As of this writing, 198 of you have registered to attend FARM in October. Approx.1/5th of those registered are associated with a venue or festival. With more than 3 months to go, this is pretty mind-blowing and with intensive planning underway, we’re gearing up for an exciting 4 days in Grand Rapids. No doubt there will be lots of great music happening all weekend and we want all of our performers to have a chance to play for an audience at least once, so for this issue of our newsletter, we’re focusing on that very thing. Yes, we’re all anxiously awaiting the selection of our Official Showcase artists, and Performance Lane slots have long since been filled, but there are many more opportunities to perform. Read on for all the info!
Midwest Radio Showcase
This Thursday Night Showcase provides invited Midwest Radio DJs the opportunity to select an artist they would like to introduce to the FARM community. We encourage artists who have not performed in any prior Official or DJ showcase to indicate their interest in being considered by one of our DJs for this year’s showcase.
Private Showcases
FARM will be designating 15 hotel rooms for Private Showcases this year. The private showcase area is always an exciting and inviting place to be. Our current plan is for the Private Showcases to run from 11:30pm to 2am each night of the conference (Thur, Fri, Sat). That’s something like 400 time slots!
If you’re an artist, you should read through all the info on the website to understand the best way to solicit showcase room hosts. The list of hosts will be available by the end of July.
Open Mics, Jams & Song Swaps
This year we’re planning a few pop-up open mics to be scheduled throughout the weekend. Most will occur while there are other things going on so watch the website and newsletter for more info about how to sign up.
And as always, there are late night song swaps and jams throughout the conference area. You can find these after the main showcase events each night. Be proactive and round up some folks you’d like to share songs and/or jam with. Our presenter/venue friends have been known to lurk about at these late hours as well.