Few people would’ve expected former CityNews Artist of the Year Fred Smith to be appearing as a poet at the launch of the National Folk Festival held on Wednesday in the Contentious Character bar at Fyshwick but there he was – Canberra’s most famous troubadour taking to the mic to perform some truly dreadful rhymes of his own devising.

Smith, it turns out will be the MC at the revived Great Poetry Debate when the festival comes up over Easter.

President of the National Folk Festival David Gilks spoke about the event’s gift of “sharing powerful knowledge,” noting that it was one of the ACT’s biggest cultural events.

“It’s traditional but innovation takes place,” he said, also welcoming the strong indigenous component in visitors such as The Stiff Gins, Richie Allan and Suga Cane Mamas,

It was also, he explained, always a haven for new and emerging artists, just like Melbourne’s Daisy Kilbourne, who performed two gentle numbers for the crowd.

On hand to explain their approach were co-artistic directors Holly Downes and Michael Sollis who, with the third part in the triumvirate, Chris Stone, had put the program together.

Downes said that the festival’s main thrust was to see people “coming together”. With performers from Chile, Ireland Canada, Scotland and the US likely to step out of their individual acts and into the Folk Festival’s National Star Band, that would be put to the test.

In a similar vein, one of Stone’s favourite projects, Restrung, sees around six different string players get together, choose a song and write a string part for it. Any number of collaborators can join in and it is a way that guests to the festival can have direct input on what happens here.

“It’s a rich village, like nothing else in the world,” Downes said.

Sollis was keen to talk up the dance elements of the festival – dance with live music, that is – with the biggest event being the dress-up Bridgerton Ball, under the autumn moon on the autumn equinox. Nobody was allowed to escape before media and festival crew alike took to the floor to learn some Cajun dancing,

The National Folk Festival, Exhibition Park in Canberra, April 17-21.