On Saturday, September 13, 2025, Moorestown embraced its rich string music heritage by hosting its inaugural Bluegrass Festival at Memorial Field, featuring regional bluegrass bands, food trucks, local artists, and family-friendly yard games.
Memorial Field was packed with people of all ages. Over the course of the evening, five bands performed for the lively crowd.
Homegrown Moorestown organized the event in collaboration with the Moorestown Music Collective.
Homegrown Moorestown is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to “promote community growth, support local initiatives, and foster a stronger connection within Moorestown,” according to their website.
“The hope is to grow [the Moorestown Bluegrass Festival] into an annual tradition—a joyful, homegrown celebration of music that connects past and present, and introduces new generations to the soul of bluegrass.”
According to the Bluegrass Heritage Foundation, bluegrass is made up of many different genres, including “blues, traditional and fusion jazz, contemporary country music, Celtic music, rock & roll (‘newgrass’ or progressive bluegrass), old-time music, and Southern gospel music.”
Andy Davis, banjo player, singer, and teacher, joined his Philadelphia-based band Midnight Flyer on stage for the festival.
“It was a friendly-looking audience,” he said.
“People from this random town in New Jersey [want] to hear this music right now, and anytime I see people coming out, particularly people [who are new to bluegrass], I’m really happy.”
Midnight Flyer formed in 2014 after its members met at different bluegrass gatherings in Philadelphia.
“They’re some of my favorite people in the world,” Davis said.
In addition to traditional bluegrass and country tunes, he and guitarist Austin Alfano included some original songs in their set.
Davis has been playing banjo since his early twenties, but was originally drawn to the instrument when he first heard the Deliverance movie soundtrack as a child.
“I saw God,” he said.
Since then, Davis has felt a certain calling to bluegrass despite how challenging it can be: “Bluegrass banjo is hard, but you kind of have to [do it].”
When asked why he enjoys bluegrass, Davis added, “I just like the way the instruments come together without drums … the whole band is like a drumset.”
As a teacher, Davis also finds events like this very important for inspiring the next generation of musicians. He explained that a kid who might play classical violin for school could see the fiddle and be motivated to jump into a new genre of music.
MFS fourth-grade teacher Chelsea Molden attended the event with her family.
“We are having a super fun time. It’s nice [that] the grownups get to hear music and enjoy that aspect, and the kids have some places to roll around and have some fun as well,” she said.
At the standing section in front of the stage, many little kids were jumping to the music and dancing with friends. Davis joked that “once the kids start moving, I feel like we’re doing something right because they’re not uptight like the rest of us grownups.”
MFS kindergarten teacher Jenny Ragghianti was also at the festival.
Bluegrass was popularized by many famous movie soundtracks (like the Deliverance soundtrack, featuring the famous song “Dueling Banjos” performed by Eric Weissberg on banjo and Steve Mandell on guitar), but the genre’s origins trace back to early North American settlers who took influence from people of African origin living in the Mississippi Delta region: “As the settlers began to move out into North and South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia, and West Virginia, they wrote songs about daily life in the new land.”
In New Jersey, folk music similar to bluegrass is deeply rooted in areas like the Pine Barrens. According to the Pinelands Cultural & Historical Preservation Society, rural places like the Albert Music Hall in Waretown, NJ, have worked to “preserve the cultural history of the people and inhabitants of the ‘pinelands’ of southern New Jersey.” In fact, the iconic folk musician Pete Seeger, known for his social activism and collaborations with other notable artists such as Joan Baez and Bob Dylan, frequently visited the Albert Music Hall to raise money for the preservation of the Pinelands’ cultural history.
Davis commented on the nature of an event like this, where people come together to celebrate bluegrass and folk music as a whole.
“Everybody supported us [today],” he said. “It means community.”
Sources:
“Home.” Midnight Flyer, Bandzoogle, https://midnightflyer.bandzoogle.com/home.
“History of Bluegrass Music.” Bluegrass Heritage Foundation, https://bluegrassheritage.org/history-of-bluegrass-music/.
“The History of Bluegrass Music.” YouTube, uploaded by Shiloh Media, 28 Apr. 2017, https://youtu.be/J6UG1Jlwiow?si=yfMGRbD3XCEljpKB.
“Timeline.” Albert Music Hall, Pinelands Cultural & Historical Preservation Society, https://www.alberthall.org/timeline.