Festival in The Park is “Bringing it Home”

Skip Brown gives the details on this year's "new old" festival.
Skip Brown gives the details on this year’s “new old” festival.

The 46th Annual Festival in the Park at Elmwood Park  May 22-24

This year is the first back at the downtown Roanoke green space and amphitheater after all of the renovations have been completely finished. Executive committee chairman Skip Brown said last year there were still some finishing touches being put on the park during the festival.

Brown announced the musical lineup and other highlights for the 2015 version of Festival in the Park recently, which includes bands where at least one member has ties to the region. That fits in with the “Bringing it Home” theme chosen for the popular event this year. Everything is free during the day, including entertainment on several stages and children’s activities, but there will be ticketed concerts on Friday and Saturday nights. “Finding artists and bands with Roanoke [area] performers just fit the theme perfectly and helped shape and evolve the theme,” said Brown when announcing Festival highlights.

The grand finale concert on Sunday, May 26 – the popular Beatles tribute band 1964 – is free again this year. It gets harder every year to get 1964 back here, but Brown said the cover band – they dress, play and sound uncannily like the Fab Four – have a “soft spot” for Roanoke. Festival in the Park has always been sort of a kickoff for summer in the Roanoke Valley, leading into Memorial Day and the warm weather season.

“We want this to be the coming back to Elmwood [Park] with the Festival that people remember,” said Brown, who noted that the Festival in the Park admission buttons are also coming back. A ticketing system didn’t work too well last year so the buttons are returning. They can also be purchased ahead of time and used for those nighttime ticketed concerts. HomeTrust Bank is a major sponsor this year and will also be a venue for button sales.

Last year all of the food vendors were only accessible after attendees passed through one admission gate – that’s been changed this time – to avoid the log jam that occurred. “We learned last year,” Brown admits.

Also returning is the “Land Yacht” race on Franklin Road that used to be a Festival in the Park favorite. Homemade, recycled vehicles can take part. “That’s a fun race,” said Brown. “You have to build it, you have to ride on it, you can’t use a motor.”

It takes a small army of volunteers – actually not very small – to put Festival in the Park on every year. About 600 people in all, said Brown – logistics, movers, attendants in the children’s area, arts and crafts instructors, stagehands, food vendor support, button vendors, cleaners (“we clean constantly”) etc. There are some 60 volunteers alone involved with overseeing children’s activities, noted Brown.

Brown sees the 2015 Festival as the real first one at the newly reconstituted Elmwood Park: “last year we had fences and stuff in the way … ‘[we] can’t put something there, that’s not been done yet, etc.’ We love being back and our hats are off to the city. We know where to put everything this year. We won’t have any of the confusion.”

Gene Marrano

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