The 16th annual Gays Mills Folk Festival of Music and Dance will be held May 9 –11th, in Gays Mills, Wisconsin.  The festival includes activities for all ages, beginning with the Friday night square dance, May 9th, 7:00 – 11:00 pm at the Gays Mills Community Building on Main Street.  The fun continues on Saturday, May 10th with daytime activities in Riverside Park on the banks of the Kickapoo River from 12:00 – 5:00 pm.  Demonstration and instructional music and dance workshops, an open stage, a fiddle bee, may crown making, a May pole dance, and a family dance are among the activities festival-goers will have to choose from.  The highlight of the festival is the Saturday evening concert, 7:30 pm at the Gays Mills Community Building.  The festival concludes on Sunday, May 11th with a gospel sing in the park from 11:00 am – 12:30 pm.

Opening the Saturday night concert will be The New Bad Habits, a quartet of some of the finest old-time string band musicians in the Midwest, playing fiddles, banjo and guitar.  The band’s members hail from Illinois, Missouri, and Wisconsin, including local Kickapoo Valley fiddler Tim Foss.  The New Bad Habits offer up hot old-time music in the tradition of some of America’s greatest string bands of the 1920’s and 1930’s, as well as original music honoring the same tradition.  They will be accompanied by award-winning flat foot dancer Dot Kent.

The second act of the evening will be The Ditchlilies of Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota.  These women bring beautiful vocal harmonies and excellent instrumental musicianship together to present energetic and heartfelt renditions of classic country and more.  From honky-tonk and hillbilly swing to jug band stomps and Appalachian fiddling, their performances takes audiences on a wild ride across the South and through country music’s Golden Era.

The concert’s headlining act will be Michael Lee Ammons and the Water Street Hot Shots of Sheboygan, Wisconsin.  This band is becoming known in the region for their expert and fun-loving performances of traditional country blues, hokum, ragtime and jug band styles of music, as well as some of their own original compositions.  Their instrumentation includes slide-guitar, mandolin, fiddle, string bass and washboard.  Listeners can expect to hear slide-guitar in the style of masters lilke Son House and Tampa Red, jug band tunes and string band blues.  Blues Review Magazine’s David Freeland calls Michael Lee Ammons “an appealing performer with a keen awareness of early blues styles…”

The concert Master of Ceremonies will be festival favorite Lil’ Rev of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  Many of the performers will be offering workshops during the day on Saturday, so don’t miss this opportunity to learn from and see some of the best in an intimate workshop setting.

A weekend pass for admission to all events is $20/adult, $5/child, or $45/family.  Admission to the Saturday night concert only is $15/adult, $5/child.  Gays Mills is located on US Highway 171, just a few miles West of US Highway 61, in Crawford County, Wisconsin.  Camping is available in town.  For more information, see the Folk Festival website: www.gaysmillsfolkfest.org, or call an organizer: 735-4031 (day), or 629-6250 (eve).  The Gays Mills Folk Festival is a project of the Kickapoo Cultural Exchange and is generously supported by Organic Valley Family of Farms of LaFarge, Wisconsin.