The first-year festival with 34 acts kicks off outside Stanton May 11-13. One of those acts, The Change, led by festival organizer Ryan Williams, was Friday’s featured guest for Local Spins on WYCE, which also debuted some new regional music.
Kicking Off the Festival Season: Joe Chamberlin, left, and Ryan Williams of The Change at WYCE. (Photo/Local Spins)
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West Michigan's music scene
Starting the outdoor summer music season in mid-May can be risky in Michigan, to say the least.
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After all, this was a spring with a very snowy April.
But music lovers are anxious to get the festival train rolling and the inaugural White Birch Music Festival being held May 11-13 outside Stanton – midway between Grand Rapids and Mount Pleasant – aims to heat things up with performances by 34 regional acts over three days.
The White Birch fest will roll out on three stages starting Friday afternoon and continue through Sunday evening at Morelands Motocross Park in Stanton about 55 miles northeast of Grand Rapids and 120 miles south of Traverse City.
“It’s taking a chance weather-wise but we wanted to be first,” said festival organizer Ryan Williams, frontman for the rock band The Change who moved to the Stanton area last fall. “We wanted to give everybody something to look forward to to kick off the summer.”
The lineup represents a wide swath of Michigan’s music scene, from Traverse City to Ann Arbor to Grand Rapids to Kalamazoo.
Traverse City’s Turbo Pup is part of that lineup and thrilled to join an inaugural event, noting that “Michiganders never let a little rain get in the way of a good time”— or anything else, for that matter.
“It’s always exciting to be a part of the organized chaos of a new fest,” said singer-guitarist Aaron Dye. “How great it is that there are folks out there who work so hard to celebrate their local musicians. We’re lucky to live in a place that does this.”
Williams has worked amid Michigan’s festival scene for 14 years in various capacities, and he and his wife, Melissa, were interested in starting something new.
“Having done it for so long and been supportive of so many other festivals that it just felt like it was time for us to chase out dream for a change, so my wife and I decided to dive in headfirst, which is quite literally what we did,” he said.
“It’s great. Things have been amazing. We could not have imagined the support we received before we started this. It’s been unreal.”
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The festival also will feature a new lineup for The Change, with a few members of the band FlyLite Gemini – Joe Chamberlin, Sam Rice and Zach Potter – now joining the multi-instrumentalist Williams, along with keyboardist Nate Karnes.
“We’ve got a whole new band after the first edition of The Change,” said Williams, who described it as a “stacked” lineup which will be playing several festivals this summer.
Williams and Chamberlin showed off some fresh material during an in-studio visit Friday for Local Spins on WYCE, performing the new song “Learning to Breathe” as well as a reworked rendition of “Please.” Watch a video of “Learning to Breathe” here with the full podcast of the radio show below.
VIDEO: The Change, “Learning to Breathe:” (Duo Rendition)
The band will play the White Birch Music Festival’s Rippin Stage at 6 p.m. Saturday.
The festival boasts a wide range of regional artists, including some playing a festival for the first time and many from different parts of the state. (See the full schedule above.)
“I booked this kind of selfishly because these are a lot of artists that I really love to hear,” Williams said.
“I’ve spent a lot of time both in mid-Michigan festivals as well as northern Michigan festivals, and there are a lot of tremendous bands happening way up north that a lot people don’t get to hear and don’t get a lot of playing time down-state. It was our opportunity to bring those communities together in a family- and community-related event.”
The three-day affair also features a “kids’ tent,” with music and activities for children, including performances by northern Michigan’s Brotha James and celebrated Grand Rapids’ children’s music artist Kevin Kammeraad. Workshops covering a wide range of topics also are part of the weekend event.
Morelands Motocross Park is located at 5221 East Pakes Road, Stanton. Tickets are $35 for a general weekend pass; $25 for Friday or Saturday only. Get tickets, directions and more information about the festival online at whitebirchmusicfestival.com.
Listen here to the Local Spins on WYCE podcast featuring The Change, plus music from Michigander, Shoebox GR, Elroy Meltzer, Lazy Genius, The Bootstrap Boys, Earth Radio, Vox Vidorra and Remnose.
PODCAST: Local Spins on WYCE (5/4/18)
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