityFolk Festival

CityFolk Festival, formerly known as the Ottawa Folk Festival, is an annual folk music festival held in the Canadian capital. The event takes place on the Great Lawn at Lansdowne Park each September, running over four or five days.

The festival was founded in 1994 by station manager of the community radio station CKCU-FM Max Wallace, local singer-songwriter Chris White, and a large committee of volunteers. Wallace served as the festival’s director for its first two editions. The inaugural festival was held on Victoria Island, as small island in the Ottawa river located between Ottawa and Gatineau. The next year, the event was moved to Britannia Park that hosted it until 2010.

In 2010, the Ottawa Folk Festival faced serious problems caused by a heavy debt-load and extremely bad weather conditions on the final day of the festival. The Ottawa Bluesfest organizers took over the running of the festival and moved it to Hog’s Back Park starting with the 2011 edition. Three years later, the festival was renamed CityFolk and relocated to its current venue, Lansdowne Park.

CityFolk’s new location (near the center of Ottawa and Carleton University) and more diverse line-up helped attract younger audiences. Thanks to its new organizers and a bigger budget, the festival was expanded to four days. Its line-up now features well-known Canadian and international performers.

However, even after the rebranding CityFolk retained the things it was known and loved for, such as daytime workshops and jam sessions, small stages for intimate acoustic performances, an impressive variety of music genres and styles, concerts and special events for children, and an emphasis on environmental protection and educational initiatives.

Like many other outdoor music festivals, CityFest has the main stage that hosts headlining acts and several sound tents for emerging performers who play short sets. Sometimes sound tents also host improvised jam sessions and unexpected collaborations. The program of the festival is focused on pop folk, bluegrass, rock and blues, but CityFest also embraces traditional folk and other genres.

Over the years, CityFolk have welcomed many well-known artists from Canada and abroad. Past headliners have included Van Morrison, Of Monsters and Men, Walk Off the Earth, Lorde, Kendrick Lamar, Joss Stone, Bon Iver, Arlo Guthrie, Natalie MacMaster, Jesse Cook, and many others.