The Tamworth country music festival is in full swing and it’s “the vibe” that keeps people coming back, according to Tamworth regional council’s director of country music, Barry Harley.
“We do surveys,” Harley says, “and the open-ended question is ‘Why did you come to Tamworth?’”
“The number one response isn’t the music – it’s the atmosphere. Second is the music.”
Along Peel Street – Tamworth’s main street, closed off for the duration of the festival – the mood is relaxed. There aren’t as many cowboy hats or boots as you see in the promo photos, and you’re as likely to hear a finger-picked acoustic cover of the Ramones Blitzkrieg Bop as a Slim Dusty standard.
The weather’s been kind, with an uncharacteristic cool snap leading into the 10-day festival, which began last Friday. Now in its 53rd year, it’s the second-biggest country music festival in the world after the CMA music festival in Nashville, Tennessee.
This year, the estimated 40,000-strong crowd is younger than usual. Tamworth is shaking off its reputation as a post-Christmas stop for grey nomads, thanks in no small part to Taylor Swift.
Harley says Swift has rewritten what it means to be a country artist. “She started off as very seriously country but now she’s sort of moving back.
“And so we’ve got this advantage that country is suddenly cool to younger people. That overall acceptance of country music leads people like the Wiggles [who performed at the Australian Equine and Livestock Events Centre on Tuesday] to identify that it’d be nice to get into country.”
There’s more than country music on offer. Suzi Quatro, the Screaming Jets and Daryl Braithwaite have all performed at Tamworth, this year.
Some choose to forgo music in their venues altogether, like Central Hospitality Group proprietor Jye Segboer, who made a decision five years ago to not put on any acts. But he still benefits from the festival crowd. Segboer’s pubs and restaurants usually serve about 10,000 meals over the 10 days, and they’re on track to hit those numbers again this year. The absence of live music in a town overtaken by performers is part of the attraction, he says.
“I think that’s part of the reason why people do sit longer and enjoy a meal and plan out their day,” Segboer says. “They use this as an escape, a sanctuary to escape from the noise.”
Segboer says festival-long hotel bookings were slightly lower this year than previous years, but those gaps are being filled by younger guests. “They’re coming for two or three nights and really hitting the ground hard in that time,” he says.
Harley says the broad positive impact of the festival is the key to its longevity. “If you had to boil it down, our responsibility is to provide the atmosphere, the environment for everyone else to actually benefit,” he says, “Like the buskers.”
Early-career artists are the foundation of the festival, not the headliners, Harley says. There’ll be no future for the industry if new talent isn’t fostered.
One of the newcomers is Sally Jane, a 23-year-old singer-songwriter, who left her horses behind in Serpentine, Western Australia, to cross the continent to play for Tamworth crowds.
“This is my sixth time performing in Tamworth – 11 times crossing the Nullarbor,” she says.
“I love Tamworth. You’ve got such a wide range of country music artists. You can run into Kasey Chambers on the street, and you get to listen to 10-year-old buskers who are just so talented.
“I feel like it makes you work harder.”
The networking opportunities are crucial, Jane says. She recently released a duet with Luke O’Shea – a performer who has just been inducted into Tamworth’s Galaxy Of Stars – and has played on the Fanzone Stage on Peel Street, despite still being “solely independent” and self-funded.
“Such a massive stage, such great sounds, and just staring off into Peel Street, everyone walking past – that was unreal,” she says.
Tom Plevey is a freelance journalist based in Tamworth, NSW
