Kathleen Edwards takes the main stage at the Evanston Folk Festival Sunday at 4 p.m., landing on a bill that includes several of the musicians who shaped her decades-long career. The Canadian singer-songwriter follows Josh Ritter on the main stage that afternoon, and the festival's Sunday headliner is the Indigo Girls, a band whose 1989 song “Closer to Fine” Edwards learned to play at age 14. The two-day event runs from 11:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. on September 12 and 13 at Dawes Park on Evanston's lakefront.
As reported by the Chicago Tribune, Edwards said the Indigo Girls' influence on her runs deep, and the pairing carries extra weight given how long it's been since she's played the area regularly. She told the paper that “Chicago and I have had a bit of a 20-year dry spell,” a line that captures both the gap and the anticipation surrounding her return. The Tribune's Doug George notes that Edwards met Sierra Hull, who plays late Saturday at the festival, at the Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island in July, and that Edwards has said Hull is a musician she'd like to share a stage with.
Edwards also crossed paths years ago with Ritter in a tiny bar in Boston, according to the same Tribune report. Ritter went on to record a song called “Kathleen,” and Edwards has said she considers it possibly about her, though Edwards and Ritter have a tacit agreement not to discuss whether it was. Saturday's headliner is Trampled by Turtles, rounding out the festival lineup.
A Career Built From Failer to Billionaire
Edwards released her debut album, *Failer*, in 2003, the same year Rolling Stone called her one of the year's most promising new acts, per the Tribune's reporting. Novelist Nick Hornby included her in his 2002 *Songbook* as well. Her first record included “National Steel,” a song named for the guitar, and she followed it with *Back to Me* in 2005 and *Asking for Flowers* in 2008, both of which made the Billboard charts. She also appeared on Letterman during that stretch of her career, the Tribune reports.
In 2014, Edwards stepped back from music and opened Quitters, a coffee shop outside Ottawa, according to the Tribune's account. She has said she used that period to focus on therapy and self-care while dealing with clinical depression. The Tribune reports she was born to Leonard Edwards, a former Canadian deputy minister of foreign affairs, and that her personal life during those years included a divorce from her first husband and musical collaborator, Colin Cripps, and a relationship with Justin Vernon of Bon Iver.
A Return to Recording and the Road
Edwards came back to music with *Total Freedom* in 2020, the same year she married developer Sean McAdam; the couple lives in Florida, per the Tribune's reporting. Her manager, Frank Riley, has helped guide her return to touring, the paper notes. Edwards performed at SPACE in Evanston in June 2025 ahead of this weekend's festival appearance, and she released her sixth studio album, *Billionaire*, on August 22, 2025, through Dualtone Records. The record was co-produced by Jason Isbell, who also played guitar on the ten-track project, according to AllMusic.
Edwards co-composed the score with Ian Lefevre for *Lilith Fair: Building a Mystery*, directed by Ally Pankiw. The film, which premiered in 2025, connects back to Edwards' own history — she attended Lilith Fair in 1999 as a budding songwriter, according to TIFF.
Third Year for Evanston's Lakefront Gathering
Now in its third year, the Evanston Folk Festival is organized by SPACE Presents. The inaugural 2024 edition featured headliners Sierra Ferrell and Patty Griffin across three stages in Dawes Park, and the festival's 2026 edition features more than 30 acts.
Evanston's lakefront parks provide a setting for public events. The city has also hosted Starlight Concerts in its parks over the years.
This year's schedule kicked off Friday, September 11, with the Punch Brothers performing at Cahn Auditorium ahead of the weekend's outdoor stages, according to Chicago's North Shore CVB. The festival has three stages and entrances at Sheridan Road and Forrest Place, and at Sheridan and Greenwood. General admission two-day passes started at $99, with free admission for children under 12 and half-priced tickets for youth ages 12 to 16, maintaining the festival's all-ages approach to community participation.
Beyond the music, the 2026 festival features “Tent Talks” hosted with Chicago Public Media, offering panel discussions on songwriting, protest music, and folk history, according to Northern Transmissions. This year's sessions include an in-conversation event with Indigo Girls members Emily Saliers and Amy Ray.
A Prine Tribute Awaits in October
Edwards' Chicago-area appearances don't end this weekend. She returns to the region in October for a John Prine tribute concert at The Chicago Theatre, titled *Souvenirs: 80 Years of John Prine*, on October 8, with performances backed by Prine's longtime band, according to materials distributed by Shore Fire Media. The October 8 show falls two days before what would have been Prine's 80th birthday.
The concert benefits The Hello in There Foundation, established in 2021 by Prine's family. The Line of Best Fit also covers the tribute. For Edwards, the tribute extends a fall that has already brought her back into close orbit with the songwriters and stages that first pulled her into music.
