Northwest String Summit

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We are headed up there bright and early Thursday morning to try and get a good (i.e. flat) camping spot.

Looking forward to the late night sets with Galactic and Pigeon's Playing Ping Pong and Dark Star Orchestra doing the Veneta 72 show. 

Anyone else going this year?  Its going to be a little weird with the ghost of Jeff Austin floating around.

Have fun!   Doing other things this weekend...and saving up for JRAD @ Frost trip in August.

Oregon Country Fair camping back-to-back w/camping at Horning's did not sound appealing this year.

...from jambands.com> 

 

Northwest String Summit Schedules Jeff Austin “Remembrance and Unification Gathering” with Yonder Mountain String Band

 

Play Jeff Austin

on Amazon Music

The Northwest String Summit has announced a special “Kinfolk Community Remembrance and Unification Gathering” to honor late Yonder Mountain String Band co-founder Jeff Austin.

“Please join us as we remember our brother Jeff Austin and celebrate the Kinfolk Community with Yonder Mountain String Band, along with their extended musical family, has helped to create and foster with a very special Kinfolk Community Remembrance & Unification Gathering,” the festival wrote in an official announcement.

Austin passed on June 24, 2019, after being hospitalized in the early morning hours of June 22.

The Northwest String Summit is scheduled for July 18-21, and the Jeff Austin gathering will take place that Sunday (July 21) at 10:45 a.m. on the Sierra Nevada Stage.

 

Well, NWSS is still the Best Fest in the West.

Got up there at 9:30 am on Thursday to get line for the announced 10:00 am gate opening only to find that they had been letting people in for hours.   After we parked, we ran up to the woods with our tents to find and stake out a good camping spot.  Many of the best spots were already taken with elaborate camps complete with sofas and kitchens with portable ovens.  Don't know how they did it, but we found a nice flat spacious spot on a hilltop next to a big group of 20 somethings with an elaborate camp already set up.   If you get a good spot, camping in the woods at NWSS is the bomb.  But if you are late or not on top of it, you might get stuck camping on a 45 degree angle or right next to a busy trail or parking area:

Hornings Camping.jpg

But music is what NWSS is about and this year delivered.   DSO headlined the first night with a recreation of the 72 Veneta show complete with 25+ minute Dark Star and Playing jams.   No naked pole humper though.   Ghost Light featuring Tom Hamilton and Holly Bowling was the best band of the first night and loved the fact that I was at a fest where most of the musicians were younger than me.  

YMSB headlined the second night (its their fest), but their first set was basically a melancholy Jeff Austin tribute with the band playing the very first YMSB album in its entirety.   That was followed by a late night funky dance party courtesy of Pigeons Playing Ping Pong.   Those dudes are bad ass.  Just two guitars, bass, and drums, but they smoked with creative use of MIDI to sound like a much bigger funk band.   It was like Frank Zappa meets the Bee Gees and people partied down hard.   Go see them if they come to your town.

Lots of good musicians playing little side stages.  What they didn't have in West Coast name recognition was made in spades by sheer talent.   Quick and Easy Boys, Kind Country, and Arthur Leland Trio stood out.   Incredible young and energetic musicians who understand and respect the scene and musical legacy of the Grateful Dead.

Third night featured more traditional hard driving jamgrass like Trampled by Turtles and Infamous String Dusters who did a nice Terrapin.

NWSS 19 1.jpg

Then YMSB came out in full electric rock band mode with drums and solid body instruments and did a "mix tape" set of covers ranging from Led Zeppelin to the Eurythmics to Marvin Gaye and Bowie.   The Space Oddity>Space>Echoes Outro Jam>Space Oddity Reprise>Starman was particularly groovy.    Galactic was supposed to play right afterwards at midnight, but their plane was delayed getting into PDX, so they got bumped to the 2:00 am slot at one the side stages.   Was planning on going, but the was completely drained by then and couldn't see raging until the sun came up (but people did).

NWSS 19 2.jpg

NWSS 19 3.jpg

Already looking forward to next year.

 

Thanks for the great report, Ken.

thanks to Ken for the informative and engaging festie report w/ pics!

I did a little Couch Tour surfing over the weekend on the free Relix webcast, and pretty much everything I heard was really good

hitting Horning's is definitely a top-ten bucket list item for me