ChristianMusicDaily

Operators of many the nation’s largest multi-day Christian music festivals gathered together in Nashville recently for the Christian Festival Association’s Fall Meeting. The goal of the Association is to help the independent festival organizations grow both spiritually and fiscally, so that more lives can be changed for glory of God.

At the meeting, the members voted to expand the Association’s membership to twenty-seven events, with the addition of four new festivals: Sonshine Festival (Wilmar, MN), Spirit Song Festival (King’s Island, OH), King’s Fest (Doswell, VA) and Crossover Festival (Lake of the Ozarks, MO).

Sonshine Festival is a three-day festival spread over 80 acres on the Willmar (Minnesota) High School campus and Civic Center grounds. The event includes five stages, a “Tent City” camping village and an Xtreme Games park and skateboard area. The 2008 Sonshine Festival will be held July 17-19. Spirit Song Festival and King’s Fest are three-day events which will next be held July 10-12, 2008. Held at amusement parks, these Festivals include three days of Christian music plus all of the parks’ rides and attractions. Spirit Song Festival is held at the King’s Fair theme park (just north of Cincinnati, Ohio) and King’s Fest takes place at King’s Dominion, just north of Richmond, Virginia. Crossover Festival takes place in June at the Stoneridge Ampitheater in the heart of Missouri at the beautiful Lake of the Ozarks.  The 2008 event will be held June 10-12.

Also at the meeting, the festival directors attended five artist showcases, spotlighting over thirty emerging and veteran artists, presented by selected Christian music record labels and booking agents. These showcased provided the festival directors with the opportunity to both sample the artists’ current music and to get to know the artists on a more personal level.

According to Bob Thompson, the Association’s president, “The Christian Festival Association member festivals are looking for artists with a heart for ministry and a single-focused desire to bring glory to God. Specifically, we seek artists who are personally engaging with our festival attendees and volunteers, and whose music is culturally relevant, artistically excellent, scripturally sound and spiritually significant.”

“In order to effectively translate the Gospel to the next generation at our festivals, the music and its message must be capable of reaching its audience at a heart, mind and soul level,” Thompson said. “We, as the body of Christ, are called by God to be excellent. Our standards for artistic quality are, therefore, consistent with this expectation. While we do not require or expect the lyrics of our artists' music to be taken directly from scripture, we do expect that the message is consistent with God's plan for our lives, as described in His word.”

As part of the Association’s goal to help develop and promote new artists, 16 of its member festivals conducted regional talent search competitions in 2007, in partnership with Word Label Group (www.wordlabelgroup.com) and Artist Ovation (www.artistovation.com). At the conclusion of regional events held throughout the summer, competition finalists were chosen to perform at the national finals in Nashville where the winning artist was announced and honored with an artist development agreement, a Word Label Group prize package, and named the 2007 Artist Ovation competition winner. The overall winner was the ethereal rock group Nitengale (www.myspace.com/nitengale) from Fairbanks, Alaska.

The band’s entire hometown pulled together to send Nitengale to the competition, held at Sound Check Studios in Nashville, TN on September 22, pooling their frequent flier miles to make it possible. “Winning the competition was an unexpected blessing,” said Nitengale lead vocalist Josh Baumgartner. “We thank God for His favor and are excited and honored to be working with Word Label Group and their staff.”

Each year, over 22 million fans of Christian music attend live events in venues ranging from small church gatherings to huge arena-based shows. Also each year, well over a million of those fans attend multi-day events, known as Christian music festivals, from coast to coast.

“The Christian music festivals put on by CFA members are attended by over 1.5 million people,” said Thompson. “Collectively, these festivals send out nearly 3 million direct mail pieces, send E-mail blasts to over 4.9 million potential attendees and hang posters in nearly a million churches, schools and retail locations. Collectively, the CFA member websites attract over 150 million annual hits. These marketing efforts are augmented by significant electronic media coverage on Christian radio and TV stations nationwide.”

The twenty-seven members of the CFA include events from coast-to-coast and border-to-border.  The member festivals include:

·        Alive Festival - Canal Fulton, Ohio
·        Atlanta Fest - Atlanta, Georgia
·        Collide Festival - Bells, Texas
·        Cornerstone Festival – Bushnell, Illinois
·        Cornerstone California – Orange County, California
·        Cornerstone Florida – Orlando, Florida
·        Creation Festival Northeast – Mt. Union, Pennsylvania
·        Creation Festival Northwest – George, Washington
·        Crossover Festival, Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri
·        Hills Alive - Rapid City, South Dakota
·        Ichthus – Wilmore, Kentucky
·        Kingdom Bound – Darien Center, New York
·        King’s Fest - Doswell, Virginia
·        LifeLight Festival – Sioux Falls, South Dakota
·        Lifest – Oshkosh, Wisconsin
·        Purple Door Festival – Lewisberry, Pennsylvania
·        Rock The Coast – Muskegon, Michigan
·        Rock The Desert – Midland, Texas
·        Rock The Light – Kansas City, Missouri
·        Rock The Universe – Orlando, Florida
·        Sonshine Festival - Wilmar, MN
·        SoulFest – Gilford, New Hampshire
·        Spirit Song Festival - King’s Island, Ohio
·        Sprit West Coast – Monterey, California
·        Spirit West Coast – Del Mar, California
·        Unity Christian Music Festival – Muskegon, Michigan
·        Winterfest - Lynchburg, Virginia

Details are at the association’s website: http://www.christianfestivals.org.

CFA’s Officers include: Bob Thompson (Atlanta Fest), President; Harry Thomas (Creation Festivals and Friendship Fest), Vice President, and Donna Russo (Kingdom Bound), Secretary. Appointed to the group’s Board of Directors were Bill Graening (Alive Festival) and John Herrin (Cornerstone Festivals). Committee chairs are: Jon Robberson (Spirit West Coast), Festival Operations Committee; Kathy Graening (Alive Festival), Spiritual Growth and Event Development Committee; Chuck Tilley (Atlanta Fest, Rock the Universe, Rock the Light, Crossover and Collide), Sponsorship and Promotion Committee; and Roger Eikenberry (Unity Festival), Audit Committee.

The group meets face-to face twice each year, with the next meeting scheduled for mid-April 2008 in Nashville. Committees meet monthly via teleconference, and report their findings and recommendations to the membership at the meetings and through monthly group teleconferences.

The 2008 season of Christian music festivals begins in Orlando, Florida on May 9 and concludes during New Year’s weekend in Lynchburg, Virginia. While most events take place during the summer months, CFA member festivals take place in every region of the United States from May to December.