Sean C. Morgan
If the smoke and hot weather bothered folks Friday afternoon, when the sun set they didn’t care any more, as Jason Aldean took the Oregon Jamboree stage.
Smoke from the wildfires blew into Sweet Home Thursday evening and all but obscured Marks Ridge by Friday morning.
“What’s really hard is when it’s so hot,” said Festival Director Robert Shamek. “What happens is people stay out at their camps.”
The heat – over 100 on Friday – combined with the smoke, kept Jamboree grounds more sparsely populated than usual during the daytime shows.
“We didn’t have the big rush until Jason Aldean’s show,” Shamek said.
Then the concertgoers stormed the gates.
“Jason Aldean got the crowd going,” Shamek said.
Shamek estimated 14,000 attended the final show on each of the three days.
“Everybody loved the headliners,” he said.
Maddie Leigh kicked the festival off Friday. Cloverdayle and Tucker Beathard followed, leading into the Jason Aldean performance.
Cloverdayle performed an acoustic benefit during the day and headlined the Spirit Mountain Stage.
By Saturday, it was business as usual. Smoke still permeated the air at 6 a.m., but then things started to change.
“All of a sudden the wind kicked up a little bit, and it was blue sky,” Shamek said.
Scotty Mac Band got things going Saturday followed by John King and then last year’s fan favorite – a cappella group Home Free – took the stage.
“The Home Free guys are some of the nicest guys,” Shamek said. He didn’t plan to repeat any artists this year, but Home Free was such a huge surprise for fans last year, Shamek said he couldn’t not repeat the group, and Home Free had the biggest Sankey Park show on the Spirit Mountain Stage.
Drake White and the Big Fire performed next on Saturday.
“Drake White was phenomenal,” Shamek said, and his band outstanding. “It was one I stepped out to watch.”
It was one of his favorites, Shamek said.
The audience screamed for Chris Janson before Little Big Town hit the stage with a giant disco ball and a pile of hits.
“Little Big Town crushed it,” Shamek said. “It was an amazing show.”
Sunday, Danny Black filled in for Season 10 American Idol runner-up Lauren Alaina.
“Robert – I met his family on a cruise ship six years ago – he’s the head honcho of the Jamboree, and I’m staying at their house,” Black said in a video blog about his visit to Sweet Home and the Jamboree, where he played the kickoff party with local singer Trevor Tagle and was scheduled to play the Spirit Mountain Stage.
“Really? The Main Stage?”
“Absolutely,” Shamek replied in the vlog.
“The Main Stage?” Black asked.
“The Main Stage,” Shamek said.
“I’m getting promoted from the B stage to the A stage,” Black said.
“I would say it’s the triple A stage,” Shamek said.
The vlog may be viewed at his website, thedannyblack.com.
Alaina couldn’t make it to the show on time, Shamek said, but she headlined the Spirit Mountain Stage later that day.
Shamek asked Black, a Michigan native who lives in Australia, to fill in on the Main Stage.
He played a variety of covers, including “Things You Don’t Say To Your Wife,” a parody of Green Day’s “Time of Your Life,” by comedian Tim Hawkins. Black wrapped up the show with a one-man “Bohemian Rhapsody” with a little help from the audience.
Black also played a benefit auction for the Sweet Home Community Foundation, Shamek said. He didn’t have a final total, but it raised in the neighborhood of $9,000 for the group, which annually grants funds to local charities for various projects that benefit the Sweet Home community.
Gary Rasmussen suggested auctioning off Black himself during the benefit, Shamek said. His group from Roofline Supply won that auction and took Black back to camp for yet another concert.
Eric Paslay and Chase Rice followed Black before giving up the stage to 78-year-old music legend Kenny Rogers, who is on his farewell tour, “The Gambler’s Last Deal.”
Rogers’ final concert appearance is scheduled for Oct. 25 in Nashville, where he will perform “Islands in the Stream” with Dolly Parton and will be joined by many artists, including Little Big Town, according to Rolling Stone.
“For a Sunday night with as hot of weather as we’ve had, our field was full,” Shamek said. “Not just for a couple of songs. They were here for the entire show.”
A lot of people were worn out, Shamek said. The heat had taken its toll, but he kept hearing that people loved the old-school music.
“I think Kenny over-exceeded his expectations,” Shamek said. People enjoyed his story-telling and his comedy. “He’s fun. He connects with the crowd so well.”
Chad and Rachel Hamar, who are Cloverdayle, kicked around the Jamboree all weekend to watch the shows and visit with fans and friends, something they’ve done in the past when performing here.
“I walked across the bridge with them,” Shamek said. They kept getting stopped by fans. Shamek kept getting stopped by Jamboree business. “I can only walk about 10 feet before somebody stops me.”
They wondered who would get stopped more and started keeping track.
“I won,” Shamek said.
“All in all, it went pretty well,” Shamek said.
New presenting sponsor Boulder Falls has been an “amazing addition,” providing the Jamboree a venue to run a five-concert summer series.
Jamboree personnel heard a lot of good comments about food vendors this year, Shamek said.
“(Administrative Assistant) Carli Erickson has worked really hard to bring in new food vendors.”
The Jamboree announced two names for the 2018 festival during the weekend, Maren Morris and Brett Eldredge.
“Marin is the female version of Chris Stapleton,” Shamek said. The singer-songwriter’s career has been taking off over the past year.
Eldredge has been in the country music game for awhile, Shamek said. “He’s an up and coming guy. He’s really got some steam going right now.”
The Jamboree has offers out to more artists and will announce them later after they’re confirmed for 2018, Shamek said. Right now, that ball is in the artists’ court.
“It was a good weekend,” said Police Chief Jeff Lynn “It was pretty calm on our front.”
Outside of a couple of reports of stolen generators in campgrounds, “it was a quiet really. We always have our normal stuff – amplified during the Jamboree.”
Lynn said he hadn’t compiled statistics yet, but he thinks Sweet Home had “next to no problems” during the weekend. On Jamboree grounds, police had to get involved in only two incidents, which makes “a nice experience for a lot of patrons.”
The Oregon Jamboree is a three-day country music and camping festival owned and produced by the Sweet Home Economic Development Group as a fund-raising tool to pay for economic development and charitable projects in the Sweet Home community.
Fire Chief Dave Barringer said the situation within the Jamboree was “fairly typical” and that most of Sweet Home Fire and Ambulance’s challenges over the weekend came from the outside.
“Heat added a few what I would call ‘sick people’ –fainting, that kind of thing. We do take care of a lot of heat-related problems.”
He said the Jamboree has provided an air-conditioned trailer in recent years, where those who have had too much heat can rest and apply ice and water as necessary.
“The last three years, that has kept the call volume down.”