seveneightfive magazine: Five Questions for Lorie Jo Bridges
Five Questions for Lorie Jo Bridges
by Tom Wah
The South 40 Music Festival returns to its beautiful home carved out of a secluded acreage north of Topeka Oct. 9-11. Conceived as a showcase for emerging singer/songwriters, the festival offers a variety of styles of music from K.C. favorites Trampled Under Foot’s rollicking blues tunes to the down home, to say the least, hill music from Arkansas’ Mountain Sprout. The festival, the third in the last four years, offers up great music, a relaxed camping atmosphere, satisfying food vendors and the opportunity to support a worthy cause, the YWCA Center for Safety and Empowerment. For complete festival details, visit the Web site at www.s40musicfest.com
1. What three new acts have you most excited?
I found several acts that I am thrilled about: The Brittle Lens out of Wichita has a really awesome sound. I was surprised to find out they are home grown. I can't wait to hear what they do live. Moriah Harris out of Nashville has an amazing sound! The Midwest is gonna love her! So refreshing, she has a really beautiful tonality similar to Norah Jones, and she writes these amazing songs that will tear your heart out or paint a picture that you can't forget. I paired Moriah with Esther Sparks, a beautiful soul on this planet. Her songs are really pointed at a subject and drive it home, and sometimes they offer another view that maybe you didn't consider. She is a really sweet lady.
2. Are you working with YWCA’s Center for Safety and Empowerment again this year?
How has that relationship grown?
We are excited to continue to work with them and will now be offering a percentage of proceeds to them. We hope to do more activities and events in the future as the festival grows and has more money to raise awareness and support things of this nature.
3. Who are you performing with? Bringing anyone from Nashville?
I am bringing 3/4's of my band from Nashville and enlisting Dave Learned from Lawrence on the bass to have a four-piece band. We call ourselves noTVmotel. We should have our debut EP for sale.
4. The grounds were in superb shape last year. What have your folks done to make the great better?
We are pretty happy with the shape of things, and we've really just been maintaining it over the year. We will expand when we need to and are pretty happy about where we are as of right now.
5. What do you enjoy most about wearing the promoter’s hat?
So many things...I thrive on deadlines and so all of it is fun for me because there is always another deadline right around the corner, even when the festival is over. I hope to revamp the Web site after this year and make it a little more user friendly and appealing. I am learning so much every year and look forward to the years to come.
The South 40 Music Festival returns to its beautiful home carved out of a secluded acreage north of Topeka Oct. 9-11. Conceived as a showcase for emerging singer/songwriters, the festival offers a variety of styles of music from K.C. favorites Trampled Under Foot’s rollicking blues tunes to the down home, to say the least, hill music from Arkansas’ Mountain Sprout. The festival, the third in the last four years, offers up great music, a relaxed camping atmosphere, satisfying food vendors and the opportunity to support a worthy cause, the YWCA Center for Safety and Empowerment. For complete festival details, visit the Web site at www.s40musicfest.com
1. What three new acts have you most excited?
I found several acts that I am thrilled about: The Brittle Lens out of Wichita has a really awesome sound. I was surprised to find out they are home grown. I can't wait to hear what they do live. Moriah Harris out of Nashville has an amazing sound! The Midwest is gonna love her! So refreshing, she has a really beautiful tonality similar to Norah Jones, and she writes these amazing songs that will tear your heart out or paint a picture that you can't forget. I paired Moriah with Esther Sparks, a beautiful soul on this planet. Her songs are really pointed at a subject and drive it home, and sometimes they offer another view that maybe you didn't consider. She is a really sweet lady.
2. Are you working with YWCA’s Center for Safety and Empowerment again this year?
How has that relationship grown?
We are excited to continue to work with them and will now be offering a percentage of proceeds to them. We hope to do more activities and events in the future as the festival grows and has more money to raise awareness and support things of this nature.
3. Who are you performing with? Bringing anyone from Nashville?
I am bringing 3/4's of my band from Nashville and enlisting Dave Learned from Lawrence on the bass to have a four-piece band. We call ourselves noTVmotel. We should have our debut EP for sale.
4. The grounds were in superb shape last year. What have your folks done to make the great better?
We are pretty happy with the shape of things, and we've really just been maintaining it over the year. We will expand when we need to and are pretty happy about where we are as of right now.
5. What do you enjoy most about wearing the promoter’s hat?
So many things...I thrive on deadlines and so all of it is fun for me because there is always another deadline right around the corner, even when the festival is over. I hope to revamp the Web site after this year and make it a little more user friendly and appealing. I am learning so much every year and look forward to the years to come.
In this note
Tom Krebs
Erin Leigh Wynkoop
