Your guide to your first Uranquinty Folk Festival
aka What? Help! I don't understand!
The Basics
Accommodation
Food
The Experience
Written unwritten rules
Artists Information
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The Basics
The Uranquinty Folk Festival (referred to by everyone affectionately as "Quinty") is a small and friendly festival set with camping around the town showground.There are two venues on site: the hall and the tennis hut which provide entertainment; but now that the local pub has reopened the Friday night Festival is located there. You can buy your ticket, pick up your wristband, buy some cool merch and enjoy the party there on Friday night; or you will have opportunities to do the same on Saturday at the hall.
Tips
Bring warm clothes because it can get very cold! Bring a chair, a rug and a flask so you can sit in and enjoy the music at the bonfires around the campsites.
Alcohol is permitted, but remember the festival is family-friendly.
DOG POLICY
Uranquinty Folk Festival has long been a small, family oriented festival that has welcomed well behaved four legged friends.
We do request that dogs be kept on leads at all times and are supervised by their owners.
Owners are responsible for picking up any mess made by their dogs and disposing of it responsibly.
There are three areas where dogs are not permitted, as follows:
Inside the hall/kitchen
On the hall verandah
Inside the Tennis Club
These restrictions do not apply to registered service animals. Please note that owners may be asked to show documentation of their service animal.
We want all festival goers to feel safe and secure and ask that all attendees adhere to these guidelines. Failure to meet these expectations may result in the owner of any unsecured animal to be asked to leave a venue.
In the case of continuous breach of these rules, an owner may be asked to leave the festival.
Please note that owners of animals displaying aggressive behaviour will be asked to remove the animal from the festival immediately.
Accommodation
There are no real accommodation options within Uranquinty apart from camping. Wagga Wagga has hotels and B&B's to stay in but make sure you book early.Most non-local attendees camp on the site around the edge of the oval. The camping is completely free and we have great loos and showers at the hall. Kids and dogs are most welcome (keep at least the latter on leads at all times and clean up after them!). Tents, camper vans, caravans are all welcome, but spaces do fill up quickly. The sites do not have power or water. There is a location for disposing of grey water.
Vehicles are allowed in the campsite but please don't drive across the centre of the oval - it wrecks the cricket pitch. Drive slowly and watch out for people and dogs!
Wood is provided for a number of bonfires around the camp site which serve as centres of warmth, fellowship and music well into the night.
Advice for setting up your campsite
- Talk to your neighbours as you set up your camp. They will most likely happily advise you which direction to pitch your tent to avoid rain and wind, and point you to where the vital facilities are. And you will make new friends!
- You may find there are people who have been camping in a particular spot for decades, but most of them will have already set up long before you arrived, so you are unlikely to ruffle feathers where ever you decide to camp - but do try to be flexible if someone does approach you about moving your tent a bit to let someone else fit their tent in.
- Once you are in you are in. In general, it is preferred that you set up camp and then move and park your car outside the fence, so that if you have to go somewhere you won't disturb anyone, or tear up the grass more than is strictly necessary.
Food
You can
bring your own food, but you can buy egg and bacon rolls at
breakfast time, hamburgers at lunchtime, and then other tasty
meals are available at the hall on Friday, Saturday and Sunday
evening. Importantly, there is a coffee van on site. The
Uranquinty Pub is also a local option for a pub meal, and the
Quinty Bakehouse has award winning pies and pastries.
The Experience
The
festival starts with the opening concert from 6pm. Buy a snag
for dinner, "meet n greet" everyone, and purchase your weekend
tickets.
There
is a full
program of events in the hall from Saturday
morning - including poets' breakfasts, women's concert,
quinty choir, featured performers, bush dance, singalongs and
much more. The
tennis hut
is the site for blackboard sessions, impromptu sessions and
jams.
During the
day, parents would be very welcome to organise group activities
for the kids - if you would like to organise something, please let us know and
we will add it it to the program!
Of course,
there will be world-class bonfire sessions around the oval till
the wee small hours every night.
Sunday
afternoon is now the (in?)famous Quinty Chorus Cup. Compose a
song about your experiences at Uranquinty and perform it for the
honour and glory of winning the Chorus cup. The rules are that
it MUST include a chorus and have more than one person
performing.
Monday is a lazy day for people able to stick around and avoid
the traffic - however there are still things going on! The
traditional veggie bowls session is always a hoot, and the
weekend wraps up with a community dinner and even more bonfire
sessions.
The written unwritten rules
If you haven't been to any or many folk festivals (large or small), you might feel a bit bewildered and lost and maybe even lonely. Don't know if you can just join in with that group of people around the fire? Don't know how those people playing folk tunes all night seem to know psychically what to play next? (nor do we) Don't know how to meet new people?Don't worry, we are here to help! We don't have all the answers, but hopefully the following will give you a bit of a guide, and courage to join in and make some new friends. These aren't hard and fast rules, but general guidance which will stand you in good stead at this and other folk festivals.
Campfire music etiquette
- Pause
as you come close to a campfire. Listen and observe.
- If the people around the campfire appear to be taking turns around the circle to perform and it looks like you could be welcomed to do so yourself, it is polite to insert yourself further around the circle, so that you have time to listen respectfully to other people before getting a turn to perform yourself.
- You may find yourself at a fire where there is "session music" going on. This is where you will find lots of people playing together some particular style of music: for example it might be Irish dance tunes, blues music or "old timey" music. Whatever the genre you are in for a treat as you will hear some world class performers playing for the joy of it and you will be awed at their skills. Sometimes these fires will end up with concentric circles of musicians - the really experienced musicians usually in the centre ring. Generally there will be one or two of those who will lead and decide what the next tune will be. They will almost never actually say the names of any of the tunes and tend to flow almost seamlessly from one to the next, so you might feel a bit lost. Don't be scared - if you aren't confident and expert but are keen to play, tuck yourself into a spot on the outermost ring and play quietly - the more you play the better you will get. Oh and don't expect that anyone will look up from their playing to speak to you; it isn't that they aren't friendly folk, they are just otherwise occupied.
General camp/festival etiquette
- Help your neighbour: Whether they need a match to light their fire, a splash of milk, or someone to hold a pole up while they drive a peg in, sometimes people just need a hand with things. Don’t be afraid to put yourself out there and help someone when they need it because more often than not the favour will be returned.
- Pick your spot/time: noone wants to stop you having a fabulous festival. But singing raucously all night right next to a campsite that has small kids is not going to make you very popular. Find a spot where your noise won't disturb others, or even better, will be welcomed enthusiastically. Need a smoke? Make sure your smoke isn't going to drift into someone's tent. The same courtesies will come back to you in other ways.
- Clean
up after yourself. NOONE is paid to clean up after you - every
single thing that happens at the festival (outside
performances) is being done by someone who is doing it out of
the kindness of their heart. Don't make their lives more
difficult.
- Volunteer - putting your hand up to give a hand makes you very popular with the organising team, will help you feel more involved in the action, and will give you the chance to meet lots of lovely people!
- Be
nice to all our volunteers and if you see a problem think
about what you can do to fix it rather than just complain
about it (See points 3 and 4 above).
- At the end of the event, lend a hand. For example, if someone has been camping alone, they might appreciate another body just to help them roll up their mattress or hold their tent bag. See what needs to be done around the site - stack chairs, sweep a floor: the organisers have been working all weekend and will very much appreciate the help from someone who still has some energy left!
- If you
have had a great time, take the time to tell us, and also tell
your friends and family about the event so that they can come
next time!