stage7winfield

Since it has been a WHOLE MONTH since Winfield, can we please start our favorite memories list now?

10. The new and improved STAGE 7. The side walls really helped soundwise. Both for the audience (more sound) and the surrounding campgrounds (less sound). Good job guys.
9. Old time music, on Stage 7, and everywhere at Winfield this year. More please...
8. Stage 7 kid camp! That was so much fun getting all those kids together. I wasn't sure if it would work, but it was GREAT!
7. Stage 7 Olympics! (And the videos, thanks Summer!) I declare Phil Whalen the OFFICIAL WINNER of the 2009 Stage 7 Olympics. Dude, yer fast!
6. Rural Grit All-stars on Stage 7. Slammin...
5. The weather! Couldn't have asked for better.
4. Kasey Rausch back in the Pecan Grove again! Now, we just gotta get Jeff and Vida back again!
3. Filling out the Winfield comment sheet with, and I quote myself here, "If Stage 7 is not allowed to continue operating during the Walnut Valley Music festival, I will not return as a paying attendee. It is my FAVORITE part of the festival, and I have been coming for years!"
2. Hay bales saved the day! SWAMP.
and...
1. Travis Peterson playing on Stage 7. You f***ing rock my friend.

That's a GREAT list, "D"!!! I couldn't agree more. Particularly noted are 3 & 1 (no prejudice of course)!!

Papa

PS - Please, in regards to #3 ... Don't forget to complete a survey! We need to be heard!!!!!! The surveys are in the program booklet you should have received at check-in.
Or, if you didn't receive a survey, go to the WVF website & make your comments there. They may even have a survey/evaluation form there. I kid you not ... this could make the difference in our continuing to exist!

Papa Pete you are a master motivator. Here is my confession and story of redemtion. I filled out the paper survey. In fact I filled up almost an entire seperate sheet op paper b/c I couldn't fit all the things I had to say in the small amount of alloted space. Then, out of sheer inexcusable laziness I failed to mail it in for a while, and then the date by which it says you have to send them in passed, and I more-or-less blew it off. I felt guilty, but my feelings of guilt did Stage 7 no good.

So Monday I read Papa's exhortation to action above, and I heeded it. I went to the WVF website http://www.wvfest.com and clicked the hq@wvfest.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false link and sent the email and just now received the response I'm pasting below.

Now, granted, I took a lot of liberties with the "truth" in the details of my story, but I don't mind using language in a figuritive, non-literal manner to potentially have an impact upon saving something as important to me as the continuation of Stage 7 in the Pecan Grove. [I stress "in the Pecan Grove", b/c Stage 7 will continue regardless, but I think we'd all prefer it remain where it's been since the last millenium].

But my main purpose in sharing this is to let you know that if you, as I did, have thought it was too late to make your voice heard, or that nobody is listening, you're wrong. Note that I received this response less than 72 hours after sending my email.

[Papa, do you know who this "Becky" is?]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Walnut Valley Staff [mailto:hq@wvfest.com]
Sent: Thursday, November 05, 2009 11:46 AM
To: Goodwin, Mark W. (SHB)
Subject: Re: Pecan Grove


Mark:

Thanks for taking the time to let us know how much you and your family enjoy Stage 7. We value the input from members of our Festival family. Your input is very important and we take it very seriously.

Becky
Walnut Valley Staff

----- Original Message -----
From: Goodwin, Mark W. (SHB)
To: hq@wvfest.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false
Sent: Monday, November 02, 2009 1:41 PM
Subject: Pecan Grove


Dear Sir or Madame,

My family, immediate and extended, have been coming to your wonderful festival for the past 10 consecutive years [2000 - 2009]. We love the music, the camping, the socializing, the amazingly-talented musicians both on the main stages and in the campgrounds as well, and the family-friendly environment and fine folks we meet there each year.

We have been hearing that there is some talk of Stage 7, which is in the southern part of the Pecan Grove near the river, being shut down.

I certainly hope that this is not true. Over the past several years, Stage 7 has become our favorite attraction in the Pecan Grove. It's nice to have a place for bands and musicians who most folks have probably never heard of, but who are almost uniformly very talented, to have an opportunity to sign up and play and get some attention.

The last few years my brother-in-law has played there with some guys he met at Winfield a few years ago. They only see each other once a year, at Winfield, but they always play on Stage 7 and he and my sister and their kids and the whole family get a big kick out of it.

The folks who organize that seem like good people and we've never felt uncomfortable having the kids there or ever witnessed any bad behavior by the audience.

I don't think my sister and her family would travel all the way from Nebraska every year and purchase 4 $80 full-festival tickets plus four nights camping fees and pay for all that gas if it weren't for Stage 7. And even though we only live in KC, I don't think we would either.

Just wanted to put our family's two cents.

Thank you so much for a wonderful event.

Mark W. Goodwin

Thanks, Mark!! I appreciate your efforts. I also appreciate your "positive" emphasis!
We can only hope that others have (or will) share their support, too!!

Papa

You don't accomplish anything by vitriolic, profane attacks right off the bat. You gotta put your brass nuckles at the bottom of a cookie jar. Feed 'em the cookies and if they still don't see the light, then fight dirty.

SkyWasGrnGrassWasBlu wrote:You don't accomplish anything by vitriolic, profane attacks right off the bat. You gotta put your brass nuckles at the bottom of a cookie jar. Feed 'em the cookies and if they still don't see the light, then fight dirty.

Love it!!! May we quote you????

I'd heard the rumors about stage 7 shutting down- and from the looks of this thread, there seems to be some validity. So I wrote in my own 2 cents to the festival and will let you know if/when I hear back.

i did a survey but didnt mail it before the october 1st deadline. how the hell do they expect to get anything in the mail by then anyways. i will type it up and send it via email, thanks for the reminder.

i know dave barnhill plugged the idea when we played stage 5 at 1am, hopefully folks speak up.

edit:
here's what mine says, just sent it:

i realized i hadnt mailed this out before the deadline, normally i would save it up for next year but feel this year's was too important not to send:

i have been going to winfield since my parents drug me along at age 5 (1986) when they played in an old timey/bluegrass group called "scrapwood". over the years i, like many others have grown more than fond of winfield and feel more at home when in the pecan grove than i do anywhere. i regularly attend shows on the main stages, purchase t-shirts, crafts, strings and picks while there on my week long campout in paradise. this year it was brought to my attention that the campground stages were threatened with the possibility of closing down mid-festival '09. watching shows on campground stages are as big a part of the festival as the main stages to me. these people arrive early, pay for the space to set up their stages, then construct a beautiful stage for people to enjoy great acts not recognized by the WVA, also allow budding groups to play on for exposure -and in my opinion the budding, unrecognized group is the true spirit of this music. i cant believe anyone would want to keep something this beautiful -and free- out of their festival. i beg you to consider what you will be suppressing by closing these stages, especially the 11 year veteran stage 7. these stages should be praised for all that they do. they are self managed, non-powered out of respect to their neighbors, self constructed, tear down and clean up after themselves. they even provide "security" though ive never seen anything get out of hand.

i had never dreamed of skipping a winfield until i thought what it could be like if there was no stage 7 welcoming me back there. the mere thought of these types of stages not being around in the future saddens me. i hope the WVA can understand how i feel about this stage and carefully considers allowing it to continue in its genius ability of warming our hearts.

Ok, I already got a reply- within 24 hours, too!

This is what I got:
Paula:

Thanks so much for taking the time to share your thoughts on Stage 7; we value your input! I will pass your comments to the Festival Coordinators. We, too, have heard the rumors about "shutting down" Stage 7 and are concerned about the anxiety the rumors are causing. Your email helps reinforce our focus - the Festival attendees and music!

Becky
Walnut Valley Staff


Soooo I have no idea what's going on.

I think what is going on [Papa or anyone else please correct the points I'm very wrong about] is that there is an old man in a position of power, perhaps ostensibly #1 guy, with the Walnut Valley Association who's been associated with the festival administration from day one. Apparently his son committed suicide several years ago. And so, while the plan of sucession may have been to have son take over the reigns of power, that obviously didn't happen, and so the Old Fart [somebody can fill in the names, and I hope I'm not totally off-base and slandering anyone] is still in power.

I have been told by many, many folks who know Old Fart personally that the guy seems to be, and increasingly so, somewhat crazy (in a literal sence)/suffering from dementia/Alzheimer's/ whatever. For example, Crazy Old Fart (hereafter, C.O.F.) will be fine with stage 7 at one point, then at another point he's driving out to the Stage with attorney in tow making all kinds of threats.

My sense is that everyone respects C.O.F. too much to directly confront him and tell him he's alienating folks and threatening to kill the cash cow with his erratic decision-making and behavior, so they've been kinda making an "end-run" around him, so to speak. Letting him make his proclamations while at the same time kinda giving a winking, de-facto approval of things behind his back, trying to preserve his dignity.

Unless I was still under the influence of a couple of very strong brownies [I was over-served], I am almost sure Papa told me that after C.O.F.'s latest threatening incursion into Camp Stage 7 turf Thursday or Friday afternoon, Papa spoke with someone in the WVA administration, in the presence of the Chief of Security, and the woman he was speaking with looked to the Chief of Security for thier "official" position, who in turn gave either a literal or figuitive "shoulder-shrugh".

So I think what we are dealing with is a "house divided" w/in the administration of the WVA. There is certainly, and I think this woman Becky's responses are indicative of the fact, a substantial contingent with the WVA "powers that be", that view Stage 7 as the postive force to the overall culture and financial bottom-line of the WVF that it cleary is and want to work with us rather than against us and realize the potential downside to picking a fight and running off a part of their die-hard base. I think this was particularly brought to light in 2008 when many folks were out at Winfield Lake, and correct me if I'm wrong since I missed that year for my bro's wedding, didn't need bracelets.

So I think our email campaign is making a very important difference. Our threat has been veiled, as is should be, but there is somebody counting the money made at that festival, and they're not all stupid. The clearer it becomes to them that they are about to drive off a cliff, the greater the likliehood that somebody will yank the steering wheel from the perhaps "out-of-touch" driver.

So keep it up, kids. Tell your friends. I bet a bunch of people who didn't and wouldn't mail a letter would be willing to email. Let's face it, it's just so much easier.

Matterafact, Man Behind Curtain, what do you say to putting a link to the WVA contact email address on the front page? Not everyone is going to be as proactive as Paula to actually go to our forum and read this thread.

I regret the length of this post. Those of you who know me know I'll talk the balls off a rhinosoraous, especially when I feel passionately about something. And I feel passionately about Stage 7 and of the good folks associated with it.

P.S NOTHING in this email should be taken to be disrespectful on a personal level to the man I'm speaking about, or be seen as making light of age-related declining mental heath, or anything like that. I respect my elders, and I am looking forward to becoming old enough to use age as an excuse for all my erratic and crazy behavior as well as my frequent egregious errors in judgement and detachment from common sense and consensual reality.