TRR photo by Tom Kane Gordy Hinners leads a class in clog dancing. (Click for larger image)

By TOM KANE

HONESDALE -- The Cherry Ridge Campground outside Honesdale hadn't seen anything like it.

Over 800 people from as far away as Dayton, Ohio; Ashville, Tennessee; Nashua, New Hampshire; and Baltimore, Maryland converged upon the place and were regaled with old time traditional music, fiddle music, Irish reels, clog and square dancing and contemporary Blue Grass.

"We've got some of the best pickers in the country," said Steve Jacobi, whose group, the Old-Time Fiddlers of Equinunk, PA organized last weekend's event.

This was the second year for the festival.

"Last year, the attendance wasn't that great but this year word got out and we tripled our attendance," said volunteer Jesse Balew.

"We plan on doing it every year," Jacobi said.

There was Steve Kaufman, master guitarist, who is a three-time winner of the National Flatpicking Championship.

There was Jay Unger and Molly Mason who won international acclaim because of their musical ballad, Ashokan Farwell, featured on Ken Burn's PBS production of The Civil War.

There were traditional music groups from as far away as North Carolina.

Over 27 workshops were held on guitar, banjo, flute, clog and square dancing, fiddle and bow techniques.

"I heard about this festival back home so I wanted to see it for myself," said Sally Smith of Dayton, Ohio.

"Festivals like this are beginning to grow all over," said John Janczewski of Lindenhurst, Long Island, NY. "I came to learn more about the guitar. It's wonderful to hear such music from the best traditional music people in the country."

"Steve Jacobi and his group of volunteers should receive a lot of credit for this festival," said fiddler Tom Druckenmiller of the Druckenmillers of Allentown, PA. "It's the best organized of any festival I've seen. There are a lot of festivals like this in the South. It's good to see this one growing up here in Pennsylvania." The youngest fiddler, Erin Slaver, 12, from Liberty, NY fired the audience up with her energetic fiddling technique and her stomping rhythms. "I've been fiddling since I was three," she said.

"On Saturday night you couldn't find a seat in the concert hall, Colette Balew said. "And there were over 100 people in the dance hall learning clog dancing."

Jacobi said he was happy to see that the festival was going to make its expenses. "We had some help from the Honesdale National Bank, the Wayne County Community and the Pennsylvania Partnership in the Arts," he said.