Registration Opens for NERFA Conference

Northeast Regional Folk Alliance (NERFA) has opened registration for its 26th annual conference to be held in Stamford, Connecticut, November 12-15, 2020. Artists may also now apply online for juried official showcases.

NERFA (http://nerfa.org) is a regional affiliate of Folk Alliance International — a nonprofit organization that aims to serve, strengthen and engage the global folk music community through preservation, presentation and promotion. Serving FAI members from the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington, DC to the provinces of eastern Canada, NERFA attracts more than 700 performing artists, presenters, promoters, agents, managers, folk DJs, and others engaged in contemporary and traditional folk music to its annual conference.

The NERFA conference features several jam-packed days and nights of music showcases, song swaps and jam sessions; one-on-one mentoring and peer group sessions; an exhibit hall; open mics; communal meals, and lots of informal conversation and networking. The conference is designed to help attendees forge connections and build community, while also providing learning and performance opportunities that can help enhance their professional and personal lives.

Through March 31, conference registration is $225 for FAI members and $285 for non-members; it includes Thursday-Saturday night dinners. Discounts and a limited number of scholarships also are available for Canadians, artists, folk DJs, and presenters.

Online Applications Available for Juried Official Showcases

Interested artists have until April 30 to apply for official showcases at the conference. There is a $25 application fee, while additional showcase production fees are assessed for those artists who are selected for these coveted opportunities.

Juried Formal Showcases are the premiere performance opportunities at the NERFA conference. Only 14 performance slots are available, with each running 15-minutes. The Formal Showcases take place between 7-9:30 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and nothing else is allowed to compete with it. Immediately following the Formal Showcases, conference attendees will shuffle between three conference rooms to enjoy Semi-formal Showcases that run concurrently and extend from 9:45-11:20 p.m. each evening. As with the Formal Showcases, nothing else is allowed to go on during the Semi-formal Showcases. A line check, stage, professional sound and production services are supplied for all juried showcases, while Formal Showcase artists also will receive professionally mixed and recorded CDs of their performances.

Editor’s Note: I am president of the NERFA board of directors and also serve on the board of Folk Alliance International. I’m not involved with the judging for juried showcases, although AcousticMusicScene.com hosts late-night song swaps and afternoon guerilla showcases during the NERFA conference. A public relations and strategic communications professional, who counts a number of artists and an indie label among my clients, I also offer some pre-conference mentoring sessions via phone.