Camping Bearfoot: Group Takes Tour Detour For Children's Jam Fest

Photo Courtesy of Bearfoot

Web posted July 12, 2007


By Libby Sterling | For the Juneau Empire

Alaska is home to a generous amount of foot-stomping bluegrass festivals and camps all year round.

During the day, participants enjoy the scheduled music or workshops, but the emergence of night is no reason to stop the hoedown. Spontaneous jam sessions are an essential bluegrass experience; no respectable festival can survive without them. They erupt anywhere there's enough space for a fiddle bow to noodle and a banjo pick to plunk.

Jammers move from session to session, often playing with fellow musicians they had never met.

There's always excitement about including the youngsters. Their parents dragged them along (or vice versa), and though they often appear hesitant to join in on the jam, one invitation from an elder is sometimes all a kid needs to participate and begin to develop a jamming technique.

So were the humble beginnings of the members of the now nationally acclaimed quintet, Bearfoot, formed in 1999. The all-Alaskan band includes Kate Hamre on acoustic bass, Mike Mickelson on guitar, Jason Norris on mandolin, and Angela Oudean and Annalisa Tornfelt on fiddles.

However, these are multi-talented folks who have been known to switch instruments from time to time. Each member also makes a vocal contribution amounting to multipart harmonies that breathe life into the auditory senses and remind listeners that it's good to be alive. They have recorded three full-length albums: Follow Me (2006), Back Home (2003), and Only Time Knows (2001), the last of which includes former original member Malani O'Toole.

After their Juneau visit, Bearfoot will resume a demanding tour schedule, including a gig opening for Lyle Lovett.

Being the offspring of musicians, it seemed natural for them to grow up as adolescents with the knack to knock everyone's socks off with their uncompromising melodies and sweet licks.

They look back fondly on their roots as young musicians and have now begun to foster the next generation of bluegrass greats through their bluegrass camps. The camps are held all across the U.S. and Canada and as far away as Ireland.

Bearfoot has taken a detour from their Lower 48 summer tour to put on a bluegrass camp this week at the Juneau Community Charter School. Children between the ages of 5 and 17 participated in classes in fiddle, guitar, mandolin, bass, banjo, and vocals in beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels.

Each child was also grouped into a band and prepared for a performance at the end of the week to showcase what he or she learned.

Camp side effects included square dancing and spontaneous jam sessions, which may lead to lifelong musical relationships and a severe case of instrument collecting.