The Voice Of The Wetlands (VOW) announces its 12th Annual 2015 Voice Of The Wetlands Festival (free to the public) to be held October 9-11, 2015 at its new location at 5407 West Park Ave in Houma, Louisiana. The new location is a 145- acre field in the heart of the Wetlands between Houma and Thibodaux.
This year’s festival has been expanded to include tent and RV camping and extended hours of music, plus carnival rides. Moving to a different location will offer the organization an opportunity to develop and offer festival-goers a greater experience of the environmental issues that VOW supports.
For the first time this year VOW and Southern Oaks Golf Course join forces to host a 9-Hole Wetlands Scramble Golf Tournament and After Party Jam Session on Monday, October 12 with a 3 p.m. tee time. The course is located at 923 Bayou Black Dr. in Houma; participants can call the club for more information at (985) 851-6804 or visit: http://www.sogolfclub.com
The VOW Allstars play at Jazz Fest. Photo: Native Orleanian
Music has always been the centerpiece of VOW, showcasing acts that come from many genres; blues, jazz, rock, country and Cajun. Again there will be two stages with continuous music: the main stage and the popular Red Dog Saloon stage, which hosts Friday and Saturday Night’s Jam Open Sessions that go to the wee hours.
Tab Benoit, VOW president, who also heads up the Voice of The Wetlands Allstars, with Cyril Neville, Johnny Sansone, Monk Boudreaux and Anders Osborne, among others, explains his and the organization’s motivation for putting on a festival to highlight and bring attention to the environmental plight of Louisiana coastal wetlands:
“I live in the heart of it…I grew up on 300 acres. We have 40 left. That’s a big deal. You tell anybody who has 300 acres of land in 20 years you’re going to have 40. It’s not that somebody took the land. It’s not land anymore. It’s open water. The places I wrote my first songs are gone. The places I learned to play and camp and hunt and fish are gone. It’s open water now. It used to be cypress swamps and bayous and trees. That hits home when it happens so fast.”
Over its 12-year history, the festival has brought in a wide array of Louisiana music as well as national acts. Local cooks and chefs prepare the region’s eclectic cuisine, ranging from crawfish to alligator to gumbo. VOW also presents some of the region’s top artists and craftspeople with their work in a market setting.
Stay tuned to more information about the festival, camping and more by visiting them on their website.
