If you feel like contributing to the great thing Folk Marathon is, there are plentiful ways of getting involved...

 

Your personal contributions during Folk Marathon

While Folk Marathon is happening, it mainly lives from all the contributions by participants. There will be opportunities to sign up for some when registering for the next Folk Marathon. There are some usual ways of contributing:

  • Holding a workshop on a topic you feel competent in and which you want to disseminate. 
  • Performing on stage, for dancing, listening, partying. 
  • Volunteering practically during FM: Helping with giving info and directions, decorating and cleaning places, giving out drinks or food, at doors, assisting bands or sound engineering and similar little tasks that are essential to keep Folk Marathon running. 

There are also more informal ways of involving yourself... Leading a great session ... Sharing food, drinks and laughter ... Starting an interest group to involve people into a topic where you feel that it could profit from some focussed exchange. 

Being a full time volunteer at a paticular Folk Marathon

Secondly, if you have more time and energy, are a great team player and have already a lot of practical knowledge regarding Folk Marathon, you might want to be a full time volunteer at a particular Folk Marathon. 

There is no fixed framework for that kind of volunteering, as all teams work differently. Anyway most teams will very much welcome your initiative! 

Best practice: Just get in touch with them quite a bit in advance to find out how you could involve yourself there, so that it fits your skills and is really helpful and satisfactory.

Plus ... the one big thing ... ;)

If you really love Folk Marathon a lot and have participated a couple of time -- well, then a big question might come up at some point:

Could Folk Marathon happen in your town / city?

Maybe... ;) Anyway Folk Marathon won't come to you. You'd need to make it happen by yourself. By organizing it.

One word of caution: It's really a lot of work! We don't want to scare you away. We only want you to be realistic in your perspective.

So:

  • You love Folk Marathon?
  • You have a couple of amazing like-minded people around, who have been to one or the other Folk Marathon, and you know some great venues for music, dancing and jamming in your home town / city?
  • The idea of maybe hosting Folk Marathon, at some point in the future, is growing strong on you?
  • Sounds terrific! Let's get it started!

But how to get it started?

  • It will definitely be a good idea to get in touch with the Folk Marathon Committee to get more important info, begin discussing it all, find out what you'll need to get into the process and whether it's really feasible. No shame if you find out it might be too much of a workload or your city and team aren't up to the task. At least you tried, that's worth a lot!
  • A good starting point would also be attending the  "organizing Folk Marathon workshop" at a Folk Marathon itself, usually on the last day, to get in depth info, get questions answered and discuss possibilities with like-minded people. 
  • The committee can provide you some written material - the "Folk Marathon Handbook", different documents to help you work yourself into it etc.

Once again: 
Really, don't underestimate the effort. You'll need at least around 10 very dedicated and quite sociable people who are used to team work and will form the core team and will work together for at least half a year (rather 9 months). You'll need (at least) another 10 reliable people who are willing to take the responsibility for some smaller fields of tasks. You will ideally need an organisation with legal status and experience in the field of music organizing. And much more...

Organizing a "Mini Folk Marathon"

Another possibility: Why not create a smaller event in the spirit of Folk Marathon? This is much easier to do than a full Folk Marathon, will help you training your organizational skills and be a great thing in its own rights. 

This should ideally not be at the same time as the "large" Folk Marathon (but it could be afterwards, so people could combine both) and you could aim for, like, something like 30 or 50 or 70 people: Less risky, more cosy...  

If that strikes a chord with you, feel free to come up with a concept! 
Please contact us, so you may let us know what your plan is and we can also help promoting it a bit. ;)

BTW did you know that the first Folk Marathon events were about that size, when its first editions started in Vienna, about 15 years ago?

 

We'd love to hear from you!