There’s Something Happening Here

FloydFest finds a new home for 2023 and beyond

FloydFest 22 "Heartbeat" at Blue Ridge Parkway milepost 170.5 near the Floyd-Patrick County line, which concluded at the end of July, was the last after two decades plus on that mountaintop leased property. As of 2023 CEO John McBroom with Across the Way Productions, the organization that stages the music and outdoors family-friendly festival every year, says it’s on to their own property in Check - in the heart of Floyd: “its always been in the back of our mind, having more of our destiny in our hands, so to speak, and not having it be a leased property. For the last few years we’ve been looking.”

And now Across the Way productions has found it, just off US 221/Bent Mountain Road in Check, in the heart of Floyd County. 200 acres - as opposed to the current 80-acre festival site and several other off-site parcels used to park and shuttle patrons. That's a plus says McBroom: “we are planning to be able to park every patron on site – so when you get there you’re there, there’s no shuttling”

McBroom - a musician who performed at the Festival with several of his own ensembles has also retired after 22 years as a teacher to work full time on moving FloydFest to the new location by July 2023. That includes new stages, utilities and roads. “We were actually looking at a property across the street [in Check]. The owner [of a long-time family farm] showed up and said he would never in a million years sell it. Then we ran into him a month later and the conversation continued.” A lineup that included headliners like Melissa Etheridge, Trampled by Turtles and Old Crow Medicine Show at sold-out FloydFest 22 was an appropriate sendoff for the annual event, co-created and curated music-wise by Kris Hodges for over two decades.

What McBroom hopes doesn't change with the move after all these years: “keep the continuity of what we’ve been doing, keep the feeling and the vibe. As much as I love the land where we are and as much as I love the land where we’re going this festival is about the people that inhabit it, what they bring to it.” McBroom in retirement will devote his full attention to transforming those 200 acres in Floyd County into FloydFest 23 and beyond; he’s even living in an old house on the property. If the past is prologue, I figure they’ll be able to transport that vibe to the new home for FloydFest.

THERE’S SOMETHING HAPPENING HERE

By Gene Marrano

Executive Summary:

It was the end of an era for FloydFest. And a new beginning awaits.