Old Time Music

According to John McEuen, the latest celebrity to join forces with the NTCMA, "it's going to be a fun time for me at your place in Fremont."

LeMars, Iowa.....LeMars, Iowa, is the home of Blue Bunny Ice Cream, the largest manufacturer of ice cream in the world. It's also a north-east Iowa rural area surrounded by corn fields. According to Sheila Everhart, Director of the upcoming 33rd Annual old-time rural roots music festival, "We're expecting the largest influx of foreign performers,and guests, from foreign countries at record breaking numbers this year. We're definitely not the Olympics, but we are just as concerned with our traditions and our cultural heritage as the Chinese are, and we have several gold medalists coming from Iowa in Bejing to prove the athletic side of Iowa. Now we begin the process of proving the validity of Iowa's traditional music.

We announced on June 10, that the NTCMA and the Oak Tree Opry will provide talent for a promotion at the Crackerbarrel Restaurant in Council Bluffs, Iowa, on July 12, 10am-7pm. We hope to be able to get a foot in the door, by providing local and regional recording artists an opportunity to have their product for sale in the Crackerbarrel Store. This is a first-time attempt, and if it works for us on July 12, we hope it will not only work well at other locations, but that good local acts will be able to get their product in the store as well.

The first international participants for the 2008 annual festival of the National Traditional Country Music Association have been announced. The festival takes place August 25-31, 2008, at the Plymouth County Fairgrounds in LeMars, Iowa, the ice cream capital of the world. All seven days are dedicated to acoustic rural roots music, with 10 stages and well over 600 participating performers. Click up LeMars Music Festival