This past Sunday’s (5/17) edition of The Boston Globe carried a feature by Scott Alarik about the emergence of more and more young folk artists on the scene.

The article has a Boston angle, as you might expect, but it does quote Sierra Hull about this phenomenon.

Tennessee bluegrass prodigy Sierra Hull, 17, who performs at the Lowell Folk Festival, is a sparkling mandolinist and singer. Like Jacobs-Strain, she discovered the music at festivals and started to play when she was 8. She loved jamming with adults, and local bands often invited her on stage, “even when all I could do was chop along.”

“It was such a fun way to meet new people, learn new things, and get encouragement from people you really admire,” she says. “Bluegrass is like a big family that way, a very sweet environment to grow up in.”

She says the availability of folk music on the Internet is also drawing new young fans: “Lots of kids my age just like being different and don’t listen to commercial music. You know, it’s like, ‘Everybody likes that, so I’m not gonna.’ “

Read the full article online.