Since the Americana Music Association was founded in 1999, the genre organized to market hard-to-classify music that might draw on country, folk, blues, rock and lots of other traditions has become a global phenomenon. And since the association’s inaugural festival and conference in 2000, what’s known as AmericanaFest (officially styled “AMERICANAFEST”) has been a local phenomenon in Nashville.

AmericanaFest returns to town Sept. 15 through 19, spreading across myriad venues. We start our preview with an in-depth conversation with Brennan Wedl, a Nashvillian and a rising star in the genre who’ll perform at various local venues during the fest. In August, she released her noisy, rocking self-titled album on ANTI-, and she talks about the mission she sees herself and many other artists undertaking — to get beneath the layers of our world, which is so dominated by superficial portrayals and interpretations in the age of social media.

We also catch up with Hunter Park, aka She Returns From War, who will play at Centennial Park as part of free concert series Musicians Corner’s annual weekend event presented in partnership with AmericanaFest. Like Wedl, Park is a Nashville musician on the rise, but her sound includes a much more pronounced influence from traditional country, something she explains is at the core of her artistic identity. We also share our top picks among the hundreds of performances you can check out during the week. And we have our annual play with the folksy nomenclature common to Americana and professional baseball — our Americana Artist or Baseball Player quiz. Pull up a chair and dig in.

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