PORT TOWNSEND — We’ve got four days and nights of singing. And the crescendo? One honky-tonk dance.
So promise the flock of musicians coming from across continent and sea to Voice Works, Centrum’s first festival of the summer.
It’s an intensive workshop for singers during the week, but the final two events are wide open to the public: the first “Global Resonance” concert tonight at Fort Worden State Park’s Wheeler Theater and the Honky Tonk Polka Dot Dance on Saturday night at the fort’s USO Hall.
Friday evening’s concert brought together the pipes of eight artists: Appalachian balladeer Elizabeth LaPrelle, Eastern European songstress Moira Smiley, Louisiana Creole singer Cedric Watson, the traditional Mexican quartet La Familia Govea and Irish folk singer Cathy Jordan.
And whether the voices come from across the Atlantic Ocean or across the Washington-Oregon border, they’re here for the same thing.
It’s the elemental joy of song, said Centrum executive director Robert Birman.
Voice Works, he added, is “about the thrill of singing in community,” and that community will be a large one tonight.
For the Honky Tonk Polka Dot Dance, Voice Works programmer Peter McCracken is assembling singers and players from Mexico to British Columbia: La Familia Govea will do a dinner-hour set to warm everybody up for the Caleb Klauder Band and singers Reeb Willms, Casey MacGill, Eli West, Pharis Romero and Laurel Bliss.
The Saturday night dance starts at 5:30 p.m. because, McCracken said, it comes with a fried chicken dinner available for purchase.
That’s a new addition, while the invitation to wear polka dots is a long-standing thing.
“We did the Polka Dot Dance one year on a whim, and people demanded to have it again,” said McCracken.
When asked whose idea it was in the first place, he admitted: “I guess it was me.”
Romero has come to many a dotted dance from her home in Horsefly, B.C., with her husband, singer and banjo man Jason Romero. She sees a similarity in the people who come to Voice Works to sing and those who might come to dance.
Both acts take guts. When you sing, you don’t have your musical instrument in front of your body.
Lifting your voice “touches on a part of yourself that nothing else does,” Romero said.
Step onto the dance floor, and there you are again, with nothing to hide behind. Romero knows of people who’d rather give a public speech than go dancing.
But Saturday’s music is old-style honky-tonk, she emphasizes, no complicated steps required. And Caleb Klauder’s outfit “is just a fantastic band,” Romero said, adding that any singer is lucky to share their stage.
Klauder heaped on some more encouragement.
“The music’s exciting. Just come and watch the dancers, and maybe you’ll pick up something.
“I’ll bet you 90 percent of the people on the dance floor think they’re not very good dancers, but they’re out there anyway,” he said.
Do something simple. That’s fine, and it loosens your body and lets you connect with the music, added Klauder, who calls himself a not-very-good dancer who has a good time at it.
As a musician, Klauder has much the same feeling. He learned by listening to other people’s licks and melodies.
“That’s pretty much the folk process,” he said.
It’s been a year since Klauder underwent surgery to remove polyps on his vocal cords, and he is delighted to be back among the singing.
The raspiness of his old voice has given way to “a little more of a clarity,” he said, “and I’ve gained a little bit more range. That’s really exciting.”
To those who liked his raspy voice, Klauder says not to worry; “I’m still me.”
Romero has also had an eventful couple of years.
She and Jason now sing, dance and travel with their daughter Indigo, Indie for short, who joined them a year and a half ago.
“She’s been on the road with us since she was three months old. We’ve traveled all over Canada and the United States,” Romero said.
After Indie was born, she wasn’t sure how much time she would put into her songwriting.
Then she discovered that nursing her baby was especially conducive: rhythms would come into her head, so she’d have to hurry and play them afterward.
Pharis and Jason Romero’s newest album is full of such songs.
It’s titled “A Wanderer I’ll Stay,” which sums up their love of making music on the road.
“I feel really lucky, really happy,” Romero said, “that this is what I get to do for my living.”
