Back Porch Festival returns with 60-plus performers at 12 Northampton venues

By Carolyn Brown
For the Valley Advocate

The roots music festival Back Porch Festival will return for its 12th year from Friday, March 27, to Sunday, March 29, with more than 60 performers at 12 venues throughout downtown Northampton. Two of those venues — Haze and the Flex Space at 33 Hawley — are new this year.

“I think it’s very exciting that Haze is getting ushered into the town and being included with all these other incredible venues,” said Haze co-owner Jon Pedigo, adding that co-owner Anja Wood, who oversaw the venue’s partnership with Back Porch, represents Northampton very well. “We plan to be part of Northampton for a long time and part of the live music scene.”

Headliners for this year’s festival will take over the Academy of Music starting Friday at 8 p.m. with BERTHA: Grateful Drag with special guest Magnolia Masquerade. Saturday’s 7 p.m. slot features Peter Rowan and the Sam Grisman Project playing the music of Old & In The Way alongside guests Big Richard and Trey Hensley. The festivities wrap up Sunday at 7 p.m. with I’m With Her with special guest Olive Klug. As of this writing, the Sunday headline show is already sold out.

“We’re going to play two full sets of Grateful Dead music at the highest level we know how to, and while serving the best looks that we can possibly serve for you, Northampton,” said Melody Walker, co-founder of BERTHA: Grateful Drag. “It’s going to be a blast.”

Andrew Curran, better known as his drag persona Magnolia Masquerade, said he was particularly excited to join BERTHA and connect with performers who take a different approach to the craft.

“And for all of this to be a part of Back Porch Fest is even more exciting as it will get more eyes on the art of drag which can dip into so many other performance types,” he said in a statement. “I feel honored that they reached out to me, and I’m looking forward to adding my brand of local drag to their touring set here!”

True to its name, BERTHA: Grateful Drag is a Grateful Dead tribute act where every musician performs in drag. According to their website, the band’s origin story involves time travel, cloning, LSD and Jerry Garcia’s severed finger — a combination that supposedly birthed “musical mutants” who each had “the chops of their father, but a physical form yet unseen in the jam band world — that of a woman.”

Their actual origin story, however, is more serious. In 2023, Walker and her friend Caitlyn Doyle wanted to protest the Tennessee Adult Entertainment Act, which targeted “adult cabaret” performances — a catchall phrase primarily referring to drag shows — in front of minors or in public spaces.

“As musicians — longtime touring musicians, songwriters, artists — we felt that that was an affront to all art and live entertainment,” Walker said, “not to mention the fact that the law was written so vaguely as to catch any gender-nonconforming musicians, performers, anybody on a stage that they think isn’t dressed the way that they’re supposed to be dressed.”

Walker and Doyle organized a one-time benefit concert for LGBT nonprofits, performing Grateful Dead songs while dressed in drag. They were joined by what Walker described as a “dream team” of musicians who were “good enough to play this music, interested enough in this music and down to get in drag, which is a pretty great cross-section of people, it turns out.”

They livestreamed the show, and it took off, thanks to queer members of the Grateful dead fanbase, the Deadhead community.

“A lot of people like to ask, ‘How did you think to make the Grateful Dead scene queer?’ And my answer is always, ‘How did you think there weren’t already queer people in this scene, enjoying the scene, participating in the music, playing the music?’ Just like in every other genre out there,” Walker said.

Beyond the live sets, Sunday’s schedule features a movie screening of “You Got Gold: A Celebration of John Prine,” a concert film about a tribute show honoring the late singer-songwriter, at 11 a.m. at the Academy of Music. Earlier that morning, The Iron Horse will host a live broadcast of the Back Porch radio show at 9 a.m., with guest artists to be announced. While the radio broadcast is free to the public, the film screening requires a Ramble Pass for entry.

In addition to the headlining acts and the regional and national performers, Back Porch Festival will also feature about two dozen local bands and artists, including Lefever, Los Trio Gigantico, Myrtle Street Klezmer, Winterpills, Gold Dust, Cloudbelly, Samirah Evans and Her Handsome Devils, and The Unlucky Shots.

Christa Joy, bandleader of Christa Joy & The Honeybees said being part of Back Porch is always a fun opportunity to connect with new listeners and share new work. Her band performs at the Hotel Northampton Ballroom this Friday from 9 to 10 p.m.

With the band’s upcoming Back Porch show, Joy said, audiences “can expect a reflection of all the hard work we’ve been putting into this music for the last few years. They can expect a really joyful, lively set [with] all original music.”

Songwriting, she added, is “just like any other profession. You have to keep at it and keep at it to improve and get better, and it’s nice to be at the point where I’ve been writing for a long time, so I get to write music that is better than any music I’ve ever written. When I write with the band in mind, it changes the way you write, and I’m excited for audiences to feel that synchronicity of players who play together regularly and are supporting a songwriter who’s hard at work. That’s kind of a cool thing. I’m really lucky.”

Admission to Back Porch Fest is $85 for a Ramble Pass, which works similarly to the buttons at First Night Northampton: for one price, guests can come and go as they please throughout the downtown venues (not including the Academy of Music headline shows). Kids under 10 are free. Ticket prices to the headline shows vary and are available at aomtheatre.com.

For more information, including a full lineup and schedule, and to purchase tickets and Ramble Passes, visit backporchfest.com.