MARQUETTE, Mich.—The Upper Peninsula Folklife Festival will kick off 2012 with a Beaumier Coffee House Series concert featuring All Strings Considered and Lumber Jakki on Saturday, Jan. 14. The event begins at 7 p.m. at the Dance Zone, 1113 Lincoln Ave. in Marquette. Admission is free, with donations encouraged. The folklife festival is presented by the Beaumier U.P. Heritage Center and is funded in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.

All Strings Considered evolved out of the Hiawatha Music Co-op Old-Time Acoustic Jam that began in Marquette in 2007 and continues on the first Saturday of each month. Band members have assorted performance histories with a host of old-time, folk and bluegrass bands of near and far. All Strings Considered has a primary focus on traditional old-time instrumental and vocal music of the Appalachian region with a bit of Celtic and Scandinavian tossed into the mix. The group’s sound is a blend of Jamie Kitchel on fiddle, Rochelle Schuster on hammered dulcimer, Phil Watts on guitar, Annette Watts on autoharp and Maggie Morgan on bass.

Lumber Jakki is a trio comprised of Les Ross Sr., Randy Seppala and Oren Tikkanen. The group performs Finnish songs learned by Les Ross when he was a young man spending time with lumberjacks around his hometown of Eben. Ross is a past recipient of the U.P. Folklife Award. He and Tikkanen are both winners of the Michigan Heritage Award. 

            For more information, call 227-1219.