Driftless village holds bluegrass festival
The Village of Mazomanie, originally built as a small railroad town in 1857, is one of those places that make you feel like you are stepping back in time. With its nostalgic downtown and thriving businesses, the people are friendly, welcoming, and make you feel special.
This past weekend, Mazomanie hosted the annual Gandy Dancer Bluegrass Festival. In its 15th year, the festival gives residents to showcase not only great music, but also what makes Mazomanie special.
Though an annual event, Gandy Dancer was not always held here. It started in Madison, Wisconsin and migrated North. “It started in 2007. The first festival was actually on the east side of Madison,” said Festival Creative Director Kenny MacMillan. “It started in 2007. The first festival was actually on the East side of Madison, and since 2008 has been here in Mazomanie.” Not specifying why, MacMillan said that there were two years the festival was not held, in 2016 and 2020.
When the festival started, MacMillan said the it had some actual trains associated with it. And at the time, Mazomanie was on a similar line. “So, it made sense to use that for the next venue, but funding and maintenance issues caused the trains not able to be a part of the festival anymore.” He noted that he hopes that the trains will be involved again someday. Thus, the Festival’s name Gandy Dancer. The name is an ode to the early railroad workers, who back in the day, manually put down railroad tracks and saw to their maintenance, before machines were engineered to do the tedious and back breaking work.
Putting on a one-day festival can be costly. Local John Wick and Wick Homes were the main sponsors with other sponsorships coming from; Cardinl CG-Mazomanie, The Peoples Community Bank, Dane Arts, Hometown Drywall, The Shoe Box. “We have a lot of other small donations, $10, $20, or a few $1000 from some of the local businesses that really support this event and make it happen every year,” said MacMillan.
But nothing would get done without festival workers rolling up their sleeves to keep things running smooth. From the festival committee members, to village citizens and local civic groups, there was a sense of pride in everyone working to ensure visitors felt like family. “It's a completely volunteer run festival. Nobody gets paid for anything. The day off. It takes about 40 volunteers to run the different booths and keep everything running smoothly. “I took over leading the festival in 2017, and we've been building up a really solid cohort of people that come back every year and volunteer. I think that is a testament to the festival, that people that volunteer come back every year to be a part of it again. I'm really proud of that.
It is the hope MacMillan shared, to bring attention to what small communities have to offer in the Driftless Area. “We try to highlight a little bit of Cross Plains, a little bit of Black Earth. It’s about local vendors, food, music and outdoor venues that we have available. We want to bring people out of Madison, out of the cities and into the rural areas to show them all that villages like Mazomanie have to offer.”
A Bluegrass music festival is nothing without its performers though. “We kind of change it up from year to year, but we do feature local, regional and national touring bands. Last year we had Grammy nominees Po' Ramblin' Boys as a headliner, and this year it’s Armchair Boogie, one of the leading progressive bluegrass bands in the world,” MacMillan said. He stressed this year the performers are pretty local saying, “I think Chicago is our furthest band, but we've done Montana, the Carolinas, Tennessee, Ohio. If they are a good bluegrass band at their core, I tried to bring them here.”
MacMillan stressed that he’s grateful for everybody that gives their time to the festival especially the volunteers. “We've got an incredible volunteer board of nine people that plan the event throughout the year.” He also shared that the Cross Plains Lions Club, local Methodist church, and the 608 Community Kitchen, all play a huge roll in the festival’s success.
