Falling dollar: Will it make US festivals sing the blues?

Give thanks that ICONS has a great lineup this year. Booking a festival is hard – and it's getting harder now that the dollar is losing ground to the euro. It's something that not everyone wants to talk about, but it's an increasing concern.

"There's definitely an issue there,'' says Cillian Vallely of Lunasa, which is playing ICONS. "And I think it's not just about festivals. I think a lot of bands find it tough to tour the States. A lot of tours are marginal enough and then with the currency so much lower and the music business maybe not going as well here (the U.S.) as it was a few years back, there are acts that are not coming at all. For bands starting out, it's a hard time to get going. There are visa issues and if you go through a lawyer, it's very expensive. It's sort of prohibitive for a new band to get in. But in terms of Lunasa, what we generally do is tour the U.S. in the spring and fall – maybe do Sanders Theatre [at Harvard University] in the spring, then in the fall maybe do a festival in September. But we'll go to Europe in the summer because one thing about Europe is that in a lot of the countries, there's no kind of touring circuit, so the opportunity to go to these countries is in July or August when they have outdoor concerts.''

Aoife O'Donovan of Crooked Still (another ICONS 2008 act) agrees. "A lot of acts from Europe don't want to come here,'' she says, "because [what they get paid] is worth nothing to them when they get home. It's hard. But you can go to Europe and get paid X amount for a festival. And when you convert it back into dollars, it's worth way more. Plus, you can sell CDs for $23 over there. But, yes, hotels are expensive. You can't get a Super 8 or Motel 6. The concept doesn't exist.''

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Speaking of Crooked Still, they're still talking about one of the their most unusual gigs this summer – the Orkney Folk Festival, which occurs on a very remote stretch of land overseas.

"The Orkney Islands are Scotch. They used to be Norwegian,'' says Aoife O'Donovan. "They're not as far out as the Shetland Islands, but they're in between Scotland and Norway, a little closer to the Scottish mainland. But they're remote islands and it didn't get dark and there was this crazy, wild folk festival. That was the highlight of our European trip … The concerts start at 7 and go until 11, then you get out and it's still not dark. You're driving home and the sun is barely going down and then it comes up at 2:30 in the morning. And people are up all night playing music. It's pretty crazy. And it was the first festival with our new band!''

-- Steve Morse

NOTE: Crooked Still's intrepid double bass player Corey DiMario offers a flavor of the band's travels through Orkney, and elsewhere, via his blog "Play the Bass, Drive the Bus."