GrassRoots concerts start Friday

Though the 30th Annual Finger Lakes GrassRoots Festival of Music & Dance has been postponed twice now, the organization will host a month’s worth of limited-capacity events beginning this Friday. These smaller versions of the festival are branded as “GrassRoots Live” events to denote a departure from the full weekend experience.

Starting this weekend, and repeating on the third and fifth weekends of July, there will be single concerts on Fridays and Saturdays at the infield stage of the Trumansburg Fairgrounds. Tickets are available online or at the door, and the headline performers are as follows:

• July 9: Railroad Earth with Aaron Lipp & Max Flansburg
• July 10: Galactic featuring Anjelika “Jelly” Joseph with Danielle Ponder
• July 16: Sam Bush Band with Driftwood
• July 17: Cory Henry with Sophistafunk
• July 30: Jimkata and Giant Panda Guerrilla Dub Squad
• July 31: Spin Doctors

The series is modeled after a COVID-19-friendly concert series the organization’s sister festival, Shakori Hills GrassRoots Festival in North Carolina, held April to June this year. Russ Friedell, director of marketing for GrassRoots in Trumansburg, said it was a huge success.

“Everybody loved it; it went well,” Friedell said. “They were requiring masks and everything, and people followed rules and stayed distanced. There were a lot of tears and hugs, and it was a lot of artists’ first concert back.”

The fourth weekend of July in T-burg will be more like the traditional event and has been dubbed “Donna the Buffalo’s GrassRoots Festival Weekend.” July 23-25 will have multiple concerts on the infield stage and in the dance tent, plus food vendors, craft vendors and camping off site.

The festival draws about 10,000 to 15,000 people in a typical year, but this year, attendees will be capped at 4,500 for the weekend. The number of bands will be reduced by 75%, and no onsite camping and no outside food or alcohol is allowed. Friedell said that the festival is smaller this year because of limited preparation time.

“Normally, it takes us a full year to plan the festival and put it on,” Friedell said. “So, when it got to March 2021, we canceled the festival again because we still couldn’t apply for a mass gathering permit. Our county health department was pretty overwhelmed with addressing the pandemic. No one really had any clear guidance for us in terms of what we could do until about two or three weeks ago.”

Since their decision to cancel in March 2021, pandemic restrictions have loosened up a great deal, spurring the team to develop the weekend concert series. Members of the band “Donna the Buffalo,” including one of the festival founders Jeb Puryear, curated the downsized festival weekend. The July shows were announced in May.

Initially, all tickets were sold as PODs, meaning that four tickets were sold in a group and each POD would stay in a designated area for concerts. Last week, GrassRoots announced via social media that single, general admission tickets are now available for purchase.

Friedell said that because New York state had crossed the 70% vaccination level, the event got approval to lift its COVID-19 restrictions. Folks will no longer need to provide proof of vaccination or a negative test to enter, something Friedell is excited about.

“I feel very lucky that this organization is coming up on 30 years and that we’re able to create something this summer,” Friedell said. “It’s such a unique, special and magical thing that’s completely unlike any other music festival I’ve ever been to in my life.”

Though there is no on-site camping allowed this year, passes for in the “Across the way” camping area on Falls Street are for sale online now. At this time, GrassRoots has received its final campground inspection from the Tompkins County Health Department and anticipates its permit to be issued prior to the events.

And while no outside alcohol is allowed — part of the original approved plan from the Health Department — Southern Tier Brewing and Hector Wine Company are sponsoring the event and supplying adult beverages, with cider and seltzer also for sale. Friedell said they are still lining up food vendors but that Silo Food Truck and New York Pizzeria are confirmed.

GrassRoots is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, so the canceled events of the last two years posed a big financial challenge during the pandemic. GrassRoots ran a capital fundraising campaign that brought in over $100,000 and helped keep the bills paid and the staff employed. This money allowed them to pivot over the winter and produce their first multicamera, high-definition live stream from the State Theatre in Ithaca, Friedell said.

“The pandemic made it so we couldn’t do what we do — bringing people together,” Friedell said. “But we were able to produce something with everybody wearing masks and people getting tested. We’ve never broadcast live to YouTube or anything like that, so that was a really nice little silver lining that brought some hope and light into people’s lives during the dark winter.”

Friedell said he and the GrassRoots team are aiming to create an event that gives people a chance to reunite with friends and their community.

Tickets that were purchased for the 2020 festival will automatically transfer to the 2022 event, where GrassRoots will celebrate its 30th year. If 2020 ticket holders wish to transfer their tickets to this year’s event, they can do so by calling the GrassRoots office.

Learn more or purchase tickets at grassrootsfest.org.