Summer’s End will be held at the Draper Rendezvous in Hailey
BY DANA DUGAN
Luke Henry grew up knowing how to wrangle. His parents run a dog training and kennel facility south of Bellevue, and handling canines has been part of his life. This ability, and a deep love of live music, set him up well in wrangling his own music festival. Summer’s End will be held from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., Saturday, Aug. 24, at the Draper Rendezvous at Lions Park in Hailey.
First up will be a series of live shows in Hailey known as Road To Summer’s End. Aaron Golay & The Original Sin will play Thursday, Aug. 22, at the Sawtooth Brewery. Chuckie Campbell will play at Whiskey Jacques’ in Ketchum, Friday, Aug. 23.
On Saturday, the lineup includes headliners the Shook Twins, and Hillstomp from Portland, Ore.; Pixie and The Partygrass Boys from Salt Lake City; Lounge on Fire from Boise; The Weary Times, also from Boise; Lost Ox from Portland; the Idaho-based gypsy folk and blues band, The Pan Handles; Andrew Sheppard, a Valley native now based in Nashville, Tenn.; Aaron Golay & The Original Sin; and two Valley-based bands, High Mtn. Heard and Secuestrado.
“Everyone is familiar with the awesome Shook Twins, who are from Idaho originally, but Hillstomp hasn’t been in Idaho in years,” Henry said. “They’re from Portland and play funk and blues.”
According to the band’s website, the duo digs through the “dumps and forgotten backwoods of American music, recycling traditional elements into a refreshing and distinctive brand of do-it-yourself hill country blues stomp.”
Musicians at large who may sit in with others, or play solo spots, include Valley-natives Cole Wells, the Blakadaar guitarist; Alyssa Joy Claffey, fiddler player with High Mtn. Heard and founder of Gypsy Music Collective; and Matt Sloan, saxophonist with Cole & The Thornes.
Henry, who helps run the Sawtooth Valley Gathering and was a member of the Northern Rockies Music Festival during its last year, said he’d been working on the idea for a few years.
“It was time to bring a festival back to Hailey,” he said, while looking across the baseball diamond at Lions Park, in west Hailey. “The momentum seemed there.”
The stage will be placed on the diamond, facing southwest, so that seating will be on the lovely grassy outfield beyond. There will be several food and art vendors, and custom water bottles for sale with water fill-up stations around the edges of the field.
“We’re the first no-single-use plastic event in Hailey, so we got good water to put in the bottles, which the Wood River Land Trust—the caretakers of the Draper Wood River Preserve—sponsored,” Henry said.
No outside food or drink will be allowed into the park, a decision Henry made in order to support the vendors onsite.
“Everyone’s been really cooperative,” he said. “We have these Road to Summer’s End shows at the Red Shoe and Sawtooth Brewery. There will also be a show at Whiskey’s, and the Sunday service at Mahoney’s.”
For more information and tickets, visit drswanmusicllc.com/summer-s-end.