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The Festival That Outlasted Three Recessions and Every Algorithm
The Folk Festival opens tonight — here's to Mary.
Katie Milton Jordan
May 21, 2026
The Townie
Know the backroads. Use the front door.
The Town That Keeps Deciding to Exist
The Folk Festival opens tonight — the first one in many years without Mary Muse.
I should tell you up front that I’m a terrible camper. Years ago I pitched a tent at Quiet Valley Ranch for exactly one night, with a five-gallon bucket of cedar chips and more optimism than sense. At two in the morning a trumpet went off next door, followed by the kind of joyful, unrepentant revelry that only happens when nobody has anywhere to be in the morning. I couldn’t even be mad — it was wonderful. It was also a million degrees, and by the next afternoon I’d surrendered, gratefully, to air conditioning. But I came by my love of that place honestly.
Doing graduate work at Schreiner University in Kerrville, I talked my way into a songwriting class taught by a professor named Bill Muse. Bill introduced me to his wife, Mary — the first person ever to serve as executive director of the Kerrville Folk Festival Foundation, a job she held for eight years — and to the low-ego people who make the whole thing run.
Mary died in January, and this is the first Festival in many years to open without her. She listened as much with her heart as her ears, and held what everyone out there calls a “loving space.” In April the foundation announced the Mary Muse Spirit of Kerrville award — given each year to whoever shows up hardworking and welcoming, a muse to the people around them, giving without keeping score. The next person who does what Mary did.
A festival that’s outlasted three recessions, two pandemics, and every algorithm since 1972 keeps deciding to exist. The people Mary drew around her are lighting the campfires tonight. So if you make it out to the ranch this year — or just roll the windows down and sing something on the drive home — sing it a little louder than usual.
Here’s to Mary.
With love and a campfire jam stuck in my head,
What’s waiting in the full edition
18 Days of Music: What the Folk Festival Means to the Hill Country
Fifty-four years on one ranch outside Kerrville — recessions, pandemics, and every algorithm outlasted. The real festival isn’t the main stage. It’s the campfires.
The Calendar & the Hill Country Briefing
Folk Fest, the Crawfish Festival, the 90th Llano Pro Rodeo, River Rat Fest with Pat Green & Cory Morrow, Mason Round Up — plus weather, ag, market, and grant intel for the week ahead.
The Economics of Event Season
What a festival actually brings to a region — and what Fredericksburg’s #1-most-welcoming-city ranking (370 million reviews) means for the town three exits over.
The Porch Supper Nobody Overthinks
A reader wants people on her porch, not a production. Hazel Mae has a plan. Fern says let the porch do the work.
You Wrote Back
Our Mother’s Day edition struck a chord. We’re honoring the readers who wrote in — and pointing to the grant one of them thanked us for.
What Song Is Stuck in Your Head
All twelve signs — for the ones singing loud, the ones humming alone, and the ones who can’t place the tune.
Still Here: Rhea
Rhea is still waiting at Second Chance Mason. Young shepherd mix, warm amber eyes, and one job in life: to be near you.
Read the whole thing — the feature, every event, and the rest.
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