Glenwood’s Two Rivers Park will play host to a special kind of music festival this weekend, one that promises to be “a celebration of DIY creativity, the great outdoors, and sustainable living.”
The Orpheus Music + Arts Festival returns to the area one year after its 2018 Sunlight Mountain Resort debut with a bigger, more ambitious lineup of music, artists and kids activities.
The festival runs from 5 to 10 p.m. Friday, from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Saturday and from 10 a.m. to 8:15 p.m. on Sunday and features 22 different bands playing 45-minute to hourlong shows. There also will be “after hours” jam sessions at the Riviera Supper Club on Friday starting at 10:45 p.m. and on Saturday at Native Son starting at 11 p.m.
Kids activities, which include volleyball, lawn games, arts and crafts, and something called a “kinetic sand pit” will take place during the free portion of the festival from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. both Saturday and Sunday.
Orpheus Music + Arts Festival is the brainchild of recent Denver University music school graduate Bridget Hartman, who said she created the festival last year to “engage community through art and music.
“It was just an idea I had, and the community around me was receptive enough to make it happen through fundraisers and concerts,” she said.
That idea led to last year’s festival, which was held at Sunlight, but Hartman said she moved the festival to Two Rivers Park this year so more people could attend it, and to create access and partnerships with Glenwood businesses.
“This year we’ve taken it to the next level because my partner Brian Trujillo, who runs Big Mountain Events, saw what we were doing and really liked it,” Hartman said. “We’re making it even more of a community event involving Glenwood — merging the Denver (music) community and the Glenwood community through music and arts.”
Hartman is a saxophonist who will perform with the bands Amazing Adventures and Men’s Breakfast this weekend. The bands she chose for the festival, she said, were a mixture of people she’s performed with and bands that reached out to her since last year’s festival.
“I just wanted to keep it eclectic, have different sounds, different groups, and introduce to the audience all the different music people are doing,” Hartman said.
A new feature of the festival this year is the Glenwood Hercules Treasure Hunt. Based off Cotopaxi’s Questival, the Hunt is a list activities in Glenwood that includes recreation, visiting businesses, donating, and taking photos. Participants use an Instagram account or email to record their feats for prizes.
Prizes include tickets for Defiance Rafting, and passes to Iron Mountain Hot Springs, Glenwood Caverns Adventure Park and the Glenwood Hot Springs, among others.
Festival-goers may still camp at Sunlight this year, and a shuttle will be provided for campers to and from the festival. Sober drivers may also register for a DD pass (Designated Driver) and have their camping fee for the weekend waived.