Ozarks musicians to be featured in preview concert at Smithsonian Folklife Festival
The Ozarks will be featured prominently in the 2023 Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, but area musicians will give a preview concert at the annual event this summer.
The June 26 concert titled "Ode to the Ozarks" will feature old-time Ozarks music on the National Mall in Washington D.C.
The free concert will be 4-6 p.m. June 26 during this year's festival. For those not able to attend in person, it will be livestreamed.
This musical style blends fiddling, folk songs and mountain music to create a distinctive genre of brisk rhythms and bright timbres.
To open the show, a trio of skilled musicians led by David Scrivner will present an old-time Ozarks jam session.
There will be a performance by Sylamore Special, a bluegrass quintet of teenagers based in Mountain View, Arkansas. The members are Mary Parker, Gordon Parker, LillyAnne McCool, Mercy Grace and Turner Atwell.
More: Missouri State library tapped to help tell story of Ozarks at 2023 Smithsonian Folklife Festival
The Missouri State University Libraries is working closely with the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage in advance of the 2023 festival program called "The Ozarks: Faces and Facets of a Region.”
“Through the Ozarks Studies Institute, the MSU Libraries has positioned itself as a regional expert on Ozarks’ history and heritage,” Tom Peters, dean of library services at MSU, said during the October announcement.
“Now, thanks to our partnership with the Smithsonian and regional collaborations to come, we can share the Ozarks’ story with the world.”
The free, 10-day Festival will be held in late June and early July of 2023 on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
At the event, participants will experience Ozarks music, food, crafts and stories through
daily demonstrations and nightly concerts. Other programming next year will focus on creativity and spirituality across the U.S.
The festival was founded in 1967.
This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Smithsonian Folklife Festival: Ozarks musicians to give preview in DC
