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The Roots of a Festival

Courtesy the Steel Wheels

In 2012, the Steel Wheels, a Harrisonburg-based Americana band, founded the popular Red Wing Roots Festival. This year’s event at Natural Chimneys Park in Augusta County will start on Friday, July 10th. WMRA’s Kara Lofton talked to Trent Wagler, the band’s lead singer, banjo player and guitarist about the three-year-old festival.

[STEEL WHEELS PLAYING “OLD GUITAR”]

In the five years since they released their initial album, called Red Wing, The Steel Wheels have traveled to festivals all over the United States playing their soulful Americana music. Although being on the road can be brutally difficult at times (especially since it takes them away from their young families) it also gave the band an opportunity to develop a nuanced idea of what they liked about festivals and what they didn’t like.

For lead singer Trent Wagler,

TRENT WAGLER: That experience of being able to go to a community and really see the community through the eyes and experience of a music festival was really magical in certain situations.  You know initially you think of a festival as being one weekend out of the year, an event, and it is, but in certain times and situations you see that one weekend out of the year and that event also creates a larger and more continual kind of impact on the community.

And so an idea began to grow: what if they had their own festival, here in the Shenandoah Valley, in the community that three out of the four band mates call home? It took awhile for the idea to develop from just a dream into a concrete plan. But within a year or two, several things came together at once.

The Steel Wheels connected with producer Jeremiah Jenkins of Black Bear Productions, they found that Natural Chimneys Park already had an existing stage (and great camping facilities), and they discovered that there were a number of local businesses willing to sponsor their endeavor. And so they launched The Red Wing Roots Festival, named after their first album, and people came.

WAGLER: What we really heard from the beginning from people was ‘please don’t let this festival get too big.’ And that many people who go to music festivals, part what they love about it is the relate-ability of it - the fact that they see their favorite artists, or a new artist, and don’t just see them on stage, but see them walking from the stage to the merch tent, or see them in some smaller in some kind of showcase or workshop atmosphere and see them collaborate with some other artist, but really get to see them. And while there are festivals out there that have tens of thousands of people and some people really like those huge groups, a lot of people at least in our style of music also really love that intimate festival that’s big enough, where you do have a large number and you can look around, I mean two or three thousand people feels like a large group, to me at least, but it’s not so big that you don’t get as overwhelmed like you do at a 20 thousand or 30 thousand person festival.

Wagler said even if they wanted to grow they couldn’t because they have already maxed out the space they have. That suits him just fine, though, because he is happy to grow the festival in others ways.  That includes developing more of a “jamming” scene at the campgrounds and finding new ways to appeal more to teenagers.

WAGLER: In your first years you are just trying to get it up on its feet.  It’s like you are just putting the tent up and hoping it’s going to stay up in many ways. And now I think, over the years we are trying to look at it a little closer, and add nuance to the festival.

In addition to music from the Punch Brothers, Elephant Revival, and a little over 30 other bands, he said they are trying to add nuance to Red Wing by both providing an atmosphere for festival goers to listen to music, and helping them take advantage of the natural resources at the park. Festival programming for this year includes four different guided bike rides, two hikes and free yoga classes. It also means having a beer garden for adults, art activities for kids and a plethora of local venders. The idea is that anyone and everyone is welcome.

Kara Lofton is a photojournalist based in Harrisonburg, VA. She is a 2014 graduate of Eastern Mennonite University and has been published by EMU, Sojourners Magazine, and The Mennonite. Her reporting for WMRA is her radio debut.