John Hartford Festival
May 31 – June 3, 2017
Music lovers from around the world are excitedly vying for tickets to what’ s quickly become one of the mostanticipated celebrations of acoustic bluegrass, newgrass, and American folk.
The seventh annual John Hartford Memorial Festival will fill the Bill Monroe Music Park and Campground with more than 70 performances on three stages from May 31 to June 3. The familyfriendly four-day celebration also will feature a songwriting contest showcase, a banjo and fiddle contest, campfire picking, a story songs workshop, pitch-in breakfast with live music, and arts and craft vendors.
The festival celebrates the life and musical contributions of John Hartford, who started a movement in music that forever changed and opened up the landscape of bluegrass music, giving way to a new genre called Newgrass.
Locals at the Boogie Stage: Dylan Hawf, John BanJovi, John Bowyer, Jayme Hood, Sean First, and Chris Dollar.
62 Our Brown County May / June 2017
~ by Chrissy Alspaugh, photos by Jules Dunlap
Headliners from across the U. S. will range from legends to the newest generation of performers in the Americana genre. And attendees have unique opportunities to interact with each act, with a mere 2,000 tickets available and no VIP areas dividing the crowd.
“ It’ s how John Hartford lived his life,” said Tom Burkhart, the festival’ s managing partner.“ Laid-back, noncommercial. We’ re committed to maintaining this great thing that’ s just become a gathering of likeminded music lovers, who really feel more like family than anything else.” Hartford was a Grammy-award winning, multi-instrumentalist, oldtimey, bluegrass-singing songwriter, and steamboat pilot. He wrote the hit song“ Gentle on My Mind” that won four Grammy awards and has been recorded more than 400 times. In the early 1970s, Hartford and his band performed in Bean Blossom, a venue that became a catalyst for a new generation of acoustic musicians that would explore and stretch the boundaries of folk music and breathe new life into bluegrass.