Native Rhythms Festival Home Page

Welcome to the ninth annual
Native Rhythms Festival

NOTICE

Our website is undergoing transition from the information for last year's festival to that for 2017. As pages are updated, the logo in the upper left hand corner will be changed from the 2016 logo (bear) to the 2016 logo (dolphin). Eventually, all pages will be updated, so check back often.

November 10 - 12, 2017
Friday & Saturday: 10:00 AM - 10:00 PM
Sunday: 10:00 AM - 5:30 PM

Melbourne, Florida

brought to you by


Indian River Flute Circle	Native Heritage Gathering, Inc.

The Indian River Flute Circle and Native Heritage Gathering, Inc. proudly present the ninth annual gathering of the Native Rhythms Festival. This three day festival during Native American Heritage Month honors the culture of the indigenous peoples of the Americas through music, and especially the music of the Native American Flute.

Welcome to the cyberhome of the Native Rhythms Festival. All available information regarding our ninth annual festival will be available here. Please feel free to browse.

While we transition this website from the 2016 festival to the 2017, you will find pages from both years' events. You can tell when a page has been updated to this year's information by the presence of our 2017 logo (with the dolphin) replacing our 2016 logo (with the bear). Check back from time to time as we update our information.

We invite you help us get the word out about our festival. Click here or on the poster image to the left to download a standard 8 1/2" x 11" PDF page containing our poster (filesize: 1.50 MB). Feel free to make and distribute copies wherever you think they might be seen by anyone who could be interested.

This website is a living entity that will grow throughout the process of planning this year's festival. Native Rhythms Festival has a presence in the Facebook community! Click here to join our fans and keep up with all announcements regarding this year's festival.

["Like" Native Rhythms Festival on Facebook and help us get to 4000 "likes" by 2017 festival time!]

Our Diamond and Platinum Level Sponsors

We have now opened our 2017 sponsorship drive and welcome all who wish to provide direct support for this event by becoming a Native Rhythms Festival sponsor. We offer a five level sponsorship program that puts Native Rhythms Festival sponsorship within the reach of most budgets. Those who participate at the highest levels, our Diamond and Platinum Sponsors, will be prominently featured here on our event home page. Find all of our 2017 sponsors listed on our Sponsors Page.

We are grateful to all of the organizations and individuals whose support makes this event possible, but we give a special recognition here on our homepage to our Diamond and Platinum Level Sponsors:

Diamond Level Sponsors

Brevard County
Space Coast Office of Tourism -
Community Marketing Program
www.brevardcounty.us/TourismDevelopmentCouncil/Home

Candlewood Suites
2930 Pineda Causeway
Melbourne, FL 32940
Phone: 321-821-9009
Fax: 321-821-9010
candlewoodsuites.com/melbournefl
nkr_gm4candlewood@yahoo.com

FDCA - Culture Builds Florida
culturebuildsflorida.org

Platinum Level Sponsors

Brevard Cultural Alliance
www.artsbrevard.org

Sam's Club
www.samsclub.com

Golf Carts Unlimited
5560 N. Hwy US 1
Melbourne, FL 32940
321-610-7011
SpaceCoastGolfCarts.com

StoreSmart Self-Storage
www.storesmart.org

2017 Headline Performers

Festival weekend will feature a continuous flow of top flight entertainment coming from the amphitheater stage. We are proud to present our program of "headline" performers. As in the past, our "headline" performers include GRAMMY, NAMMY (Native American Music Award), and ISMA (Indian Summer Music Award) winners and nominees. They are supported by outstanding "featured" performers to fill out our on-stage program.

Find photos, CD offerings, and performer biographic information for all of our performers on our Performers Page, or click on the individual performer's photo or name below to go directly to their bio.


Robert Mirabal	Arvel Bird

Scott August	Randy Granger

Steven Rushingwind & Nelson Rios	Ed WindDancer

Dock Green Silverhawk	Painted Raven
*2017 Featured Performers*

Billy Whitefox	Mark McGourley

Sydney Phipps	Johnny Kee & Ken Holt

Mike Cook 2016 Players' Competition Winner

2017 Master of Ceremonies

Randy Granger

We are honored to have Clint Goss and Vera Shanov conduct the 2017 Native Rhythms Flute School on Thursday (Nov 9) and Friday (Nov 10) at the Candlewood Suites. Click here (or on the banner above) to go to the flute school's website for all the details and to submit your on-line registration.

NEWS -- NEWS -- NEWS

Check back from time to time and see what else is happening with those associated with this year's festival.

	CONGRATULATIONS to Painted Raven, Annette Abbondanza and Holly Harris, for winning TWICE at the *Indian Summer Music Awards*. One for the Native American Flute category (All My Ancestors), and one for Classical/Traditional Instrumental category (Dragonfly Returns)! Both of these songs are from their Crossroads CD. Annette and Holly will once again be headlining at Native Rhythms this November, so be sure to stop by and say "HI!", and pick up Crossroads and maybe some of their other CDs!

	Nominations have been announced and voting opened for this year's *Native American Music Awards* (NAMMYs). Speaking to the quality of our Native Rhythms Festival performers all these years, we have a number of them up for awards. Here's a summary by category of NRF performers (* indicates a 2017 NRF performer): 2. ARTIST OF THE YEAR - Randy McGinnis, "The Journey - hi a vi si i" 3. New Artist or Debut Artist of the Year - Kokopelli Girl (Sydney Phipps), "Ricochet" 4. New or Debut Duo/Group of the Year - Steven Rushingwind & the Native Groove, "Fuego" 6. Flutist of the Year - Randy McGinnis, "The Journey - hi a vi si i" - Steven Rushingwind & the Native Groove, "Fuego" 10. Best Music Video - Conceptual - "Lady of the Lake", Painted Raven 13. Native Heart (Non Native) - Jonny Lipford, "Waves of Serenity" - Timothy J.P. Gomez, "The Awakening" 18. Best Instrumental Recording - "Crossroads", Painted Raven* - "Fuego", Steven Rushingwind & the Native Groove* - "The Journey - hi a vi si i", Randy McGinnis Congratulations to one and all of our talented performers, present and past, whom we have come to call friends the past 9 years. We encourage all of our NRF supporters to visit the NAMMY voting site at the link below and support your favorite performers. Hopefully this will include the performers who have made NRF great all these years. https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/NATIVEMUSICAWARDS

A Family-Friendly Event

The Native Rhythms Festival is a true family-friendly event. No use of alcoholic beverages or illegal drugs will be tolerated. The use of profane or abusive language is unwelcome. Abusers of these rules will be asked to leave the grounds.

Please send questions or comments regarding this website to webmaster@nativerhythmsfestival.com.