Board members Willie
Nelson, Neil Young,
John Mellencamp and Dave Matthews — along with Tim Reynolds, Mavis
Staples, Nathaniel Rateliff,
Lukas Nelson and more — lead lineup
for all-day music and food event to rally support for family
farms
SARATOGA
SPRINGS, N.Y., July 23,
2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Farm Aid's annual music and food
festival is returning to Saratoga
Springs, New York, on Saturday, Sept.
21, at Broadview Stage at Saratoga Performing Arts
Center (SPAC). Tickets will go on sale to the public on
Friday, July 26, at 10 a.m. ET, at LiveNation.com.
Farm Aid 2024 — a full day of music, family farmers, HOMEGROWN
food and agrarian experiences — will feature performances by Farm
Aid board members Willie Nelson,
Neil Young, John Mellencamp, Dave
Matthews (with Tim Reynolds),
as well as Mavis Staples,
Nathaniel Rateliff & The Night
Sweats, Lukas Nelson with
The Travelin' McCourys, Charley
Crockett, Joy Oladokun,
Southern Avenue, Cassandra Lewis and
Jesse Welles, with more artists to
be announced.
The festival will highlight how family farmers are essential for
a secure supply of safe, nutritious food; healthy soil and water;
and strong, economically vibrant communities. Farm Aid 2024 will
highlight innovative, resilient farmers on the Farm Aid stage and
throughout the event. As farmers and farm and food advocates
converge from across the country for the annual festival, Farm Aid
will host additional pre-festival events that gather farmers and
farm advocates to spotlight their work and strengthen their unity
and power.
This is the third Farm Aid festival to take place in
New York, and the second in
Saratoga Springs. In 2007, Farm
Aid held its festival at Randall's
Island, New York, where Farm Aid's
HOMEGROWN Concessions® was first introduced. In 2013, the festival
returned to the Empire State, this time to Saratoga Springs. Surprise guest Pete
Seeger joined Willie, John, Neil and Dave onstage for one of
his last public performances.
"We're energized to be back in New
York. The farmers here have always found ways to innovate
and contribute to their communities, even as they deal with
uncertainties, extreme weather and policies that favor corporations
over people," said Farm Aid President and Founder Willie Nelson. "Farmers need us to stand with
them as they work to grow our future."
The 2022 U.S. Department of Agriculture Census shows that
between 2017 and 2022, New York
State lost 3,000 of its 33,000 farms. Like elsewhere in the
U.S., farms are declining due to rising production and labor costs,
consolidation and abnormal weather patterns. New York State has nearly 3,200 dairy farms
that produce 15.7 billion pounds of milk annually, making
New York the country's fifth
largest dairy state. Dairy farms have been hit particularly hard
with rising production and labor costs, as well as consolidation in
the dairy industry. All New York
farmers are on the frontlines of climate change, innovating to
address crop losses, disease and heat stress due to rising
temperatures, as well as extreme weather events like flooding.
Temperatures are projected to increase, further threatening both
the maple and dairy industries.
Farm Aid festival attendees will experience a full day of music
and the taste of local flavors with Farm Aid's HOMEGROWN
Concessions®, offering a diverse, fresh menu with ingredients that
are grown or raised by family farmers using ecological practices
with a fair price paid to the farmers. Farm Aid's HOMEGROWN Village
features hands-on activities engaging festivalgoers with exhibits
about soil, water, energy, food and farming.
Festivalgoers can hear farmers
and artists inform and inspire
on the FarmYard Stage and celebrate the know-how
and diversity of cultures of agriculture in the HOMEGROWN Skills
tent.
Tickets range from $85 to $325 and will be available
for purchase at LiveNation.com. A limited
number of pre-sale tickets will be available beginning at
10 a.m. ET on Wednesday, July
24. Visit farmaid.org/tickets for more
information.
For event updates,
follow Farm Aid on X (@FarmAid), Facebook (facebook.com/farmaid) and Instagram
(instagram.com/farmaid), and visit
farmaid.org/festival. Festivalgoers are encouraged to use
the hashtags #FarmAid2024 and #Road2FarmAid to join the
conversation on social media around this year's festival.
Sponsors of Farm Aid 2024 include Tractor Beverage Co.,
Patagonia Workwear and Organic Valley. Farm Aid welcomes the
participation of the business community and offers corporate
sponsorship and VIP
hospitality opportunities. For more information, contact Anna
Mulè at anna@farmaid.org.
Farm Aid's mission is to build a vibrant, family farm-centered
system of agriculture in America. Farm Aid artists and board
members Willie Nelson, Neil Young, John
Mellencamp, Dave Matthews and
Margo Price host an annual festival
to raise funds to support Farm Aid's work with family farmers and
to inspire people to choose family farm food. For more than 35
years, Farm Aid, with the support of the artists who contribute
their performances each year, has raised nearly $80 million to support programs that help farmers
thrive, expand the reach of the Good Food Movement, take action to
change the dominant system of industrial agriculture and promote
food from family farms.
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SOURCE Farm Aid