Graham Lindsey on the folk music scene in Canada – Apartment613

By Pune Media On Apr 5, 2025

The Canadian Folk Music Awards (CFMAs) have officially started! This year’s event takes place from April 3-6 at the National Arts Centre and the Canadian Museum of History.

Apt613 sat down with Graham Lindsey, board president of the CFMAs, to talk about the awards and the folk music scene in Canada. Lindsey is also a Celtic performer and 2020 CFMA nominee for Best Instrumental Solo Artist.

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Graham Lindsey. Photo from Canadian Folk Music Awards website.

APT613: Starting off, what does the folk music scene look like in Canada right now?

Lindsey: I would say vibrant. Over the past 20 years, we’ve seen the folk scene develop. And the CFMAs were created because the Junos had I think one category that really lends itself to folk music. We realized there’s so much depth to the folk music world, that there needed to be an awards ceremony to recognize the people who did create all these different kinds of music, like Celtic and Bluegrass.

I’m wondering on the other flip side of that, what challenges do emerging folk artists face in Canada today, and how do the CFMAs help overcome them?

Lindsey: Streaming platforms, while they are great for getting the word out, are terrible at paying. They will pay if you meet their threshold, but I think every stream for one track that you stream is about 34 cents depending on the platform. You used to get gigs and sell CDs or records, or sell merch. But now you don’t get paid a whole lot, and you don’t sell a whole lot of CDs because people don’t necessarily have CD players.

The Canadian Folk Music Awards try to make sure that the the artists that we have, we give them a place to play, not only for people in the local community, but for people who come in from across the country and around the world with the hope that they will book these artists, increasing their chances for touring in different areas.

It’s been 20 years of this award season. How has the reaction been from artists about having this opportunity for exposure?

Lindsey: It’s always been really wonderful. My favourite part of this is that artists who come to the Canadian Folk Music Awards event, more times than not, leave feeling like they are part of a family, that perhaps they weren’t part of before.

I know, my first event, I was playing music with a friend. He was a nominee in 2012. I met some Ottawa area musicians and just being at the CFMAs to me, meant that I met a ton of people. And it’s more than just meeting them at a venue, it’s like you’ve done something really good musically, and it really builds a strong bond between people.

The artists who are involved, they know that they’ve been recognized by their peers, and it’s not a public voting sort of thing. We have industry professionals, people we trust, with the knowledge of what is exceptional music, and they are the ones who make the decisions.

How do you see the CFMAs continuing to contribute to the folk music scene in the future?

Lindsey: We’re in a period of, I’d say, pretty stable growth. Every year, we try to do a little bit better. We try to reach out to communities.

One of the things that I’m really passionate about is local organizations and communities, so the Ottawa Grassroots Festival is a great example of that. The last two times that we’ve been to Ottawa, they have provided all our volunteers, and it’s just been wonderful to work with them. What I really want to do with the Canadian Folk Music Awards is lift up organizations like the Ottawa Grassroots Festival, who have an event coming up later on in April, and make sure that people know they exist and that they’re bringing in wonderfully high caliber music, storytelling and songwriting.

What can visitors expect this time around?

Lindsey: One of our new developments is something that we’re really excited about: we figured for our 20th anniversary, we wanted to spread out the awards at each of the different shows that we have. So we have four different shows, three of them at the Canadian Museum of History, one of them at the NAC. And essentially we’re going to be handing out a series of awards each night, as opposed to having just one gala performance. In this case, what we do is we hand out awards in the space between the performances by the different bands.

It gives us the opportunity to bring new music to people, and in a way that you might never know, to go out and find one artist or another. In this case, you could find somebody who’s basically brought to you. Any artist that you see at the Canadian Folk Music Awards is going to be somebody who’s just absolutely at the top of their game.

What are you personally looking forward to the most this year?

Lindsey: I’ve never hosted an event through the NAC before, so that’s going to be a lot of fun. I personally love the chance to hang and spend time with all the different nominees and other folks who are in town for the event.

I’ll be going to one of the jam sessions that we’ll be hosting, on Saturday afternoon. And so I’ll be enjoying that. But really, for me, it’s the chance to see old friends, make new friends, and just gather together with a common love of music.

You can still catch the last couple days of the CFMAs and buy tickets here or watch the livestream here.

Plus, catch our upcoming coverage of the Ottawa Grassroots Festival, starting April 24!

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