Music has become a bigger focus for the festival in recent years.
In folklore, a topic of discussion is how traditions change over time. When norms change and a tradition become outdated, it could die out, but instead of doing so, traditions often adapt. Going in line with this, the Westerville Music and Arts Festival has always been open to change. It’s shifted locations multiple times throughout its history as it has grown in size in size. New elements have been added over time, such as the Saturday Night concert, which has become one of the festival’s main attractions in recent years. Each festival, new acts come in and replace old ones, with Lofy saying that he always wants things to stay fresh. One thing that’s becoming a more and more important focus for the festival is reaching a wider audience. The goal is to make the Westerville Music and Arts Festival relevant and exciting to wider groups of people, and that means bringing in a more diverse group of musicians, a wider selection of food, and seeking out new artists that are pushing the boundaries and innovating. Lofy says that he wants the festival to find young and exciting artists to add to the collection of creators that they already have, in the process doing things like creating a digital media tent. He wants to acknowledge a shift in the art landscape and this is one way of doing it. As David Picard and Mike Robinson say in Remaking Worlds: Festivals Tourism and Change, “The Idea of festivals as limited and ‘permitted’ transgressions, rather than timed-fixed occurrences of whole-scale radicalism, emphasizes the point that festivals exist and resonate within wider contexts and structures” (7). The attempts by the runners of the Westerville Music and Arts Festival to use their event as a way of being proactive and keeping up with the times rather than becoming attached to the past shows one of the ways that festivals can be part of societal progress when they bring in artists and performers from further away and work a wider collection of art and musical styles into the event. Insun Sunny Lee, Timothy Jeonglyeol Lee, and Charles Arcodia, argue that visitors who feel an attachment to the community and ethnic culture of a festival are more likely to revisit it. In a society like America where people from all over the globe live, there are a diverse number of cultures and communities. An event like the Westerville Music and Arts Festival needs to be adapted if its runners want a greater number of people to feel connected with it.
Many of the performances take place by Everall Barn.
Matt Lofy details ways that the festival’s runners have attempted to diversify and adapt it.
A prime example of the festival having to adapt came in the year 2020, when hosting the event in person became impossible due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This led to the festival being held online. The festival’s goal was to support the artists who’d attended their event for so many years, trying to promote their work in any way possible. An in-person food pickup station was created so a few of the food trucks could be supported like they usually are and the work of the artists and musicians was shared online through the festival’s website. This desire to give back relates back to the importance of community in small-scale, local festivals, and since the festival supported its artists and musicians through a tough time, they are more likely to continue being part of a festival in the post-pandemic world. The Westerville Music and Arts Festival has now taken place for nearly five decades, meaning it has endured many societal changes and shifting cultural norms. If it is to stay relevant in the future to new generations, then it will have to continue to adapt and readjust, redefining itself as its community evolves.