How an international folk festival came to be in this small Utah city

Springville • Every summer for nearly four decades, folk groups from around the globe have gathered to share their cultural heritage — from clothing to music to dance — in one small Utah city.

The World Folkfest started in 1986, and will be held in Springville this year from Tuesday through Saturday. This year, 10 countries are represented at the festival, including Ukraine, Bulgaria, Montenegro and Poland.

The performance groups arrived Sunday afternoon at the Springville Art Museum in four big buses, and were greeted by host families with cheers and waves. Soon, the complex around the museum’s entrance became a sea of suitcases as participants unloaded.

Emily Wilkinson, the festival’s spokesperson, said the event started in Utah after some inspiration from abroad.

“In the 70s, a tour group from BYU [was] driving around in Europe,” Wilkinson said, “and they’re like, ‘We should do this in the USA, because other cultures and other lands have a lot of folk dance where the communities come together, and we’ve kind of lost that in the U.S.’”

Wilkinson said once the festival idea came together, then-Springville Mayor Delora Bertelsen became interested in her city being home to the event.

“These are groups from the International Council of Folk Festivals and they perform for governments, for presidents, for the elite of the elite,” Wilkinson said, “and they’re coming to Springville, Utah.”

While host families awaited the arrival of the performers on Sunday, they discussed arranging potlucks and coordinating activities so their guests could explore Utah with their friends from their dance groups.

Over the course of 38 years, representatives of more than 80 nations have come to the festival, Wilkinson said.

“We had a group come just before the fall of USSR and they had KGB with them,” Wilkinson said. “It was really interesting because you get to know the people, not the government. We’re all the same. We all understand music, we all understand dance. There’s no translation needed.”

Other performing groups this year have come from Colombia, Austria, Taiwan and Georgia. Local groups will also perform, representing the cultures of the Lakota Nation, Ireland, Chile, Spain and the western United States.

The world on Springville’s doorstep

The World Folkfest is a volunteer-based festival, filled with locals who help with everything from pitching tents to hosting the performers in their own homes.

Wilkinson has a history with the festival, starting as a second-generation volunteer with the event.

“My father worked with Springville when [the festival] was conceived, and [the festival] went to the city workers and said, ‘Hey, we need host families.’ So he came home and talked to my mom,” Wilkinson said. “They found out that Japan was actually coming that year. My mother’s father had been killed in World War II, so there was a lot of resentment from generational trauma.”

Wilkinson said her mother decided it was a good time to “find peace,” so the family hosted some of the Japanese performers in 1987.

“We were hooked, because it truly did heal generational traumas on both sides. The ladies were from Osaka, Japan. We bonded over Elvis, over just the simple things of life, and not war. We were able to get past that, which was monumental.”

The impact it had on her family inspired Wilkinson to continue working with the festival.

“To have the world come to your own doorstep in little Springville City, to be able to see the culture, authentic costumes to hear the music and language is just really rare,” Wilkinson said.

The festival also helps bring diversity to Utah County, Wilkinson said, adding that hosting the event here is important because it shows diversity should “be embraced and not feared.”

Wilkinson said it takes about $300,000 in donations every year for the festival to take place, with much of that money coming from host families that open their homes to participants.

Volunteers set fest up for success

According to Julia DeLeeuw, the festival’s marketing director, this year’s festival has 26 new host families and about 60 homes in total for the 250 performers. Upward of 40% of those families are located in Springville, with others coming from surrounding Utah County areas.

Orem residents Keith and Ada Wilson have been part of the festival for three years. This year, they are hosting seven teenage boys from Ukraine.

The Ukrainian group also has nine girls, who are staying at Megan Wilson’s (no relation to Keith and Ada) house. She made a sign with all the girls’ names to welcome them.

Woodland Hills resident Lora Lee Johnson is a first-time host this year for two members from the Austria group. Her family was a part of the festival growing up.

“I remember a huge table full of guests, my family, sometimes cousins, and just a lot of music, dancing, cultural get-together stuff. It was just really fun,” Johnson said. She said they plan on taking their guests to Classic Fun Skating and Salem Pond for kayaking.

Her three kids — Isis, Thor and Skadhi — were also excited. Johnson said she is excited to include her kids in the tradition and carry it on.

“As a child, I loved it,” she said. “You make friends with these people all over the world. And I hope my kids, too, could just enjoy seeing the world come to them a little bit.”

Longtime hosts to receive award

Springville residents Debra and Earle Wells are two regular volunteers, having hosted performers from 10 different countries in their home more than 25 times over the years, according to Debra, who has also acted as a translator at times because she speaks Chinese. This year, they are hosting two participants from Taiwan.

The couple are slated to receive the World Folkfest Sara Newman Hearthstone Award for their contributions.

The longtime hosts said they learned of the festival after they first moved to Springville in 1987 because it was held in their neighborhood near Springville High School.

Hosting a family for the folk festival lasts seven to 10 days. In the past, Debra said, it was even longer. The hosts provide the performers with bedrooms, meals, transportation, sightseeing and shopping opportunities, and more, her husband explained.

Over the years, the Wells couple have made many memories through their support of the festival.

“Early on, we had some really great experiences with dancers that came to stay in our home,” Earle said. “We had, at that time, a growing family, and the interaction with our children was really wonderful. We really thought it was a great thing to broaden their lives, their education, their scope of the world.”.

Debra, meanwhile, recalled one year when she and her husband helped match festival participants with their host families. By the end of that process, there was a group of six performers left. They came home with the couple.

“We had six kids around at the time,” she said. “So basically, in our Suburban, each dancer held the child on their lap when we drove.”

One of the dancers, she said, was a famous Chinese choreographer named Huang Doudou.

“He has come and visited us a couple of times,” Debra said. “We met up with him in New York. He helped one of my daughters who went on to Julliard, gave her some advice. We made a really solid connection.”

Earle said the experience that comes from hosting is worth the effort.

“I don’t think anything comes free,” he said, “and so a little sacrifice to participate in something like this, it brings great rewards.”

Tickets are available at worldfolkfest.org