Michigan Womyn's Music Festival crosses generations

At this year's Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, it shouldn't be a surprise to see grandma boogieing to some quirky tunes from The Ditty Bops.
"The generational spectrum is much, much wider than it was back in the '70s," said Sandy Ramsey, a festival worker for more than 20 years. "There are women (here) who now work beside women who they watched grow up at this festival, as children, then as teenagers and then as young adults."
Before thousands of women rally together at the festival in Hart, Mich., the land is mostly empty aside from trees and wildflowers, said Ramsey.
"Women build this small city every year," she said.
The Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, an all-female gathering always held the second week of August, began 31 years ago and has continued to draw women from all over the globe to make art, explore politics and community, bask in the lush forests and "have a heck of a good time."
"It's creating a woman-only place and building community," Ramsey said. "Women come back year after year and it's because of those two things."
Although the location isn't specifically disclosed on their Web site because of security issues, Ramsey said it's given to women who register for the festival.
"People attending need to know where we are, people who do business with us need to know where we are, but the world doesn't need to know where we are," Ramsey said.
In past years, the festival has been a target of slurs and vandalism.
"We don't need more teenage boys driving up and down the country road throwing beer bottles at the front gates," she said.
While last year's festival brought in around 5,000 women, Ramsey doesn't expect that many next week.
"Last year was an anniversary year and our attendance always spikes at an anniversary year and it levels off at the years in between," she said.
Forty acts, including The Ditty Bops, Jill "I Kissed a Girl" Sobule and Elvira Kurt, will perform on one of the three festival stages. In past years the event has seen artists, like Tracy Chapman and Sarah McLachlan, who eventually went on to reach mainstream audiences.
"We try to book performs who are just starting to be known and they're building an audience around the country," Ramsey said. "Women give us feedback about who they want to see."
The Womyn's Festival also sifts through artists over the winter with an audition process. "We get auditions from all over the world," Ramsey said.
Each year a new combination of women, ranging from first-timers to those who have worked on it for more than 30 years, design and craft the festival, which also features craft booths, hundreds of workshops and lesbian cinema.
Ramsey said, "We've gotten better at building community, we've learned to value our differences and embrace those."
For more information on the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival visit http://www.michfest.com or call (231) 757-4766.