For three days starting this Friday the forests in Campton will ring with the sound of music as the Forest Jam takes over the Branch Brook Campground.
Part eco-fair, part family camping trip, the Forest Jam is hoping to attract environmentally inclined music lovers to this jamboree in the woods.
NHPR Correspondent Sean Hurley has this preview.
FX: Footsteps in the Woods
Before we do the Jam, let’s take a little walk in the woods.
I met with Jim Nordgren, Executive Director of the Northeast Wilderness Trust at the head of an old logging trail in Sandwich.
Together we explored the Trust’s newest acquisition, a 400 acre parcel of beautiful old-growth woodlands.
A few dollars from every Forest Jam ticket will go directly to the Trust to protect forests like this one.
Jim: Doesn’t it smell good?
Sean: Smells extra good. Like preserved forest.
Jim: (laughs) And some of these trees are pretty old...look at that, that’s a white pine...
The Trust doesn’t want to preserve just single tracts of land here and there.
They want to create an ever-enlarging network of interconnected forests, across states, and even across countries.
It’s an expansive, long-term vision, but Jim is both passionate about it and hopeful:
Jim: So what you’re seeing now in Forest Jam and in other fundraising events is the next great generation of young people going out, seeing hardship and saying “I’m gonna do something about it.” I look at that and what’s going on at Forest Jam and it makes me really really optimistic about the future...this next great generation. Here’s the bridge!
SFX: Sounds of Tewksbury Brook and feet on the bridge.
Two members of that next generation, Ryan and Tara Harty, are responsible for bringing the Forest Jam into being – and this will be its inaugural year.
Ryan: We’re super nervous! Oh yeah! (laughs) We’re nervous and excited all at once.
Tara: Yeah, you fluctuate between completely nervous and completely excited. And just hope that on the day you’ll be completely excited. It’s a lot of work.
The Forest Jam won’t be powered by solar or wind. At least not this year. But Ryan and Tara have worked hard make this an environmentally friendly eco-fair, with solar demonstrations and other sustainable activities and exhibitions.. This isn’t, like, say Woodstock, which began with the remarkable call to arms, or call to something:
Wavy Gravy: “What we have in mind is breakfast in bed for 400,000...”
Well, Wavy Gravy, there won’t be any breakfast in bed for 400,000 here.
Still, they are planning for a steady trembling ruckus of rock and funk, and dancing, and camping in the fields and a scatter of firepits and stargazing, but there are plenty of clear differences.
For example, the festival has been designed around families:
Tara: We want it to be family friendly.
Ryan: That’s what we want. We definitely want it to make it a family friendly festival.
Tara: Kids can be a great force. We want this to be a hands-on educational thing for the kids too, cause sometimes its kids that fuel a family to make changes.
If you don’t have children to encourage change, the Plymouth Area Renewable Energy Initiative, one of the Jam sponsors, will be on site ready to serve a similar role.
Peter Adams is the Intiative’s founder.
Peter: What we’re trying to do is get people to make plans. A plan could be to drive five miles less a week or a plan could be to put in compact fluorescent bulbs, or a plan could be to put in solar on your roof.
–17 bands are scheduled to share two separate stages over the three day festival.
Regionally known acts such Fungus Amungus, Roots of Creation and Scarecrow Collection will join local favorites Lichen and Pay the Piper.
Headliner Gordon Stone has played with Phish and moe. A virtuoso musician, he’s created an eclectic and infectious style of music that borrows from bluegrass, jazz, funk, latin, reggae and swing. It’s a curious swirl that he calls:
Gordon: Barackabilly! (laughs) This is another one of my tunes, called Southwind...
MUSIC: Gordon Stone’s “Southwind”
Organizers are expecting to sell over a thousand tickets.
They cost $50 for the entire weekend and include parking and a space for a tent.
The music starts at 3pm on Friday at the Branch Brook Campground in Campton.
For NHPR News, I’m Sean Hurley
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