Appel Farm cancels music festival

The recession has claimed Appel Farm's outdoor music and arts festival, held the first Saturday in June since 1989.

For the last few years, rain washed out acts, audiences - and profits - at the farm in Elmer, Salem County, said Appel Farm's artistic director, Sean Timmons.

"We felt it would be risky to mount the festival in this economy. It's weather-dependent," executive director Mark Packer said.

Instead, about a dozen performers, including Livingston Taylor, John Gorka, the Nields, Phil Roy, and Grey Eye Glances, have donated their time for a four-hour outdoor concert June 7 to benefit scholarships to the farm's summer camp. Free arts classes also will be offered.

Organizers were considering revamping the annual festival anyway, Packer said, when news came that next year's state budget includes a $100,000 cut in the farm's funding.

"Appel Farm is a nonprofit arts center that's always believed in living within its means. We're very mindful of our expenses," said Packer, who has worked at the farm for 25 years.

Over the years, the music and arts festival featured such headliners as Jackson Browne, Roseanne Cash, the Indigo Girls, Judy Collins and Emmylou Harris. In good weather, it drew 8,000 to 13,000 people.

Over 20 years, as the original audience aged, the format - two stages, a children's area, and a crafts fair - remained the same.

"We saw an opportunity to study what we can do to draw a younger demographic," Packer said.

Appel Farm hopes to reintroduce a festival in 2010 that reflects the breadth of the nonprofit's mission, Timmons said.

The 176-acre farm began its transformation to an arts center in 1959, when Albert and Claire Appel created a residential summer arts camp. Each year, about 400 children ages 9 to 17 study visual arts, theater, music, and dance with 90 teachers, some in converted chicken coops. About 25 percent receive scholarships.

The farm also offers a winter concert series, year-round arts classes, school programs, and a conference center.