As you may have recalled last year, we’d reviewed the Newport Folk Fest on Saturday. Well, this year, things are a bit different (it’s still just a Saturday). We’ll show you what we mean: Taken by the lovely and talented Allie Runnion (www. allierunnion .com), we’re now able to provide you with concert photographs. As some of you may know, this particular artist is the lush and political-minded Nneka (percussionist Gary Sullivan, bassist Emmanuel Pokossi), who opened on the main stage with her Marley-tinged “Your Request.” Note that she’s wearing a sweatshirt over that dress; it really was a bit cool to start. We wereRead More →

Tift Merritt takes to the stage, wrapped in a light, summery flesh-colored dress. She sits at the piano with a harmonica neck-rack, and the fiftieth anniversary of the Newport Folk Festival begins with her original “I Know What I’m Looking for Now.” Dreamy-eyed and diffuse, she comments on a plane swirling in the sky.Across three stages and two days at Fort Adams in Newport are several of the latest folk, country and indie acts. Saturday brought a particularly strong line-up, including indie/folk phenomenon Iron and Wine, and Britain’s veteran punk Billy Bragg. Whether it was Gillian Welsh asking for extra reverb for Jefferson Airplane’s classicRead More →