Calvin Cooke is approximately my favorite musician ever.

There have been other good ones, certainly -- Clapton and Hendrix and any Marsalis. But what Cooke does stirs emotions in special ways.

If you aren't familiar with him, you can catch him Sunday (Aug. 14) -- if you live near East Lansing, Mich. That's when the National Folk Festival wraps up.

(Yes, I usually prattle about TV; see previous blogs. But this one and the ones around it deal with the festival, this weekend.)

If you live near East Lansing, Mich. -- and you really should, you know -- here's an assignment. This weekend (Aug. 13-14), definitely catch the Great Lakes Folk Festival.

(I know I usually prattle on about TV here. Please catch the previous blogs on "So You Think You Can Dance," including an interview with the winner, Melane Moore.)

"How many of you have never been to one of my shows," Doyle Lawson asked the Great Lakes Folk Festival audience.

Many hands, including mine, went up. Lawson paused before drawling his conclusion: "You people really should get out more."

He's right, you know. Lawson, 66, has been performing professionally for almost a half-century. He's had his own group for 31 years; for six straight years, it won the bluegrass award for best vocal group. By all logic, we should have heard him before.

By the second day of the Great Lakes Folk Festival, I realized something important had been overlooked. Missing from the music stages was ... well, 51 per cent of the human population.

So far, I've sampled eight acts with, by rough count, 35 performers. That breaks down to 32 men and three women -- 93-year-old singer Alberta Adams, the singer (C.C. Collins) who opened for her and a flamenco dancer

Each August, the Great Lakes Folk Festival has been rather great. This year, it's merely semi-great ... which is still pretty good.

This blog entry is strictly for people near East Lansing, Mich.: If you have a chance, catch the last two days of the festival, Aug. 14-15. The event is half as good as it used to be, which still makes it twice as good as almost anything else.

The problem involves dropping the Valley Court Park concerts. During the day, under the searing sun, they were sparsely attended; at night, they gave the event its festival flavor.