Happy Wheatland: Festival boasts long history of traditional music and education | Features - Central Michigan Life

Andrew Mullin, Staff at Central Michigan Life notes, Music rooted in tradition and Americana echoes across the wooded, rolling hills of Wheatland Township. 

Wheatland print edition spread

Plucks of strings, the sound of a bow raking across a fiddle and the pounding of dancing feet blends to create the soundtrack for the weekend. Participants all around are learning, or teaching, music and art. 

The Wheatland Music Festival is not just about listening to the music, it's also about learning it.

Since 1974, the festival has been bringing together music lovers from all over the country to Central Michigan to hear traditional music styles, including bluegrass, folk, Celtic, blues and early country. 

The 46th Wheatland Music Festival, which begins Friday, will celebrate traditional music and provide workshops for aspiring musicians as well as dancers, storytellers and crafters. 

The biggest music festival near Mount Pleasant, that you may never have heard of, is sold out Friday and Saturday. If you do plan on going Sunday to take advantage of a ukulele workshop or to watch Canadian folk trio De Temps Antan let us be the first to wish you, "Happy Wheatland."...

More than music
But Wheatland is known for more than the musical performances. Workshops and education have long been a part of the festival’s existence. Bauman said the original core group of friends started having dancing groups, such as cloggers, to the festival.

The festival committee also began to take notice of the local talents and heritage-art performers from around the area by the early 1980s, including quilters, dancers and storytellers. Many continue to present workshops that are found at Wheatland to this day.
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Source: Central Michigan Life