Bonnie Boxley got such a kick out of helping at the Oak Harbor Music Festival last year that she arrived early Monday night to a volunteer orientation for this year’s festival.
That way, she figured she was assured of getting a festival T-shirt in her desired small size.
Boxley, 81, of Oak Harbor, pulled on the shirt and looked ready to rock.
“I just love music,” Boxley said. “There’s music going on everywhere (at the festival) and it’s cool.
“There’s nothing I don’t like except hard rock. Even hard rock, I’ll just take my hearing aids out and put ear plugs in.”
The type of music that will be performed by more than 30 bands at the free live music festival, Sept. 2-4, is designed to appeal to an audience of all ages.
Larry Mason, event organizer and musician in charge of securing the bands, was careful in picking bands and choosing what times to put them onstage.
He had a younger audience in mind when he stacked three bands in particular one after the other on the same stage Saturday night — Fly Moon Royalty, The Fame Riot and Penguin Prison — starting at 6:15 p.m.
Mason referred to their music as “new 80s pop.”
Millie Goebel, 23, the daughter of a festival board member, saw Penguin Prison perform at The Crocodile in Seattle and convinced Mason that the electro-pop band from New York City would be a headliner that would turn heads in Oak Harbor.
“It just makes you want to dance,” Goebel said of Penguin Prison’s music. “People are going to want to dance to it.
“Even if you don’t know the band, you will love it when you walk out of here and you will want to go out and buy a CD.”
The festival features performers that will deliver rock and roll, country, blues, jazz, rap and more on two main stages on opposite ends of Pioneer Way.
“I love jazz,” said Gary Wallin, who is volunteering this year with his wife Martha in the beer and wine garden.
“I like rock and roll. We love music of all kinds.”
Organizers with the Oak Harbor Music Festival Monday night held a meet-and-greet and volunteer orientation at the Best Western Plus ballroom, where they unveiled festival T-shirts that featured a new twist for 2016 — a kraken’s tentacles wrapped around a guitar and microphone.
The design was created by Abbie Martin.
“I think it’s really cool,” said Karla Freund, a festival board member who greeted volunteers Monday night.
It takes more than 200 volunteers to put on the festival, which has earned a reputation for treating bands first class.
Volunteers received a special blue T-shirt with gold trim. Festival shirts for the public this year are brown with a yellow design and lettering, including the names of the bands on the back.
This the festival’s fifth year, which starts with Sarah Gerritsen & the Shadow Catchers on one stage at 6:15 Friday night, and Mbrascatu, an indie rock band from Portland, beginning 15 minutes later on another.
The festival wraps up Sunday with a 4:45 p.m. performance from Jelly Bread while Ayron Jones and The Way plays at 5 p.m.
Island Thrift is the title sponsor of the festival.
For more information, including the band lineup, go to www.oakharborfestival.com
