The Philly Folk Fest is back. Here are five acts you shouldn’t miss

The Philadelphia Folk Festival returns to the Old Pool Farm in Upper Salford near Schwenksville on Aug. 16-18. The festival is back to familiar stomping grounds after not being held in any form in 2023 for the first time since its inception in 1962. (The fest was a virtual-only event in the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021.)

This year’s fest is being branded as “A New Legacy Begins” and is headlined by John Oates and genre-blending hip-hop and country band Gangstagrass. There are over 50 acts playing on seven stages including Sug Daniels, Jersey Corn Pickers, Jess Klein, Dom Flemons, A Day Without Love, the Adam Ezra Group, Crys Matthews, and John Flynn.

Here are five recommended acts to check out beyond the headliners. A full schedule is at folkfest.org/stage-schedules

Tickets, which range from $5 for youth day passes to $775 for a Family Four pass with camping included, are available at folkfest.org/tickets.

» READ MORE: Everything you need to know about the Philadelphia Folk Festival featuring John Oates and Gangstagrass

The great Cajun band led by the fiddler and vocalist Michael Doucet, who first set out to preserve the folk music of French-speaking Louisiana in the 1980s, has been a frequent Folk Festival visitor over the years. They’ve kept Cajun music alive by respecting tradition but not being beholden to it.

Doucet started off playing New Orleans rock in the 1970s. When he heard “Cajun Woman” by British folk-rock band Fairport Convention, he was inspired to explore the music of his own culture.

He sings in French and English and makes dance music that stays true to southern Louisiana while also being influenced by music from around the world, as evidenced by albums like Arc De Triomphe Two-Step, and From Bamako to Carencro. Lobby Stage, 4:30 p.m. and Martin Stage, 9:45 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 17.

» READ MORE: ‘It’s a gift in a way’: John Oates on life after Hall & Oates

The Folk Fest gets major cool points for bringing in Kaye, the longtime guitarist in the Patti Smith Group, renowned record producer, Underground Garage DJ, and music historian whose book They Call It Madness centers on Camden-born crooner Russ Columbo.

Kaye is closely associated with Smith and the punk and New Wave scene centered around 1970s New York, but he’s a Rutgers University graduate who spent his teen years in New Jersey and lives in East Stroudsburg, Pa. He’s playing as part of a Welcome to Godfrey Daniels set on Sunday, Aug. 18. Kaye has voiced his enthusiasm for Folk Fest in a social media post: “Sharing the stage with three of my favorite singer-songwriters, trading chords, emotions, and sing along choruses. Camaraderie at its most festive.” Tank Stage at 1:30 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 18, with Christine Havrilla, Jack Murray, and Mary Battista.

Siblings Laura Rogers and Lydia Slagle grew up on country music in Muscle Shoals, Ala. They have been stellar creators on the Americana scene for their decade-and-a-half career without quite attracting the sizable following they deserve. But those who know, know: Brandi Carlile coproduced their previous two albums, and 2014′s Put Your Needle Down, which was produced by T-Bone Burnett, includes “Dirty Lie,” an unfinished song Bob Dylan gave them to complete. Their new Mind, Man, Medicine featuring Ray La Montagne and John Paul White of the Civil Wars is a richly comforting record, full of grown-up songs of love and loss, sung in sisterly harmony. Martin Stage, 8:45 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 17.

Among the scores of banjo players gathered at Old Pool Farm on Folk Fest stages and campsites, odds are against finding one who plays with the virtuosic dexterity of Tony Trischka. (And that includes Jo the Smiling Banjo, the Fest’s grinning logo who will be seen in various guises throughout the grounds.)

Trischka’s EarlJam is a tribute to bluegrass legend Earl Scruggs, in which he and singer-guitarist Michael Daves, bassist Jared Engel, and fiddler Duncan Wickel, recreate rare, unreleased jams that Scruggs played with guitarist John Hartford, using them to tell the story of Scruggs’ life. Martin Stage, 7:45 p.m. Sunday, Aug. 18.

The folk-jazz duo of Bethlehem & Sad Patrick are one of the Philly music scene’s underappreciated treasures. Bethlehem Roberson is a skilled, subtly emotive vocalist who met guitarist Patrick Arkins when the guitarist was hosting an open mic at a cafe in Germantown. Their 2023 album, This Is What We Do, is a minimalist delight, displaying Roberson’s impeccable timing as a vocalist on top-notch Arkins originals like “Because It Rhymes with Sin” and “Starving Kind of Love,” as well as an arresting cover of “House of the Rising Sun.” Lobby Stage, 2:45 p.m., Friday, Aug. 16.