Day one of Appleton’s Mile of Music goes on indoors amid thunderstorms
APPLETON, Wis. (WFRV) – The threat of severe thunderstorms forced Mile of Music organizers to move the acts originally scheduled to perform on the music festival’s three main stages indoors Thursday evening.
“For the sake and safety of our festival-goers, our artists, our sound techs, and their equipment, we are officially calling off the music at the three main stages for tonight,” organizers wrote on their Facebook page. “Some of those shows will be moved inside yet today and tonight…please watch your schedule via the app for those rescheduled sets.”
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The festival has over 700 acts lined up across its 40 venues, many of which are at restaurants and bars and can be moved inside easily. That was the case at the Stone Arch Brew Pub, which kicked off the festival at noon with a performance from Northwoods Wisconsinite Billy Bronsted.
“It’s huge, it’s one of our busiest weeks of the year,” Steve Lonsway, Stone Arch Brew Pub co-founder, said. “For us having the indoor space, we’re very fortunate for that. We don’t rely totally on what Mother Nature can do. Our taproom is a very intimate space. We do live music every Tuesday anyways, so we just had to transition from in to out, and it’s that simple.”
Indoors or outdoors, Dave Magruder made the trip to Appleton from Cincinnati. He would rather attend the festival without the rain, but he’ll take free music where he can get it.
“We’re looking forward to seeing a lot of stuff, taken aback by the rain though. But it’s nice that they have it downstairs now instead of sitting out in the rain,” Magruder said. “It’s nice; I like the flow; you can go to different venues, and you don’t need wristbands or tickets or anything. If you want to wedge in, you wedge in and just enjoy the music.”
The bars and restaurants prepare for the event all week long, and once day one arrives, all hands are on deck. Other businesses become sponsors, host events, and introduce the artists on stage.
“We’ve taken it to a bigger level because we’ve been here for eight years,” Knuth Financial Life Planning co-owner Kay Knuth said. “We come in and actually spend time at the venue with the artists and we have shifts and we greet the artists as they come in and we take them to the green room.”
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Bomber Sound Productions owner Gary Bomber has been working Mile of Music since its first year, and rain or shine, he will put in the work for good music, even if that means having delays and pulling out the tarps.
“It’s all original. It’s great, great bands, people from all over the country, some from the world, and it’s awesome, four days of fantastic music,” Bomber said. “Lot of tarps, and we always just keep pushing along. It always works, it always works.”
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