Sadie Gustafson-Zook (’13) Wins First Place

Sadie performing at WinfieldSadie Gustafson-Zook, a junior at Bethany Christian Schools in Goshen, Ind., became the youngest person to win a first-place award in the New Song Showcase at the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, Kansas, Sept. 14-18, 2011. Each year two first-place awards are given in ten categories. Sadie’s song, “Unless I Loved,” (listen to clip, full song) was selected as one of the top new songs in the religion/spirit category. The festival, commonly referred to as Winfield, is one of the top acoustic music events in the world and host for several national and international competitions.

Sadie wrote “Unless I Loved,” which is based on 1 Corinthians 13, for a Bible class project at Bethany in January 2011. Then, on a whim, she entered the song in the Winfield contest, since she was already planning on attending. She has been a longtime attender of the Winfield festival where her parents, Les and Gwen Gustafson-Zook, have performed and her father won the 2001 International Autoharp Championship. Sadie too has performed previously at Winfield as part of Acoustic Kids—an opportunity for those 16-and-under to take the stage. And she did so again this year, twice performing three-song sets.

Sadie with folksinger John McCutcheonSo performing on stage at the festival wasn’t new for Sadie, but performing “Unless I Loved” in the New Song Showcase was special. “Being recognized as a songwriter was nice,” she says—especially from some of her father’s friends who had assumed that her father wrote her song.

She also enjoyed the opportunity to go backstage, where she met Beppe Gambetta, a highly-acclaimed guitarist. She also met John McCutcheon, who has performed on several occasions in Goshen and will do so again on Feb. 19, 2012, as a benefit for the theater department at Bethany Christian Schools.

Sadie, who has participated in several theater productions at Bethany and is a member of the school’s performing arts troupe, Emmaus, has sung with her parents for ten years. In addition to singing, she plays violin, guitar, and ukulele. In recent years she has also started performing on her own and in 2010 released her own CD, Melange, an exciting mixture of folk, Irish, and classic tunes featuring tight harmonies.