The Desert is Freedom, Music Is Power & Community Is Crucial (Why We Do It)
The Desert is Freedom
Joshua Tree was a love at first sight kind of thing. It was October of 2002. We drove in at night, to sell espresso bevvies at the JT Didgeridoo Fest at the Joshua Tree Lake Campground, and woke up to sweeping views of the otherworldly National Park, bordering BLM land, nestled up against the Copper Mountains. Wow. We started setting up our booth, and this cat rolled up in his VW bus, with a large mural of planet Earth painted on the side. He said he had fixin’s for egg burritos, but no coffee. A dream date, as we had no food (thanks D-Lo!). That was the first of many serendipitous moments that transpired over the long weekend.
The desert is freedom. Away from more crowded environs, you’re free to cultivate your eccentricities. Free to dream big. California dreaming. Free to shout, shout, let it all out. Stars abound ad infinitum. More stars than cars. Radiant moonbeams flaring. Electrifying sunsets. I’ve seen sunny days I thought would never end. The massive (uncluttered) views calm the frenetic chatter of the mind. The desert is vast; you’re invisible now, you’ve got no secrets to conceal. It’s a place without expectations, so come as you are. What I’m saying is, I love it here.
At this point, I’d been selling coffee at hundreds of music festivals for nearly a decade with JavaGogo. Over the weekend at the Didgfest, I met our gracious hosts (Sally & Ken Jayes, JT Lake Campground owners), and enthusiastically suggested “This would be a great place for a music festival !”. And Sally said, “If it’s such a great idea, why don’t you do it ?!?” Dare taken. Within six months, I’d moved to Joshua Tree, and produced the inaugural Joshua Tree Music Festival, April 11-13, 2003. BIG THANKS to Sally & Ken Jayes, as we’ve now had 41 JTMFs (two virtual) at their beautiful campground.
Music is Power Ever since I was little, I’ve leaned on music to get me through; to get on up. I’ve got solid gold memories of driving around as a kid, w/ my mom in our Dodge Dart, the AM radio fueling us. Aretha would be telling me to Think and to Rock Steady. I had no clue what Rock Steady meant, but I sure wanted to find out. Paul implored me to Let It Be, while John taught me that We All Shine On. Props to Diana, as she ingrained in my brain that Aint No Mountain High Enough. Carlos encouraged me to change my Evil Ways, while Curtis urged me to Move on Up. And on and on….
My mom would get into the music while driving. Feeling it. She’d do this dance where she’d pump the brakes and tap the steering wheel with the palms of her hands at the same time. So the car would be jerking, and we’d be singing and bumpin’ down the road. Good times, to be sure. Looking back, I’m amazed we never got pulled over.
By my teens I was a vinyl junkie. Clearly AM radio was a gateway drug. For 3 plus decades I spent an unwise percentage of every penny I made on records and cds. Always looking for my new favorite song, or a band or a sound that I’d never heard. Over the years, I made over 600 mixed tapes & cds. You could say I was mixed up. Worth every penny, cuz music made a bad day good, a good day great, and a great day phenomenal.
Then accidentally on purpose, back in 2003, the Joshua Tree Music Festival was born. Live mixed tapes if you will. I’m still seeking that new favorite song, sound or band. And still leaning on music as medicine.
Community is Crucial
Yes, the music is powerful, and the desert setting sublime. But it’s really all about the people. And now, more than ever, we need one another. The capacity for collective joy is encoded into us almost as deeply as the capacity for the love of one human for another. The Desert is Freedom, Music is Power, and Community IS crucial.
For 22+ years, folks have been bringing more friends and family with them to the next Joshua Tree Music Festival. Organic growth. The fab result of that slow growth is the super tight, family-friendly, community-centric feel that is palpable. It’s real, it’s refreshing and it’s rejuvenating. When friends & family camp together under the stars for a few days & nights, bonds are renewed and strengthened. Spontaneous eruptions of gratitude abound. Magical connections are inevitable. Serendipitous moments are maximized. We humans need these rich, life-affirming experiences. The festival is a playground, and you can understand more about someone in an hour of play, than in a year of conversation. I laugh and cry more in the four days at the festival than I do in months.
And when we all get together, there’s that joyful euphoria felt during a shared communal experience. Collective effervescence. That incommunicable thrill of a group deliberately united in exaltation. Intense feelings of well-being and happiness from being a part of something that is bigger than us. And we hold on to those feelings of connectedness long after the actual event. That’s the real juicy stuff.
Hundreds of talented, loving and caring people help create the music festivals. Charismatic improvisers, wild hearts, positive deviants, hippy gypsies, seekers of exhilarating beauty, the lustfully compassionate, and the rebelliously kind. An oasis of smiling faces conspiring to commit intelligent fun. It’s a family affair. It’s a love affair.
The festival is a place where you're a shining star, no matter who you are. And we all shine on, like the moon and the stars and the sun. So shine on you crazy diamonds.
Here’s to hoping we see you at the 23rd Spring Joshua Tree Music Festival - May 15-18.
