Cedar City, Utah’sGroovefest American Music Festival is celebrating its 11th annual music and art festival in the community’s beautiful historic downtown district beginning on Monday, June 24th and running through Sunday, June 30th for 2013.
Enjoying its recognition on the nation-wide festival circuit, the event is now a week-long festival that includes national as well as local musicians, artists and writers - plus a new children’s event, called “Groove Kids” (where local elementary and middle school aged kids are featured), the LitFest literary event, the annual Campfire Concert, the yearly Kick-off Show, music workshops, after-hours shows, the very popular Gospel Hour, as well as the always highly anticipated music performances in the downtown’s Main Street Park alongside the Cedar City Arts Festival.
Groovefest began in 2002 as a small parking lot concert and has blossomed into its current week-long extravaganza. With much hard work and devotion from the Groovefest planning committee (better known as “The Groove Crew”) the festival has garnered much national attention due to the wealth of great talent that has appeared over the years. In addition, the event brings well over one million and a half dollars of revenue to the local Cedar City economy!
Tim Cretsinger, Groovefest founder and director sites the abundance of amazing talent that exists in the United States: “Our goal is to nurture and expand on the great musicianship we’ve discovered that there is out there. What I want to do is to introduce our citizens to the wonderful musicians that they may not have seen, but likewise to show our area to a group of performers that may have never been to this beautiful place before. We live in vacationland and I want to share that.”
And it has paid off. Cretsinger has seen the return of a remarkable number of musical artists over the course of the past eleven years. He has been able to book shows quite often that have played at Groovefest at one time or another, and that want to continually return.
“Not only do they get a great reception here, but they love the area – plain and simple!” says Cretsinger. “There have been bands we’ve signed on that have never been east of the Mississippi – and they’re blown away!”
This year’s Groovefest will not be a disappointment to anyone, offers Cretsinger. He believes this is the best year yet.
“I don’t even have to solicit entertainment any longer,” he says. “They come to me with the desire to play here – and that has meant success to me! Cedar City is now and forever on the map as far as a destination for musical performance!”
The Groovefest American Music Festival has been putting on awareness events all year. Since the success of last year’s 10th anniversary “reunion show”, festival planners have wanted to keep Groovefest in the minds of Cedar City.
The committee has offered fundraisers as a way to do so.
December and April both witnessed the continuation of the annual Groovefest Rummage sales. In addition there have been various live performances by musicians to keep the Groovefest spirit alive, art shows; and the premiere of “Groovefest – the Movie” by co-founder, Lisa Cretsinger, a documentary about last year’s anniversary, was a huge success.
These various fundraisers have also been implemented by the planners to offset the costs that are required of a festival the magnitude of Groovefest. But the celebration would not be possible without continued support from the many local businesses and individuals who advertise and contribute to insure that Groovefest is successful year after year.
The Groovefest American Music Festival is truly a grassroots effort and the current list of dedicated partners proves it. To see the list of those who make Groovefest possible, plus everything that festival-goers need to know about the festival, go to www.groovefestutah.com.
There, in addition to this year’s partners, you’ll see schedules, biographies, photos, arts festival info, and much more. There are also many ways to connect with Groovefest on Facebook and various other social media sites.
The schedule this year is extensive, so you’ll want to make sure you find out as much as you can about all of the diverse happenings at the 11th annual Groovefest American Music Festival. For further information, you can also call 435-867-9800.