DAWSON CITY – One might expect that a 40th anniversary event would aim to be a blowout – bigger and better than those that had come before it.

Anyone who came to the past weekend’s 2018 edition of the Dawson City Music Festival (DCMF) expecting an extravaganza would have been disappointed. But anyone who came expecting a weekend of good music would not have been.

The DCMF has had to scale back to survive.

Forty years ago, it was nearly one of a kind. Now, there are several communities with somewhat similar events, and most of them are closer to the Yukon’s main population centre than is Dawson City.

In an attempt to differentiate itself from other festivals, the DCMF kept some of the things that have worked in the past, tried a few new things, and dropped some others this year.

Except for the Parks Canada Music Crawl (more on that later), there were four main venues this year:

• the main stage tent in Minto Park;

• the Dänojà Zho Cultural Centre outdoor stage;

• the return of the Palace Grand Theatre; and

• the Klondike Institute of Art and Culture (KIAC) Building.

The performances began at Dänojà Zho, a two-hour set played in jazzy blues by the Blue Moon Marquee duo and followed by loud, energetic indie rock from the quartet called Wares.

We will all miss the Gazebo event that used to kick the festival into gear. Once CBC North’s finances were removed from the event several years ago, it became a serious drain on the DCMF bank account – so it’s gone.

A bit earlier in the afternoon, between 2 p.m. and 5 p.m., there was a technical workshop called Intersessions.

Run on a “pay what you can” basis, it was aimed primarily at women and LGBTQ2+ folks. It dealt with DJ-ing and using sound equipment.

Main stage that night ran from 8:10 p.m. until just about 2 a.m. It began, as it has for several years, with old and new and reworked material from the Hän Singers. Local artist Driftwood Holly and his band were up next.

They were followed by the weekend’s third innovation: tweener acts.

Local performers Jesse Smith and Sara Wray Enns each had 15 minutes to try out their folk stylings on the crowd during the lull between bigger acts while the stage was being efficiently rearranged. This happened on both Friday and Saturday, and seemed to be well-received.

The remaining bigger acts for the evening were Elliott Brood, Goodnight, Sunshine, Les Deuxluxes and Chippy Nonstop.

On Saturday, the Kidfest ran from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Folks with children said it was a good time, and segued neatly into the Yukon Girls Rock Camp Showcase on main stage.

The teens had been mentored through the week to be ready for this.

They had formed groups, learned how to play instruments, written songs, practised other songs, and taken part in some additional cultural activities.

There were six bands of various sizes: Klondike Mutts, Second Class, Roses and Thorns, the Black Holes, the Flaming Foxes and Solar Wings. They performed their material to an enthusiastic tent full of parents, friends, and others.

They were followed by the Youth Hip Hop Showcase, with demonstrations by artists from Whitehorse, Haines Junction and Fort McPherson, N.W.T.

On Sunday, the KIAC hosted a hip hop workshop between noon and 2 p.m.

Meanwhile, at the Palace Grand Theatre, a number of Yukon performers staged a tribute show, A Singer Needs a Song, in honour of the late Bruce Bergman. The Whitehorse musician had been a regular performer and tech person at the DCMF for decades.

That was followed by more from Driftwood Holly, Blue Moon Marquee and first sets from the Mayhemingways and Old Man Luedecke.

If nothing in that lineup appealed to you, there were performances by Dena Zagi and Skye Wallace at Dänojà Zho between 12:30 and 2. There was also a Bhangra Dance workshop at the Main Stage with Whitehorse resident Gurdeep Pandher.

Goodnight, Sunrise led off the evening fun at the Main Stage, followed by the tweener acts, Wares, Les Deuxluxes, Snotty Nose Rez Kids, and Yamantaka // Sonic Titan.

Sunday featured the Parks Canada Music Crawl, the final innovation. Scheduled between 11:30 and 2:30, it actually ran an hour later.

It could be described as a combination of the DCMF and Park’s Open Doors Dawson program.

Or you could call it an exercise in seeing how large an audience you can cram into a space never intended for performance. Judging by the lineups at each venue and people’s willingness to be packed in like sardines for 20 minutes at a time, it was a success.

Snowblink (Daniela Gesundheit) made music next to the old printing presses in the Daily News building first.

Then everyone trundled over to the Old Post Office to listen to Wares’ Cassia Hardy perform in the space behind the post boxes.

The Red Feather Saloon was probably the tightest fit for an audience and some people skipped the Les Deuxluxes set there.

Saint Paul’s Anglican Church was the most suitable venue, and it was SRO for the show by the Mayhemingways. People were clearly happy to be able to sit down.

That was to have been the end of the afternoon, but up popped Old Man Luedecke with banjo and guitar to take advantage of the acoustics.

“I’m supposed to be somewhere else shortly, but I’m here now,” he said nostalgically.

He then proceeded to reminisce musically about meeting his wife here 20 years ago, and how splitting wood is easier in the Yukon at 30 below than it is in Nova Scotia at 0.

He also tried out some new material slated for the album he’ll record in Montreal next month.

Mild-mannered fellow though he may be, he gave the crowd a listen to a brand new tune (“finished writing about nine minutes ago”) that smacked of a protest about certain current events.

While some of these things were happening, something called Deconstruct, with the Dakhkà Khwaàn Dancers, DASH and Yamantaka // Sonic Titan, was underway at Dänojà Zho.

The latter group would perform that evening at the Palace Grand, after sets by Snowblink and Snotty Nose Rez Kids.

One of the most popular events is always the Sunday afternoon potluck, in which bands are scrambled into new combinations and forced to very quickly come up with a song they all know and can do as a new group.

Since the members all have different musical backgrounds, this can be a challenge, and it’s always a lot of fun.

At 8 p.m., while the Palace Grand events were winding down, the Main Stage revved up again with a full evening of headliners doing their second or third performances and ending with a finale the performed by everyone.

Sunday night has to wrap up by midnight, two hours earlier than the previous nights.

So, the DCMF policy is “no encores” no matter how many times the crowd shouts, “One more song!”

A couple of the groups sneakily finished their sets five or six minutes early, so were then able to answer that call with a final short tune.

The finale was Daft Punk’s Get Lucky, which celebrates rebirths, among other things:

“Like the legend of the phoenix

“All ends with beginnings

“What keeps the planet spinning (uh)

“The force of love beginning

“We’ve come too far to give up who we are

“So let’s raise the bar and our cups to the stars”

Probably, though, the most appealing part of the song for this sort of exercise is the line in the chorus from which it takes its name (“We’re up all night to get lucky.”).

It’s repeated more than 20 times in the printed lyrics and way more than that at about 12:05 as the festival was concluding.