{"id":798278,"date":"2026-07-13T03:23:30","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T03:23:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/798278\/"},"modified":"2026-07-13T03:23:30","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T03:23:30","slug":"winnipeg-folk-festival-wraps-up-with-sold-out-crowds-despite-scorching-heat-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/798278\/","title":{"rendered":"Winnipeg Folk Festival wraps up with sold-out crowds despite scorching heat"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 51st Winnipeg Folk Festival wrapped up Sunday with sold-out crowds enduring near 40 C temperatures as a heat wave settled over southern Manitoba.<\/p>\n

For the first time in the festival\u2019s history, tickets sold out before opening day, with more than 80,000 people attending the four-day event despite the extreme heat.<\/p>\n

Festivalgoers said staying cool became part of the experience.<\/p>\n

\u201cLots of water, lots of shade, staying in the breeze whenever there\u2019s a breeze, you gotta turn to it, give it a big hug,\u201d said\u00a0Olivia Nahuliak, who was attending her fifth Winnipeg Folk Festival.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe carry a lot of ice, we find the shade, every music that we love has the best shade,\u201d said\u00a0Korinne Kelly, who was attending her 27th Winnipeg Folk Festival.<\/p>\n

\u201cExcessive attempts to hydrate, lots of electrolytes, lots of recognizing our limitations, and if we need to go rest, we need to go rest,\u201d said\u00a0Jonathon Proven, who was attending his first Folk Festival in 15 years.\u00a0\u201cAnd wet bandanas!\u201d<\/p>\n

Valerie Shantz, executive director of the Winnipeg Folk Festival,\u00a0said attendees have learned how to handle the summer heat.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve been through this before, they totally know how to dress for the heat and how to find shade when they need it and keep hydrated and that sort of thing. And that\u2019s really been the main challenge and it hasn\u2019t kept people away. Amazingly we are still really enjoying a lot of people,\u201d Shantz said.<\/p>\n

The festival, now in its 51st year, has built a loyal following that extends beyond the music, Shantz said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe culture of the festival is a huge part of our success, and the music is an important part, but our unofficial motto is \u2018People and Music,’\u201d Shantz said.<\/p>\n

For many attendees, that sense of community is what keeps them returning year after year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is one of the safest places you can imagine being. I was here as a little kid, I\u2019ve been here since I was an embrio, and like you see all these kids running around, you see everyone runinng around having a good time, this is a very safe place and a very good community. And everyone is here to have the best time they can possibly have, and they\u2019re doing it,\u201d Proven said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s the community feeling and just the tradition around it. There\u2019s so many people that have been going for as long as I have and even longer and I just feel like it\u2019s something we all look forward to every single year,\u201d said\u00a0Cam Enns, who was attending their 25th Winnipeg Folk Festival.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can do it all here. Actually it is a very special thing. It\u2019s my Christmas of the year. It\u2019s my favourite weekend of the whole year,\u201d said Kelly.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is definitely the community and the embrace of the Earth. You come out here and everybody gets on stage and they say we gotta be thankful for the Mother Earth and I can\u2019t agree more. We\u2019re laying out in the grass all day like I said looking at the bugs, we\u2019re enjoying the trees and the air. This beautiful blue sky, not a cloud to see. It doesn\u2019t get better than this,\u201d said Nahuliak.<\/p>\n

\t\tKeep it Factual<\/p>\n

Add CityNews Winnipeg as a trusted source on Google to see more local stories from us.<\/p>\n

\t\t
\n\t\t\"Add
\n\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 51st Winnipeg Folk Festival wrapped up Sunday with sold-out crowds enduring near 40 C temperatures as a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":798279,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194296],"tags":[49,48,22073],"class_list":["post-798278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-winnipeg","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-winnipeg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=798278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798278\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/798279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=798278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=798278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=798278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}