Carrboro shows musical side

For one Sunday afternoon a year, the atmosphere that characterizes Weaver Street Market in Carrboro expands throughout downtown for the Carrboro Music Festival.

The backyard revelry typical of the store's shady front lawn - people of all ages, dogs of all sizes and musical instruments of all varieties - stretches from the market to Town Hall.

Banjos plunk away on one stage while drum kits echo from across the street and voices resonate from around the corner.

Children climb the stone fountain with ice cream dripping down their faces while adults take in the music and chat with their neighbors.

Dogs have a respite from the heat from a bowl of water sitting on the sidewalk in front of Weaver Street Realty, while their owners sip drinks inside Nested, a new venue this year.

The festival's eighth year featured twenty-one stages, including four other new ones - Archer Graphics, Orchid Island Trading Company, Padgett Station and WCOM Radio.

The Carrboro Music Festival Committee runs the annual event along with the town's recreation and parks department and local sponsors.

Volunteer coordinator Meg McGurk said that there were about 65 volunteers running the festival and that each venue was manned by its own volunteers.

The committee sold raffle tickets to offset the costs of running the festival, along with purple T-shirts commemorating this year's event.

Carrboro bluegrass band The Brown Mountain Lights, one of about 150 musical acts performing Sunday, played a set from the market lawn.

As they introduced a song that recently was featured on the show "Veronica Mars," singer Janet Place, who also sits on the festival committee, joked that no one in the audience seemed likely to watch much television.

In the street nearby, the young and not-so-young kept time to the music as they spun adult-sized hula hoops that are used in a hooping class at Balanced Movement Studio.

A few steps up Weaver Street, the Little Blue Choo - a trackless, 27-passenger tram - carried families from the market lawn down the street to the kid-oriented crafts and inflatable slides in Town Commons.

Along the way, the street was dotted with campaign booths, where local politicians rubbed T-shirted elbows with their constituents.

Even national politicians went casual - former Sen. John Edwards, also in a T-shirt and sandals, stopped by the Orange County Democratic Party's booth with his wife Elizabeth to greet supporters and soon-to-be neighbors.

Edwards said that once he and his family move into their newly built house in October, he will be more visible around town.

But for a moment Sunday, he was able to pull his sunglasses back down and enjoy the music with the rest of the crowd.

 

Contact the City Editor at citydesk@unc.edu.