Organizers hope preview show will generate interest for a spring festival
Valerie Emerick
Lisa Holtzclaw-Martin, CEO of the Augusta Stock Music Festival, has a vision and a goal to unite the Augusta community through music and to help revitalize downtown. Ultimately, she would like to see a three-day Augusta music festival to showcase local talent, consisting of all genres of music from the ’60s to the present, to converge in the downtown area with proceeds from that festival going to benefit the Golden Harvest Food Bank, as well as providing funds for a $1,000 music scholarship for a student in need.
The projected festival would take place in April 2013, and there are preview shows scheduled before then to help generate interest.
“This is the first year that this is being done,” explains Flo McCorkle, who is a part of the ad and sponsorship committee for the Augusta Stock Music Festival. “Hopefully it’s going to bring the community together and generate interest in the downtown Augusta area for tourism other than once a year. Music has always been a part of Augusta… there’s so much local talent here and from here.”
This weekend, there will be a special Fall Preview Show at Sky City featuring music by the South Atlantic, Tony Williams & The Blues Express, George Croft & The Vellotones and Mama Says.
“Coco Rubio has donated his venue… it’s going to be a blues night and will feature four blues bands, and proceeds will go to the Golden Harvest Food Bank,” says McCorkle. “It’s $10 at the door, and five if you bring a canned good. This is our first kick-off in preparation for the event in April. We are planning another one to take place in February, probably at a different venue.”
Everyone working on the festival is doing so on a volunteer basis. “We’re all working pro bono,” says McCorkle, “everybody is volunteering for this first one, including the bands. Of course, musicians are wonderful people… artists of any kind are wonderful people and always want to help out the community. Their hearts are just that way.”
So where did Holtzclaw-Martin get the idea for such an ambitious festival?
“Basically, from spending my whole life in Augusta, Georgia,” she explains. “I just woke up one day and thought, ‘Why don’t we take what we have here in Augusta, with all this talent we have, and support our local musicians and artists and all the downtown venues as well?’”
If the festival happens as planned, it is Holtzclaw-Martin’s vision to have all of downtown, the Common and all the downtown venues full of local music and visual arts. The festival would take place in the spring and would focus mainly on Augusta’s rich musical heritage.
Augusta Stock Music Festival Fall Preview Show
Sky City | Saturday, November 17
Doors, 8 p.m.; music, 9 p.m.
$10; $5, with canned good
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