Ozark Heritage Festival Preview
Performers and Programs Announced
WEST PLAINS, Mo. – On September 7, 2024, a mini festival “preview” is scheduled to take place in and around the civic center grounds. Attendees can expect music, storytelling, artisans’ demonstration and other activities represented at the festival. The annual event in downtown West Plains celebrates Ozarks music and culture.
The lineup for music will be the Shortleaf Band at 1:00 p.m., Duane Porterfield at 2:30 p.m., The Ozark Hellbenders at 4:00 p.m., and Hogmolly at 5:30 p.m. With the performers scheduled, there will be music playing all throughout the festival preview.
The Shortleaf Band has been a part of the Old-Time Music, Ozark Heritage Festival from the inception and for 30 years has built a strong relationship with the festival. They will open the music programs for this inaugural Ozark Heritage Festival. Celebrating the people, land, and music from the first “Scots Irish” settlers in the area, Michael and Tenley Fraser use their talents with fiddle and vocals to create a story in a traditional and contemporary style of the Ozarks while they entertain. To know the stories yourself, you will just have to come and listen for yourself.
Duane Porterfield has a passion for music that started in his childhood when he started learning acoustic instruments and honing his skills alongside his brothers Dennis and Les Crider at festivals and fairs. Duane in 1997 then stumbled into the Mountain Music Shop in Shawnee, Kansas, where he was introduced to the mountain dulcimer. Reminded of his great-grandfather playing a similar instrument in Duane’s youth, he would pick up the mountain dulcimer and go on to be a former National Mountain Dulcimer Champion along with his current Arkansas State Old Time Banjo Champion title in the senior division.
The Ozark Hellbenders, deriving their name from the local salamander with the same name, have Gordon Johnston on piano, Randy Aufdembrinke on guitar, and CD Scott on guitar and mandolin, they create an eclectic sound with their instruments and vocals. Playing with a range of older rock and roll, country, bluegrass, Celtic, and gospel music, there is a little something for everyone to enjoy.
Hogmolly features Bo Brown on guitar, Mat Calton on mandolin, and Jeff Sowards on bass. The Springfield-based trio have thoughtful originals along with reimagined covers that have the eclectic, folk, and bluegrass style that Bo, Matt, and Jeff have known from their upbringing. Having performed since their formation in the late 90’s, Hogmolly have played in clubs, concerts, and festivals to share their unique sound.
Along with performances, we plan to have activities in and on the Civic Center grounds. Inside we plan to have storytelling with Dannette House and Marideth Sisco, dulcimer workshops with Fawn Cockrum and Duane Porterfield. Dennis Crider’s photography of “Smokey Hills Trail Stage Journey”, and an exhibit highlighting the 30-year history of the Old-Time Music, Ozark Heritage Festival. Storytelling with Dannette House who will have a cross-cultural storytelling of Ozark Stories combined with East Indian Music and Dance to talk about the experience created when mixing cultural material and performance genres and Marideth Sisco using her story “Polly” to examine narrative, interpretation, and the use of linguistics while highlighting the importance of family and community archives to conserve resources. Marideth’s talk is sponsored by Missouri Humanities, Speakers Bureau.
Outside there will be the Butterfield Stagecoach with Cowboy Rick, pickin’ circles for anyone to bring along an instrument and join in making some music, and a Living History group demonstrating from 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. along with a small encampment with different samples of original artwork available to purchase. There will be demonstrations of rope making, fire starting, knot tying, river cane fishing poles and building them, flintknapping, Pawpaw recipes for ice cream and cheesecake, Persimmon recipes for pudding and bread, Sassafras tea recipe, butter churning, ice cream making, apple butter making, rendering fat, corn sucking and shelling, yarn carding, weaving, and spinning exhibit of materials and equipment, spoon making and wood cutting boards with native and exotic woods, carving walking sticks, honey making and bee keeping.
The Ozark Heritage Festival is the signature event for West Plains. The festival seeks to celebrate, preserve, pass on and nurture an appreciation of the old-time music and folk life traditions distinctive to the Ozark Highlands. Admission to all festival events is free.
Festival partners are the West Plains Council on the Arts, the City of West Plains and Missouri State University – West Plains. The festival receives funding from the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency.
For more information on the festival e-mail info@westplainsarts.org, visit the website at http://www.oldtimemusic.org, or Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/Old.Time.Music.Festival
