No Harmony Fest this year!
https://www.pressdemocrat.com/images/logo2.gif
No Harmony fest this year
https://www.pressdemocrat.com/articl...p=all&tc=pgall
By JEREMY HAY
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT
Published: Thursday, March 29, 2012 at 12:32 p.m.
The Harmony Festival, a counterculture-rooted event that took over the Sonoma County Fairgrounds for three days every summer, will not take place in Santa Rosa this year, its organizers said Thursday on Facebook.
“It is with a deep sense of regret that we announce that after 33 years we will not be producing a Harmony Festival in Santa Rosa, CA in June 2012,” festival CEO Howard “Bo” Sapper said in the announcement, addressed to the “Harmony Festival family.”
“We are working on plans to reorganize the company and the possibility of creating Harmony Festivals in the future,” wrote
He did not explain in the announcement the reason for the decision.
The festival’s founder, Debra Giusti of Sebastopol, said that the company that put it on, Harmony Festival, Inc., had not ceased operations. She said the event would return.
“Its full intention is to,” Giusti said. “This is a 33-year tradition with many, many people involved, so it’s a matter of reorganizing it.”
At the same time, Sonoma County Fair Director Tawny Tesconi said a similar event is planned for the weekend the festival traditionally opened.
That event, on June 8, is to be presented by some people formerly associated with the Harmony Festival, Tesconi said.
“It’s a one day event, offering a lot of the vendor opportunities and entertainment,” she said. “More of the old Harmony days, not the more recent years; a lot of spiritual vendors and that kind of thing.”
The festival, originally named the Health & Harmony Music & Arts Festival, started in 1978. It billed itself as “California’s largest outdoor multicultural music celebration and arts and crafts faire with a health and environmental exposition.”
In the mid-2000’s, it changed its name to simply the Harmony Festival, defined itself as a celebration of “progressive culture” and began broadening its focus, adding skateboarding competitions and punk music and country concerts.
It drew crowds upwards of 30,000 but also spurred complaints that it had grown too expensive.
“I’ve been going since before my daughter was born and she’s turning 18 this year,” said Celeste Winders of Sonoma. “But the last several years we just have not been able to go to. We cannot afford the ticket prices.”
You can reach Staff Writer Jeremy Hay at 521-5212 or [email protected].
Re: No Harmony Fest this year!
Here's their post on Facebook:
Dear Harmony Festival Family,
On behalf of the Harmony Festival Board of Directors and management team, we sincerely thank you for your continued support and encouragement as we grew and evolved The Harmony Festival from a grassroots community event in 1978, into the nationally renown music, arts and cultural festival—that you've come to expect year after year.
It is with a deep sense of regret that we announce that after 33 years we will not be producing a Harmony Festival in Santa Rosa, CA in June 2012. As you can imagine, this is a very difficult announcement for us to make. We appreciate your patience as we took the necessary time to prepare a thoughtful message to inform the greater Harmony community of our decision, which is now effective immediately.
You might ask why we made this decision. Please trust that we have spent many months creatively exploring dozens of promising options in the hopes that we could keep this magical event alive this year. We know this news is a great disappointment to the entire Harmony team and the community at large, and we share your feelings of disappointment. We ask that we work together to move beyond this stage, toward hope and optimism for future Harmony Festivals.
We are working on plans to reorganize the company and the possibility of creating Harmony Festivals in the future. We are counting on engaging YOUR support and participation going forward as we re-envision a sustainable future for the festival. We also ask that you assist in communicating this message within your own community, in the most positive light possible.
We welcome your comments and feedback via our new blog www.harmonyfestivalonline.com and look forward to the possibility of rekindling the Harmony Festival flame so it shines even more brightly again in the future.
Respectfully,
Howard "Bo" Sapper, CEO Harmony Festival, Inc.
on behalf of management and Board of Directors
Re: No Harmony Fest this year!
Here's the line-up for the 1-day event on June 9th (the usual Harmony weekend) at the fairgrounds:
Line-up:Burning Spear
Tinariwen
GAUDI
The Motet
https://highervisionpresents.com
