KANSAS CITY, Mo. - Walking down the hallway of the sixth floor of the Westin hotel at 2 a.m., a music lover never knew what kind of sounds the next few steps would bring.

At the Folk Alliance International conference in Kansas City that started Wednesday and ends today, about 1,000 musicians and singers gathered for five days of music, song and mingling with promoters, critics, agents and disc jockeys for a maniacal, magical feast of music that ran almost 24 hours a day.

The subtitle for this year's convention was "Forbidden Folk," and many of the performers took the title to heart playing a modern version of the kind of 1960s protest music that made their parents and grandparents proud. Or nervous.

Though the name of Donald Trump was not heard at the conference, it was clear that he was the person, or force, referred to in many performers' repertoires loosely defined as "folk" music.

The umbrella of "folk" includes blues, rock, Cajun, bluegrass, country, Americana, and songs from musicians from as far away as Moscow, Sweden and Israel, and almost anything else imaginable.

In one room, Violet and the Undercurrents, the Columbia, Mo., trio of young women played "Flashlight," a blistering song about the new president and what people can do together "for the sake of humanity." Nearby, Anna Tivel of Portland, Oregon, played the guitar with eyes closed and sang a chilling song about a worker questioning his life after being fired from his job, but then begs God for life after he is involved in a fiery car accident in "Dark Chandelier."

And a little earlier, folk music legends Tom Paxton and John McCutcheon played political and spiritual songs in a small room for 25 lucky people, most of them joined in with songs of their own or played along.

The conference was a chance for artists from all over the world to show their talent in mostly small venues in 30-minute sessions. The lucky 100 or so artists chosen for the showcases every night played in larger rooms that could seat as many as 300, or as few as 25.

When those shows stopped around 10:30 p.m., the music moved to hundreds of hotel rooms where bands and solo performers continued to make music in 30 minute sets until 3 in the morning or later. The music started up again around noon and played until the evening showcases resumed.

Even when there were no concerts scheduled, there were always people singing and performing in the lobby, hallways, stairwells, even the elevators. They came to be with fellow music lovers from around the world and they made every moment count.

With so many performances going on simultaneously, it was tough to decide which one to see since choosing one act meant not choosing 200 others. Word of mouth played a big role in making the choice, but not as much as just walking down the hallway and hearing the music slip out.

Some of the highlights:

Tom Paxton, John McCutcheon and dozens of friends performed "Songs from the intersection of the political and the spiritual" late Thursday night in a crowded room in perhaps the best show of the week. The two performed a couple of their own songs, ending with Paxton's anthem of early sixties rebellion, "Ramblin' Boy," but generously insisted that others in the small crowd perform songs as well.

George Wurzbach is a Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter, formerly a member of the musical-comedy band, Modern Man, who sings a mean story. Sometimes his songs were funny, as in "Something's Up," the modern retelling of the Noah's Ark story. Other songs, like "I'm Gonna Haunt You," about the spirits of murder victims that torment their killers" were thought-provokingly serious.

Joe Jencks, a former Clevelander and ace guitarist, played his own shows and also an hour-long tribute to Phil Ochs featuring dozens of other musicians playing the music one of the fathers of the protest song. Ochs was born in Columbus and lived in the Cleveland area before setting off to New York in the early 1960s.

John Fullbright, an Okema, Okla, singer-songwriter wowed a large audience Friday night with songs of social protest and unrest that rival the other famous singer from Okema, Woody Guthrie. His closing song, about an evil politician who controls a small town in "The Fat Man," was played on the piano with a pounding urgency not heard in previous renditions.

Once again as in recent years, the conference was evenly split between grizzled old timers and young, often female, musicians leading veterans to remark that the future of folk is in capable hands.

Sometimes there are more performers than listeners, and no one seemed to mind. The performers offered snacks, alcoholic drinks, free CDs and food to lure people into the room.

On a somber note Saturday afternoon, British singer and activist Billy Bragg talked about challenges facing the United States and the world under a Trump administration.

"Go back to work on Monday morning and stand up for what you believe in," he told a packed audience. "Music can't change the world, but the people who hear that music, can."

Get involved: Interested in attending the conference in 2018? To become a member of the Folk Alliance, get invited to the conference, or volunteer to work there (and get in free), go to
  folkalliance.org.

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