A GLORIOUS WEEKEND AT DEEP ROOTS… FRESH BEATS RHYTHM PARADE & MORE!
Fabulous FREE events happen at Deep Roots Music Festival throughout the day Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and even Sunday morning.
Click here to learn more about Hospitality at Deep Roots.
Thursday
Artists@Acadia
Festival Theatre: 1:00 PM – Making it new. Nani Vazana
Part of Acadia School of Music’s Thursday Concert Credit Series. All are welcome.
What does it mean to create within a living tradition – to honour the past without being imprisoned by it? In this lecture-performance, Amsterdam-based singer-songwriter and composer Nani Vazana traces her creative process as one of the world’s few artists composing original music in Ladino, the endangered Judeo-Spanish language carried across centuries and continents by the Sephardic diaspora. She’ll explore how she brings that ancient tradition into dialogue with contemporary jazz, flamenco, and North African rhythms – and where she draws the line between innovation and preservation. Featuring live performance on piano and trombone, the presentation will also offer a first look at material she will further develop during her Deep Roots Artist in Residence week at Ross Creek Centre for the Arts, following the Festival.
Nani Vazana
Growing Roots: A Community Empathy Experience
Harriet Irving Gardens, Acadia campus: 2:30 PM – please pre-register
We are pleased to welcome back Selah Rose of Empathy Village Mediation, for an Empathy Circle at the Harriet Irving Botanical Gardens. This participatory workshop is a gentle prelude to the Deep Roots Music Festival. Together we’ll practice listening and connection in community, supported by fresh air, birdsong, and trees. Please bring a folding chair and anything you need to be comfortable outdoors. The purpose of this experience is to provide meaningful connection in a community setting so we can all grow our capacity for belonging and interconnectedness. Pre-register through the button below:
Selah Rose
Friday
Patio Concert
Wolfville Memorial Library: 11:30 AM
We are welcoming the production crew of Eastlink cable’s Atlantic Notes program to our festival this year. The musical host of Atlantic Notes is Jesse Hemmings, and Jesse will be performing at the Library along with Lily Gunn. Filming will be happening throughout the concert. Deep Roots will be included in 2 episodes of the upcoming season 6.
Please note: this concert is being filmed for the sixth season of Eastlink TV’s Atlantic Notes. By attending, you may appear incidentally in the broadcast footage.
Smudge Ceremony
Waterfront Park: 12:45 PM
This is the ceremonial opening of Deep Roots Music Festival – when Sandy-Lynn Fisher and her teenagers Lily Beth and Morgan Joseph welcome us into a smudging circle, uniting those who share this ritual of cleansing, and inviting positive intentions in mind, body and spirit. Using the four sacred medicines – sweetgrass, sage, tobacco, and cedar – Sandy-Lynn shares teachings passed down from Mi’kmaq Elders, guiding participants through a practice of clearing the mind, opening the heart, and connecting with the land. All are welcome to take part in this meaningful start to our festival weekend.
Paddy’s Pub – Late Night
Cap off your Deep Roots day with a free night of music at Paddy’s Pub. Wolfville favourite-turned-Halifax storyteller Mat Hughes opens the evening, bringing foot-tapping piano pop and razor-sharp, wry lyricism that finds the absurd and the tender in equal measure – having grown up attending Deep Roots with his father, he returns to the town that shaped him as one of Nova Scotia’s most original young talents. Things turn up the heat when Annapolis Valley power trio Rad News Bears take the stage, delivering raw energy, bold riffs, and an all-original sound built on bandleader Liam Potter’s restless songwriting. Fresh off their debut album From the Uncanny Valley, they’ll close out the night with a set that sends you home buzzing. Free admission – bring your dancing shoes.
Paddy’s Festival Tent
Waterfront Park: 1-5 PM
Enjoy a free afternoon of live music in the park.
The music opens alongside the Smudge ceremony, with Cristian Quirivan of Rad News Bears playing peaceful Andean instrumentals, before the trio takes the stage in full with their raw energy and bold, all-original riffs. The mood shifts for “Soul and Story,” a song circle featuring Joce Reyome’s powerhouse soul-rock vocals, Rob Lutes’ storied fingerstyle blues and folk, and Adrian Sutherland’s roots-rock shaped by his Cree culture. The afternoon wraps with Wolfville’s own A Band Called Tim, bringing down-home hillbilly power-pop to send everyone off in high spirits.
Saturday Morning
Farmers’ Market
Check out the Farmers’ Market on Saturday, 9am to 1pm, for Valley Voices: A Heritage of Songs, hosted by Delhaven.
From centuries-old ballads to songs still sung today, Valley Voices: A Heritage of Songs celebrates the living musical traditions of the Annapolis Valley. Featuring music inspired by the collections of Carrie Grover, Helen Creighton, and other keepers of song, this special concert highlights the stories, cultures, and voices that continue to shape our region’s rich musical heritage.
Drop in anytime during the morning to enjoy the tunes and the wonderful market atmosphere. Featuring Kevin Roach Band, Steam Mill Band, Junior Céilí Band, Emily & Iain Levy, Adria Jackson, and Jesse Hemmings.
Parade Prep – Crafts
Explore your creative side – prepare for the parade by either making crafts or putting on costumes and playing with giant puppets.
At the Clock Park at 10 AM, artists from Ross Creek Centre for the Arts will have a tent with exciting craft supplies – so you can make things like hats, masks and musical instruments that you can use in the parade.
Parade Prep – Puppets
Over in the Festival Theatre lobby, starting at 10 AM, Wee Giant Theatre has magical costume pieces to share and will help you explore and express the character you develop.
For maximum enjoyment, please give your children the time they need to truly play and explore these pieces, to choose what really speaks to them, and to develop their character and movements, before the group leaves the building at 11:30 to go to Clock Park and join in the parade.
Singing
Express your musical side – sing at the harmony workshop on Saturday morning from 10-11am with music therapists Sarah McInnis and Rebecca Fairless, at the Wolfville Legion. You will be guided through a series of exercises and songs that will have you singing in harmony in no time. No experience necessary.
Drumming
Djugdjug Ensemble will provide drums and training so you can participate in the drum circle at Clock Park from 11-11:45am.
Kids PLAY Music
Children under 7 and their adults can join Marilyn Manzer & Shannon Lynch at the Baptist Church vestry at 10:30am for an hour of playing, singing, clapping and dancing.
Marilyn Manzer has taught and performed music in Wolfville for over 30 years and led Kindermusik® classes for 13 years. The 2011 Valley Arts Award recipient, Marilyn sings, plays piano and recorder, and has directed music for Women of Wolfville and various musicals for teens.
Shannon Lynch is a musician, performer and educator. Formerly a member of the children’s music duo The Wilderbeats, Shannon currently teaches elementary music for grades P-6 in Halifax.
Harmony Singing workshop, 2025
Wolfville Farmers Market
Drum Circle with Djugdjug Ensemble
Wee Giant Theatre’s puppets and costumes workshop
Saturday Parade
Join the fun
Whether you’ve participated in one of our morning workshops or not, come join the Fresh Beats Rhythm Parade at noon. It will be the most fun you’ve had all day, for sure.
Everyone gathers at the Clock Park at 11:35am bringing their own rhythm instruments, if they have them, and wearing their finery, a costume or just a wacky hat if so inclined.
Parade
Many folks have claimed that our Fresh Beats Rhythm Parade is one of the highlights of their weekend. It’s at the very heart of the Deep Roots Music Festival. At NOON … the parade in all its glorious colour and joyous noise begins. Many people walk or dance. Wheelchairs, bikes, wagons and strollers are welcome. All motorized traffic is stopped while the parade goes on.
Parade Prep Workshops
The morning workshops help you explore costume, or make hats, masks or instruments for the parade. When you join the parade, you could be wearing a fantastic hat or mask you’ve just made, or be holding the rhythm instrument you’ve created, wearing the Wee Giant costume you’ve just borrowed, or just lbeing your wonderful self!
Parade Route
Leaving from Clock Park, the parade proceeds east on Main Street, turns left and goes north on Central Avenue, turns right and goes east on Front Street. A final left and a hop, skip and a jump will bring us to Waterfront Park and the Paddy’s Festival Tent. Please stay in costume and gather for a GROUP PICTURE right after the parade finishes. (Route subject to change.)
After the Parade
Waterfront Park
After the excitement of the parade there’s lots of free music at the Paddy’s Festival Tent down by the Wolfville Harbour. Come sing along, dance it out, and enjoy an afternoon of feel-good fun for the whole family.
Farmers’ Market
If you check out the Farmers’ Market (9:00am -1:00pm), you’ll catch more Deep Roots music there. And you probably won’t be able to resist picking up some of the great local food choices for your picnic later.
Family Music
The party starts in the street this year. Jitterbug James & Norah Spades – the husband-and-wife duo known as The Vaudevillian – will lead the Fresh Beats Rhythm Parade through Wolfville before bringing the whole joyful chaos outside to the Festival Tent at Waterfront Park for a family show you won’t soon forget.
Their jug band ragtime blues is rowdy, warm, and completely impossible to resist – the kind of music that pulls dancers out of their chairs and keeps them there, whether they’re six years old or sixty.
Bring the whole family – and wear your dancing shoes.
Kid’s Music – for everyone
Fresh off winning the 2026 ECMA Award for Children’s Artist of the Year, Nova Scotia’s own Donna & Andy bring their irresistible mix of fiddle, accordion, guitar, keyboard, and the legendary Newfoundland Ugly Stick to the Festival Tent for an afternoon the little ones will be talking about all the way home. Expect singing, laughter, and plenty of audience participation – this is a show that gets everyone involved, from the tiniest dancers to the grown-ups who forgot they knew the words.
All ages welcome.
Group Picture and Costume Return
Please stay in costume and gather for a group picture right after the parade finishes. Cooperative play in costume is encouraged. This is one of many reasons to hang around in the Waterfront Park on Saturday afternoon. When you are done with your costume, please return it to the Wee Giants and help them pack it away in the bins at the Park.
Deep Roots Open Mic
Do you have a song to sing? Deep Roots listeners want to hear you! Scott Marsters and Hannah Clausen of HUSH host our Open Mic at the Paddy’s Festival Tent starting at 2 pm. Sign up with Scott or Hannah, at the tent, starting at 12:30 pm.
What to bring
If you bring your own water bottle, we have water onsite for refills. Bringing your own chair is recommended. Bringing a picnic along to enjoy while listening to the music adds to the fun!
Youth Open Mic
Deer Jenny is hosting the Youth Stage at Devour Studios on Saturday afternoon – partnership with Music In Communities. Sign up for the Open Mic in advance through MIC, or at 12:30 at Devour.
Saturday Evening
Paddy’s Pub – Late Night
Paddy’s Pub heats up Saturday night with Corbies and A Band Called Tim.
Corbies is Scottish-born duo Eilidh Campbell and Andy Webster, friends since their student days in Glasgow, who’ve played alongside Belle and Sebastian, Old Man Luedecke, Leahy, and Dougie MacLean – now Nova Scotia-based, they blend Scottish tradition and original songwriting through lyrical fiddle and rhythmic guitar and bouzouki.
Closing out the night is Wolfville’s own A Band Called Tim, an unlikely trio of Victor Scarnati, Graham Stone, and Tim Peacock dishing out self-styled “hillbilly power-pop” on dobro, mandolin, banjo, guitar, and harmonica. Free admission, all ages welcome – two sets of genre-bending, East Coast-rooted good times.
Sunday Morning
Rise Up Singing: Festival Theatre – 10:00 AM
Sunday begins with one of Deep Roots’ most cherished traditions. More than a concert, Rise Up Singing is a communal experience where the audience becomes the choir. This year’s session is co-hosted by Ken Whiteley and Sarah McInnis, joined by a lineup of festival artists, in songs that remind us just how powerful it is to sing together.
Thanks to funding from the Mud Creek Rotary Club, this show is offered free to the community. You are encouraged to make a cash donation to the local food bank if you can. Come and celebrate and Rise Up Singing at our 20th festival.
If the weather is REALLY wet …
September is usually beautiful in Nova Scotia, but… it could still rain.
Almost all of our venues are indoor and unaffected by adverse weather conditions. All shows at the Paddy’s Festival Tent in Waterfront Park, will go on, rain or shine. (If it is very wet, we will move to a nearby rain venue!)
The Saturday morning craft workshop at Clock Park will also be under a tent. (The drum circle will be cancelled if it rains.) If it is just a little misty, the parade will go on!
If the wind is too much, some Tent events may need to be cancelled, and the program for the Paddy’s Festival Tent will move indoors at Devour Studios.
