A local Coldsnap volunteer has worked so long on the music festival that it wasn't even known as a winter celebration of the arts when she started.
It was called FolkFest, an outdoor summer festival that began in 2004 at Lheidli T'enneh Memorial Park.
After three years of battling the elements, organizers decided to bring it mostly indoors to enjoy a Coldsnap in February, a time that seems to see a lull in entertainment options.
This year's music event is on right now and will conclude Saturday.
Elizabeth Eakin, a retired French immersion Kindergarten and Grade 1 teacher and now president of the Retired Teachers' Association, wanted to support a fellow teacher, Jo Beattie, the founder of FolkFest and Coldsnap.
Eakin has always enjoyed music and had been leading a traditional French Canadian dance troupe for decades at Le Cercle des Canadiens Franais de Prince George. Her love of music inspired her to immediately volunteer for the music festival and Eakin continues to volunteer to this day.
"I started out in hospitality," said Eakin. She'd give out swag bags and direct people to the various activities. "And now I'm on the board as secretary and I'm what's called audience services, so when people come to the show there's the ticket taking and the stamping of the hands and giving people their internet tickets so they can get in."
She supervises all that.
In the early years, Eakin would tell people she was volunteering with Coldsnap and people would ask what it was.
"Now when you say Coldsnap people say 'oh, right, I have to get tickets' and before it was just 'what?' So there's much more awareness of the whole thing," said Eakin with a pleased smile.
Coldsnap volunteers have meetings once a month up until the new year and then things happen more often. As opening night approaches, it's a non-stop whirlwind of activity.
"I go to all the shows because I organize all the people who do the ticket taking and stuff and if somebody doesn't show up then I do that, too," said Eakin.
Coldsnap uses several venues throughout Prince George to bring the entertainment to eager audiences. There's an outdoor concert at Canada Games Plaza, dances at the Ramada, performances at the Prince George Playhouse, and the Prince George Golf and Curling Club Fore Bistro.
A big part of the event is the free workshops where the audience gets a closer look at instruments and how the musicians develop their music while enjoying the musical entertainment in a more intimate setting like the Legion, the Elder Citizen Recreation Centre, the Fore Bistro, Studio 2880, The Firepit and the Two Rivers Gallery.
"More people are now going to the workshops that are more like small, intimate shows where people get to see the musicians up close and it's just wonderful," said Eakin.
Mainstream music has never really appealed to Eakin and that's OK. She likes who she likes whether the artist is known or unknown.
"It's about hearing musicians and thinking 'aren't they great and why doesn't everybody know about them?'" said Eakin. "And that's what Coldsnap is all about really. For me, it's about seeing all these really talented people who are just doing it."
It's an enviable talent for Eakin.
"I would really love to be able to sing but it's just never been part of what I've been able to do," she said with a wistful sigh. "So I often feel like if I just get close to these people maybe some of it will rub off."
For more information about Coldsnap, visit www.coldsnapfestival.com.
Flip through The Citizen's Volunteer City series, featuring stand-out volunteers in Prince George:
