The 15th annual Pickin’ in Parsons Bluegrass Festival hosted another five days of straight, honest to goodness bluegrass music.
This year’s lineup came hot on the heels of the festival’s award winning year. The International Bluegrass Music Association named Pickin’ in Parsons 2017’s International Bluegrass Event of the Year.
“Just to get nominated was cool, and to win it was kind of unfathomable for us,” John Bowers, festival organizer, said.
As always, Joyce and John Bowers are at the helm of the event, steering it toward success every year since 2004.
In addition to the Event of the Year award, the Tucker County Chamber of Commerce named the Bowers the Tucker County Business People of the Year.
With two big awards under their belts and fifteen years of hosting, this year was sure to draw a larger crowd.
In 2004, the Bowers hosted the inaugural Pickin’ in Parsons. The festival started with eight acres and ten campsites. Now the Bowers own 46 acres and 120 full service campsites operated as Five Rivers Campground. “We like this spot. It’s a beautiful location to have a festival. It’s really conducive to what we are doing,” John said.
“Before we started the festival I was in business with my dad,” John said. “And as soon as he retired, I wanted to do my own thing, start my own thing, so we moved here. I didn’t know any people from Tucker County. I came here to do a festival,” he said.
John estimated the first festival drew a crowd of 50. This year estimates were close to 5,000. “This has definitely been our biggest year, even with the rain. We’ve got a monster crowd out there. It’s been awesome,” John said.
“We get people from all over the world,” he said. He noted that last year’s festival brought attendees from 11 different countries.
The Bowers chose bluegrass as the musical genre for their festival because of its prevalence to the area. “Bluegrass is traditional, and this area is kind of the breeding ground for it,” John said.
Five bands a day lined up for five days straight meant that attendees are getting their fair share of music to sample.
On Thursday, bluegrass staples Seldom Scene came through to play tunes that fans have grown to love over the band’s four decades of playing.
Rhonda Vincent and the Rage played Friday bringing their fast picking that accompanied Vincent’s vocal prowess.
And finally, Grammy award winners The SteelDrivers brought the festival to a close on Saturday night.
Radio Personality Cindy Baucom was at this year’s event as well as last year’s. Her show, “Knee-Deep in Bluegrass,” went in to syndication in 2003 with the John Boy and Billy Radio Network.
“Pickin’ in Parsons was last year’s IMBA’s Event of the Year, and I was fortunate enough to be chosen as IMBA’s Broadcaster of the Year,” Baucom said.
“Usually a multi-day bluegrass festival is typically three days, to find out this is a five day festival, I was like, ‘Hmm…I wonder if people will come out on a Tuesday or a Wednesday.’ And boy did they ever,” Baucom said.
“They bring in a good variety of well known groups for music fans. It’s not a lot of fill in with a headliner at night. All the bands you see here are nationally and internationally recognized,” Baucom said.
For John, one of the greatest joys of the job is, “Exposing people to stuff they haven’t seen or heard,” he said.
Stayed tuned for a lineup announcement, because the Bowers already began planning for the 2019 festival about two months ago.
