Yonder Mountain String Band is renowned for their premier annual Northwest String Summit in North Plains, Oregon. The Colorado string quartet now has their name attached to a new festival. The former Mulberry Mountain Harvest Music Festival in Ozark, Arkansas has now been coined Yonder Mountain String Band’s Harvest Music Festival, taking place October 14-16, 2010 on Muberry Mountain.
With the annual summer Wakarusa festival moving from Kansas to the same spot in Ozark, the festival is now leveraged to not be overshadowed by its big brother. In addition to Yonder Mountain String Band, the festival will feature three days worth of roots/string/americana artists that include: Leftover Salmon, Keller Williams & the Keels, Railroad Earth, Marin Sexton, Bret Dennen, Sam Bush, Split Lip Rayfield, Emmitt Nershi Band, Infamous Stringdusters and a number of Fayeteville bands. Brett Mosiman co-director of the festival, recently wrote in to let music fans remember to hit Arkansas up in a few weeks this October.
Tell us about the festival location and why its special?
Mulberry Mountain is an incredible venue for hosting events. The surrounding natural environment includes float streams, waterfalls, mountain trails for hiking and biking…..add fishing, disc golf and all the amenities of a great campground and you have an unrivaled experience. The temperatures should be warm in the day and cool in the evening. There should be a fantastic display from nature as well with the changing of the leaves in the national forest.
How would you say Harvest is most different from other festivals?
Partially the location as there are not a lot of midwest camping festivals. Partially the crew – which has tons of experience to help produce an incredible and memorable event. This is also a smaller more manageable festival. The programming thrives on lots of string based music.
The music lineup is very diversified – how was it chosen? Were there are any artists that you wanted to play but couldn’t get?
We pick our favorites from the various bluegrass genres, Americana, singer songwriter and jam music.
What are some of the bands you are most excited about?
We really love them all. There are favorites like Yonder Mountain, Leftover Salmon, Railroad Earth and Keller Williams but there are lots of great young acts that people may discover like Mountain Sprout, Poor Man’s Whiskey and Hillstomp.
As the headliners, what types of musical surprises does Yonder have in store?
They will be playing two huge headline sets and they always throw in some surprises but if we told you it wouldn’t be a surprise.
There are going to be so many creative things happening that are not music related, can you tell us about some of them?
We have tons of great food vendors and dozens of arts and craft booths as well. New this year will be the Nomadic Dreams Village hosting daily workshops, yoga, hoops classes and much more.
For those camping, what types of advice can you give so people are most prepared for the elements?
Come well prepared as you never know what nature will deliver. RV’s are welcome (you do need a special pass) On site, we’ll have plenty of water and showers.
Is there anything else you want to say about Yonder Mountain String Band’s Harvest Music Festival?
Check out our incredible VIP plan which includes meals and beverages and premium camping along with front row viewing.
Tickets are still available, for more information visit the festival’s website.
