If you’re a Newport Folk Festival regular, you’ve probably seen Dan Blakeslee on your way in or your way out of Fort Adams State Park. The Festival favorite and former Rhode Island resident is returning this year, kicking off the festivities on Sunday, July 30 from the Fort Stage, making it the first main stage appearance for the singer-songwriter who is usually seen busking around the site.
The Maine resident began his career playing for change in Boston-area MBTA stations, working dive bar gigs, recording his music, and more recently, popping up the lawns in and around Fort Adams. He’s shared the stage with numerous acts including Langhorne Slim, Lydia Loveless, The Lumineers, and others. He’s also a professional graphic artist whose work has adorned festival walls in prior years.
Blakeslee is an approachable and affable artist, a good-natured singer who’s always down for a quick chat and a song … you may even end up in an improvised lyric. He’s the quintessential folk singer – no bells or whistles, just time-tested stories to sing around the campfire or far out at sea. Drop him into a Folk Festival line-up from the 1960s and he wouldn’t miss a beat.
Blakeslee was among the final performers added to the festival line-up for 2023. “It came as a huge surprise,” he said in a recent interview. “In years past, I’ve been added to do a couple of songs on the Family Stage or the Museum Stage. They’ve been so wonderful – all those involved in the Newport Folk Festival to have me over the years – this one obviously takes the cake. I was so enamored by the news, they told me about a month ago and I still haven’t quite processed it yet.”
His role as the official/unofficial festival busker has made him a mainstay in recent years, and many folk fans have gotten to know him personally. “That’s how I’ve gotten their attention,” he explained. “In the beginning was the busking, my first year was around 2010, I brought a couple of CDs to maybe share. That whole weekend, I was just too chicken to play, so in the last ten minutes, I just felt that I had to do it. I asked someone who I had seen behind the scenes, and he directed me to (Chief Creative Officer) Chris Capotosto, who couldn’t have been nicer. That was the first year I busked.”
This year, Blakeslee will be performing solo on the festival’s largest stage, and expects to bring a somewhat different approach to his presentation.
“When I was busking, before I was bringing equipment with me, I couldn’t do any finger-picking; I had to do songs that were the loudest I could shout out in a field to reach as many people in the ferry line as possible,” laughed Blakeslee. “When they asked me to officially busk at the festival I was able to bring some equipment. I definitely need some sound reinforcement for me to play songs without overplaying them,” he said.
“I’ve already made the setlist which is very unlike me,” he noted about his upcoming appearance. “The first song is about my first-ever experience at the Newport Folk Festival. It is kind of crazy because I actually was asked early on in my music career to play the festival, I think it was the family stage, and I didn’t feel that I was ready.”
Blakeslee is also excited about his new album, which is due out on August 25. “It’s called Road Hymns, a collection of story songs that are mostly road/touring related,” he said. “I recorded each song in places that are sacred to me around New England. I recorded one under a lilac tree in Boston’s Arnold Arboretum, you can hear birds flying around, I recorded one on Mohegan Island in Maine, 10 miles out to sea in an old chapel, and I also recorded one at Fort Adams, called ‘Overwhelmed and Underpaid.’”
Be sure to get to the festival early to catch Dan’s set. Blakeslee plays the Fort Stage Sunday, July 30 at 11:25.