Eating, drinking and playing music – three of the recipes for the success of the Majors Creek Festival. Photo: Majors Creek Festival.
While too many concert promoters around the country announce their latest event will be their last, in Majors Creek, (population: about 300) their main worry is drawing too big a crowd.
Since it began in 1993, the Majors Creek Festival hasn’t tried to be like other festivals. Yes, its plan has always been to bring together like-minded, music-loving people together in a safe, clean environment. But it’s also been about so much more, according to festival director Hannah Gillespie, whose father Pete, created the now two-day event more than 30 years ago.
“It started as the Braidwood Music Festival with my dad and some other folkies,” Hannah said, “as a weekend of music and jamming – where the stage was just on the back of a truck.”
This weekend, for the 2024 festival, there’ll be music coming from a much wider range of venues in the tiny hamlet, including the stunning acoustics of the stone church, the village hall, special marquees and recreation reserve.
The 2024 music line-up includes singer-songwriter Shane Nicholson, Keith Potger celebrating music of The Seekers, Bill Chambers, the Canberra Shanty Club, Benji and the Saltwater Sound System, Bret Mosley, Dingo, Bad Shed, Karl Williams and Sally Wiggins.
Visitors will be treated to everything from yoga sessions to a yarning circle, basket weaving – and even how to folk dance in the dark.
“I think the reason we have survived for so long is that we are not like other festivals,” Hannah said. “And we don’t do it to make a profit.”
It relies solely on volunteers for its operation and they mostly just break even – but it could teach the bigger cities much when it comes to drawing a good crowd for down-home entertainment.
“It’s like people come here because they know exactly what to expect. It might be a different music line-up, every year, but people know it’s a family event, where we have special places just for kids.
“We’ve had people turn up who say they haven’t even looked at the music program – they trust us and know what to expect,” she laughed.
The festival is also a no-waste operation, the brainchild of Hannah’s uncle Gerry Gillespie. Many festivals, despite their green credentials, leave their mark on their land – but not so Majors Creek.
“Gerry came up with this amazing concept to take the yuck factor out of our waste,” she said. “All the stallholders get scrap buckets for their waste, like one for organic waste for example, all the visitors get different bags and we have advisers who go around helping people with what’s what.
“It’s amazing how well it works,” she said.
At the Majors Creek Festival, the environmental message is clear – don’t be a mug, recycle. Photo: Majors Creek Festival.
The festival, now a national leader in waste reduction and the reuse and recycling of recovered material, has achieved significant savings in water use, uses composting toilets and, as a result, even though it brings many people to the village and dollars to its businesses, it requires little demand on the local council’s services. Last year, for example, there was only one small skip of plastic waste after the festival – and, as for the glass and cans, they proved a fundraising boon for the local Scouts.
Through its action, Hannah said, the festival not only entertains visitors but also educates everyone about caring for the environment.
“We’re not a big festival and we don’t want to be,” she said. “We have had up to 2000 people – that’s about enough. We can’t go over 2000 people – we just don’t have the infrastructure. It would lose the essence of the thing if it was too big.”
For its efforts, Majors Creek won a Keep Australia Beautiful Award in the “Waste Less Recycle More” category in 2017 and an “Environmental Communication” award in 2020.
The 2024 Majors Creek Festival is on this weekend, 8 to 10 November at Majors Creek which is about 15 minutes from Braidwood and an hour from Canberra. Tickets are available online or at the gate.
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