Voegele to open Village Folk Festival on Memorial Day
By Charles Cassady
happenings
Published May 25, 2005

American Greetings has done a lot for the Cleveland community and culture in general. They've given us the Care Bears, Holly Hobbie and Robert Crumb. And, if you want to think of it this way, the Village Folk Festival at Bay Village is also a fringe-benefit.

That's because the impresario behind it is Bay resident Robert Lanning, a managing editor at AG. His job put him in touch with Northeast Ohio writer/illustrator Jim Gill, who not only has his own line of amusing cards but is also a folk singer. "Two years ago we did something we called 'An Evening of Folk Music and Bluegrass.' And we had a pretty good turnout with that in the Community House."

This Monday — Memorial Day — the event returns, in grander fashion, as the Village Folk Festival, in a bigger venue now (Bay Village High School auditorium) and with three big singer-songwriter acts from the folk-acoustic field.

Kate Voegele

Opening the all-ages show will be Kate Voegele, a Bay Village teenager who started performing as a freshman and has since been booked locally and nationally (including at Farm Aid in 2004, along with Dave Matthews, Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp). Voegele has issued two EPs, one entitled "Louder Than Years" and the other, recorded in Los Angeles, called "The Other Side," which brought her much attention as an up-and-coming talent.

Jim Gill

And, of course, Jim Gill is out of the inkwell and on board as the second-act entertainment. "I would say that his sense of humor applies to his songwriting," said Lanning. Gill is a star on the Lake Erie Islands and brewery circuit, he said, but added that "we'll probably hear a little bit more of the ballads and the softer stuff." Gill has two CDs in print, "So Fine" and last year's "Sky."

The headliner is Red House Records artist John Gorka — the first time Lanning has booked a national act. Even he seems surprised at how it came off.

"We just extended an invitation. He's been one of my favorite folk singers of the past 10 years; I'm such an admirer of his work....I think I started with an e-mail to his agent and followed up with a call."

Gorka, on a bicoastal tour, was available for the Bay Village gig on the holiday weekend, and Lanning couldn't be happier with the mix of talent. "His poetry blends in well with Jim Gill's ballads," he said.

John Gorka

Born in Newark, N.J., in 1958, Gorka has put out nine albums in a career that dates back to his high school and college days in Bethlehem, Pa., where he became a house act for a lively coffee-house venue and opened for Nanci Griffith, Bill Morrissey, Claudia Schmidt and Jack Hardy, among others. He worked at Sing Out magazine for two years before becoming a full-time musician and acoustic troubador in 1986. Even after nearly two decades in the field, Gorka says he considers himself "an aspiring folksinger" trying to make a difference with his music. More on the artist can be found at his Web site, www.johngorka.com.

Profits from the show will go to Bay Village Middle School, specifically to fund installation of artwork in the recently-remodeled facility. "We just thought it would be nice, especially since [Kate Voegele]'s a senior this year," said Lanning, whose wife teaches at Bay Middle School.

Will the Bay Folk Festival become an annual event? "I hope so," said Lanning, who added he would like to see (and here) a lot more folk music on this end of Cuyahoga County. "Cain Park in Cleveland Heights has a lot of these activities. I thought it would be nice for the West Side."

If it comes off well, we all know where to buy the thank-you cards.