Whether the focus is music, art, film or something similar, festivals of all kinds have recently become a major influence on today’s culture.
| 2019 Q2 | story by Bob Luder | photos by Steven Hertzog
The Free State Festival at the Lawrence Arts Center
Photo by Ann Dean
During the last 15 to 20 years, it seems as though the United States—and really the world—has contracted a huge case of festival fever.
It’s an epidemic that shows no symptoms of slowing down anytime soon. Wherever or whenever you look, a new festival—mainly music, but also arts, film, food and, most recently, craft beer and wine—is popping up or an established fest is hosting its latest iteration.
Out of 318.9 million U.S. citizens, 32 million attend at least one music festival per year, according to 2017 statistics compiled by Billboard. Add to that another 10 to 20 million film and food/beverage festival attendees, and you have one-fifth of the population attending festivals. Statistics also showed that 14.7 million millennials attend U.S. music festivals each year, and those fest-goers travel an average of 903 miles, racking up significant economic impacts.
In short, festivals have now become a major influencer on our culture. Younger generations, particularly millennials, appear less materialistic and more into experiences. There’s also the power of social media, which gives festivals of all sizes massive opportunities to show potential attendees what they have to offer. Each festival offers unique experiences on set schedules with built-in breaks, the perfect weekend getaway to relax and enjoy life.
Lawrence certainly has not been immune to the festival craze. Just about any weekend during a typical year, especially during the spring and summer months, one can find an event that offers something of interest and entertainment.
The behemoth of all Lawrence festivals was the Wakarusa Music and Camping Festival, which drew tens of thousands to Clinton State Park for two to three days each summer between 2004 and 2008 before moving to Arkansas. But a large number of diverse festivals remain.
Coming up on Memorial Day weekend, the 12th annual Busker Festival, featuring street performers both local and international, will hit downtown streets. Strictly music festivals include the Lawrence Field Day Fest in July and the Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships in August. There’s the Food Truck Festival on the first Saturday every May, the Kansas Craft Brewers Exposition every March, Transformations every January, the Haskell Indian Art Market and the Free State Festival.
All in all, something for everyone.
“All the festivals in Lawrence are so unique, and they’re all different,” says Marlo Angell, director of new media at the Lawrence Arts Center and coordinator of the Free State Festival. “They give the city a more national presence. It’s a great way to build up community togetherness.”
Elizabeth Keever, executive director of the Just Food food bank and organizer of the Food Truck Festival, adds, “Festivals are a great opportunity to tell the community what we’re all about and what we’re doing, while also having a great time. Lawrence is always up for a good time and a good cause.”
Here’s a closer look at some of the more prominent festivals in Lawrence.
Cate Flaherty aka Cate Great performs to her audience at the 8th St Pitch during the 2019 Lawrence Busker Fest
Lawrence Busker Festival
The word !!busker!! conjures images of lone guitar players standing on street corners, guitar case open at their feet, accepting the occasional dollar or coinage tip. But as organizer Richard Renner says, the Lawrence Busker Festival, which takes place each year over Memorial Day weekend, is much more than that.
< img class=”fltleft” src=”../../../../wp-content/themes/starkers-theme/images/2019-Q2/festivals/busker_sara.jpg” alt=” A Festival Frenzy ” width=”350″ /> Martika Daniels (top) and Sara Kunz- The Flyin Hawaiian (bottom) perform at the Lawrence Busker Fest 2019
The Busker Fest is a three-day free celebration of street performing artists of all types. Twenty different acts will perform on five “pitches,” or performance areas, around downtown. For the first time in its 12-year history, the fest will feature strictly female performers. They include Strong Woman Mama Lou, a six-time world record-holder as recognized by Guinness, Cate Flaherty, known as Cate Great, an international performing acrobatic juggler, Sara Twister, a contortionist, and Flyin’ Hawaiian Sara Kunz, who performs acrobatic acts involving hula hoops.
One of the local performers will be Martika Daniels of Kansas City, Mo., who regularly performs her circus-show stunts like sword swallowing and walking on glass in the area. When she’s traveling and performing outside the region, she says she still hears from a lot of her peers about the Lawrence Busker Festival.
“Knowing my home pitch is so well known … it’s really cool to be able to say this is where I’m from,” Daniels says. “I travel a lot, so it’s nice to carve out a little time for something so close to home.”
She says it’s also a nice opportunity for family and friends to travel over to Lawrence and see what additions she’s made to her act.
“This festival is also about how the audience treats the buskers,” says Daniels, who’s on the official fest schedule for the second year. “It marks all the boxes of what buskers are looking for.”
Other acts include jugglers, stand-up comediennes and, yes, musicians.
“We’ve been voted best festival in Lawrence each of the last five years in the !!Lawrence Journal-World!! Best of Lawrence,” Renner says. “We’re very proud of it. It’s been wonderful.”
Kansas Craft Brewers Exposition photo by Allayne Thornton
Kansas Craft Brewers Exposition
The Kansas Craft Brewers Exposition is a collaboration between the Kansas Craft Brewers Guild and Downtown Lawrence Inc., and is the oldest craft beer expo in the state. Coordinator Phil Bradley explains the event is “put on by brewers for customers.” The expo, held every March at Abe & Jake’s Landing, strives to keep ticket prices low and holds two tasting sessions on a single day, limiting ticket sales so as to avoid overcrowding.
The expo has master brewers on-site from almost all Kansas breweries, as well as those from neighboring states and even the odd brewery from far away.
“Tickets go on sale on Kansas Day (Jan. 29),” Bradley says. “We usually sell out in minutes.”
That adds up to approximately 600 craft beer lovers tasting the beer of upwards of 50 breweries represented.
“It’s not just people who want to fill up,” Bradley says, “but people who want to talk about beer.”
Transformation Charity Gala 2019. The winning prize money of $10,000 photo by Leilani Tuttle
Transformations Charity Gala
The original inspiration behind the Transformations Charity Gala eight years ago was that of a one-time female impersonator benefit show to raise funds to send its creator, Brandon Eisman, to compete in the Miss Gay America pageant. What it’s grown into is one of Lawrence’s most prominent annual charity fundraising events for non-profits people normally don’t think about or consider.
“We decided to do it for local charities as a way for us to give back to our community,” says Eisman, who performs under the stage name, Deja Brooks. “What started as a fun event to benefit me became this great charity event to raise money for charities no one knows about. Lawrence has almost 600 non-profits, and it’s easy for some of them to get lost in the crowd.”
The first six editions of Transformations were made up of women working with female impersonators to dress up in evening gowns and compete in a talent show and win money for their charities.
“It was a way for women to step out of their comfort zones and be their glam selves,” Eisman says. “We wanted to create a greater feeling of appreciation and empowerment to women and people of all walks of life.”
Transformations raised its game a notch two years ago when it switched to making over men. Last January at Liberty Hall, 10 men became female impersonators, competing in an evening gown competition, talent category and answering an on-stage question.
“Each year is crazy,” says Eisman, who produces and directs the annual show. “When we made the transformation to men, that was a totally different experience from women as the contestants.”
“It’s really cool when men, straight or gay step up to represent a charity while dressing in drag. We had teachers, doctors and everything in between.”
Eisman says Transformations sells out every year. In fact, the VIP section for this year’s show sold out in two minutes. General admission sold out in 1 ½ months.
The Transformations winner receives a prize of $10,000 to go their charity of choice.
A film crew from Los Angeles, fluid.tv, also shot a documentary in 2018 about the event: Transformations The Film. This documentary has screened at the Free State Festival, DOC NYC, San Luis Obispo International Film Festival, Irvine International Film Festival and won Best Documentary Short at the Kansas City LGBT Film Festival.
“What we thought was going to be one fun night has grown into something we never thought would last this long and be so popular,” Eisman says. “I never thought we’d last five years, let alone eight.”
Free State Festival
What started as a small weekend film festival in 2011 has expanded to film, live music, art and comedy at numerous locations around Lawrence, including the Lawrence Arts Center, Liberty Hall and even smaller downtown restaurants such as The Burger Stand.
“We’ve made it a total community event as much as possible,” the Arts Center’s Angell says.
Attendance for the festival averages around 3,000, and many event venues fill to capacity. But Angell says she’s just as proud of the many smaller events, such as a short-film showcase and outdoor puppet shows, which are just as important to the growth of the community.
“We started the festival because I’m a fan of film,” she says. “You can really get a cultural vibe of the city. And it gives festivalgoers a chance to explore Lawrence. It’s such a wonderful place.”
Angell says the next Free State Festival is not scheduled until the summer of 2020.
Cheech Marin at the Free State Festival 2019, photo by Ann Dean
Free State Festival
What started as a small weekend film festival in 2011 has expanded to film, live music, art and comedy at numerous locations around Lawrence, including the Lawrence Arts Center, Liberty Hall and even smaller downtown restaurants such as The Burger Stand.
“We’ve made it a total community event as much as possible,” the Arts Center’s Angell says.
Attendance for the festival averages around 3,000, and many event venues fill to capacity. But Angell says she’s just as proud of the many smaller events, such as a short-film showcase and outdoor puppet shows, which are just as important to the growth of the community.
“We started the festival because I’m a fan of film,” she says. “You can really get a cultural vibe of the city. And it gives festivalgoers a chance to explore Lawrence. It’s such a wonderful place.”
Angell says the next Free State Festival is not scheduled until the summer of 2020.
Kansas Food Truck Festival to benefit Just Food
Kansas Food Truck Festival
The 6th annual Kansas Food Truck Festival was just held earlier in May in the Warehouse Arts District, at Ninth and Pennsylvania streets. In its six years of existence, the festival has grown from five food trucks and a couple hundred attendees to this year, when 33 trucks drew crowds that approached 4,000.
Tickets cost $10 for adults with children 12 and younger free. All proceeds from the Kansas Food Truck Festival benefit Just Food, the Douglas County Food Bank.
Like many festivals that sound specialized on the surface, the Kansas Food Truck Festival is much more than just a line of food trucks serving up delicious cuisine. Two stages hosted live entertainment that ranged from musicians to Hula-Hoop acrobats. There were other fun kids’ activities such as face painting and inflatables.
Then there are the food trucks, which offer foods from around the world: Brazilian, Jamaican, Cajun, Greek, Mediterranean, barbecue and grilled cheese.
“We have predominantly regional trucks,” Just Food’s Keever says. “But I know this year, we had one that came from Fayetteville, Arkansas.”
She says last year’s Kansas Food Truck Festival raised $55,000 for Just Food, the Douglas County Food Bank, and she was hoping to surpass that total this year.
Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships
Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships
The oldest festival in Lawrence just might be the Kansas State Fiddling and Picking Championships, which will hold its 39th annual event from noon to 5 p.m. August 25 in South Park. It is free.
Widely known as the Pickin’ Festival, it actually is a competition in numerous string music categories that vary from year to year. Typically, categories include adult fiddle, youth fiddle, adult flat-picking, harmony, banjo and mandolin, among others.
The event annually resembles a reunion as musicians form circles jamming under trees throughout the park. There also are four bands ranging from local to touring acts booked to play between competitions, and many times, former contestants return as professional performers. Many of the competitors are the second and third generations of their families to perform there.
Food trucks are also on hand, as well as beverages from Free State Brewing Co., artists and other community organizations.
“Attendance largely depends on the heat, but we usually average between 2,500 and 5,000,” says Tim Metz, senior vice president, commercial lending at Central Bank of the Midwest (a sponsor) and coordinator of the event. “We just want people to come out and support the competitors.”
Haskell Indian Art Market
The 31st annual Haskell Indian Art Market will take place Sept. 7 and 8 on the campus of Haskell Indian Nations University, in the southeast corner of the city. The market features original, handmade artwork crafted and designed by Native American artists that include pottery, jewelry, paintings, drawings, basket weavings, rug weavings, sculptures, beadings, carvings and more.
Admission to the two-day event is free, and it typically attracts thousands of art lovers throughout Lawrence and the surrounding areas.
Lawrence Field Day Fest
The 8th edition of the Lawrence Field Day Fest is scheduled for July 18 through 20 on multiple stages across the city. The fest, put on for the first time this year by I Heart Local Music, showcases the best in local music talent, with dozens of bands tucked in every nook and cranny throughout downtown and beyond. And per I Heart Local Music’s policy, all shows for this year’s Field Day Fest for the first time will be free and all ages.
Some of the more popular bands to check out at this year’s fest include Kid Congo and the Pink Monkey Birds, The Sluts, Vedettes, Oxford Remedy, Shoebox Money, NuBlvckCity, The Band That Saved The World, Serene Fiend and The Midnight Devils. The venues to be used this year are the Granada theater, Lucia Beer Garden and Grill, The Bottleneck and the White Schoolhouse.
Lawrence Go Fourth
Lawrence Go Fourth is a festival put on by a group of citizens, vendors, sponsors and volunteers that combines elements of many of the other major festivals around town.
Held in Burcham Park, on the banks of the Kansas River, the festival includes food and drink from local restaurants, bars and food trucks. There will be a handful of bands and DJs performing live music. Buskers will present performance art. There also are face-painters, Hoop Mamas, balloon art and inflatables for kids. And of course, the evening culminates in the largest fireworks display in town at 9:30 p.m.
The event, presented by the Granada theater, is free.