Forest Fest

By: Kristen (Twitter: @BiscoAmbassador)

With the rise of EDM, music festivals, and all things hau5 – it’s hard to find a festival so true to a genre’s roots and scene. Then something like Forest Fest – a progressive music, arts, and activism festival - comes around and brings the purest of vibes for festival-goers to share.

Forest Fest started just a mere four years ago and has quite the story. The festival originally was hosted at Forest Glen (hence, the name) in New York with a minimal budget, the first year drawing out 50 attendees and a handful of bands. When year 2 came around, original organizers: Andy Lynch, Brad Gorfein, Micheal Steinberg, Meg Magnolia, Roman Vinnichuck, and Heather Ording decided to make the event even bigger and reached out to local Djs, Bands, and various vendors. The turnout jumped to 300.

After the second festival, still having a minimal budget, Forest Fest decided to make the event a non-profit– something not so common in the music festival industry. Instead of pricing water bottles at $10, like most popular venues tend to do, Forest Fest was a BYO and donated any proceeds to charity.

By the time the 3^rd Forest Fest came around, 700 eager campers flooded the field making it very apparent that this festival was catching on like wildfire. However, the festival’s neighbors were not so happy about the noise and scene (that they, of course, negatively painted in the media). After almost being shut down, the show went on – leading to this year’s Forest Fest 4, which is trying to reach 1,000 attendees.

This year, Forest Fest will be a two-day event featuring 26 bands and 3 DJs to perform on 3 separate stages. With the growing attendance, Forest Fest moved to Center for Symbolic Studies in New Paltz, NY and unlike other years, has a designated camping area – as well as – a separate performance area. Accompanying the music will be fire dancers, a hookah tent, t-shirt painting, food and alcohol, and various other vendors.

One of the many Forest Fest organizers, Jonathan Bartz, stated: “The festival has come along way and continues to grow. The amount of talent and creative energy involved from artists and volunteers is overwhelming. We know we are doing good for the community, giving artists/musicians exposure and I am personally proud to have been involved.”

Tickets are still on sale and are $20 at the door. For the full lineup and more information, check out: www.forestfest.us