Sunday, August 9, 2015

The Mile Of Music

We headed for home this past Friday form St. Louis, but only because it was a convenient stop over on our way to Appleton Wisconsin for the 3rd Mile of Music.

The Mile of Music is an event In Downtown Appleton founded by my college friend  Mary's husband Dave and musician/recording artist Cory Chisel.  I learned very quickly that Mary and her kids are heavily involved with this festival as well, as must be many others, as something of this scope isn't happening with just a few people running it. 

This is an amazing music festival.  Around 200 groups and artists with nearly 800 performances.  In the bars up and down College Avenue.  The shows run about 50 minutes.  There are a number of larger venues as well, and a few places not on the strip.  And it is packed.  The music ranges mostly from folk to country to indirock I would say.  There is such a wide variety of music and the folks watching it it is difficult to describe.  It reminded me very much of Nashville---blocks of bars with live music and people having a really good time.  And oh yeah, it's free, for the most part.  They have a bunch of corporate partners, sell their own beer, have some raffles===yeah, it's a fundraiser too.  The profits go to the school district for musical education.  They have workshop type things throughout the weekend for kids so there is stuff for the entire family to do. What a fantastic event Dave and Mary and Cory and their team have come up with.  Everyone I saw, from performers and audience alike seemed to be having a great time.  And I read the economic impact last year was somewhere around  $2 million. Pretty good for the second year of a festival, I'd say.  I like to wish them all good luck with continuing this great weekend.  I hope to be back, and definitely encourage everyone else to plan on making a trip to Appleton for Mile of Music.

And that will do it.  We are done, worn down a bit, but so much better for this great trip.  We'll need a couple of days to get our wits about us and see what's up next.  Sure was a great time......

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