Spring Break
The Echo Project
Can a music festival really be "green"?
Marion Coddou
Issue date: 11/7/07 Section: News/Features
I chose to see Cat Power's Chan Marshall over Thievery Corporation, since she tours so rarely. Notorious for her performance anxiety, Marshall was noticeably uncomfortable throughout the show and tried to negotiate an escape several times toward the end. As an audience member, I was torn between the guilt of being part of the forces compelling her onstage and an intensely selfish desire for her to stay and continue to grace us with the simple beauty of her music. Her eyes expressed deep anxiety as she hopped and paced around the stage, but her voice never wavered as she crooned into our eager ears.
On Sunday, I wandered around the nonprofit graveyard before heading over to see Afromotive, a new band from Asheville, N.C., that blended afrobeat, funk and jazz into a fusion that kept the hula hoopers in perpetual motion, and inspired one dancer to a bizarre chicken dance. Before heading back to Nashville, we managed to catch Austin natives Spoon, who promptly forsook their Texas roots and claimed origins in Detroit. Wherever they're from, their set was one of the highlights of the festival.
By Sunday, what had been a pristine expanse of rolling pastures, lush with long grasses, wet with water coming off of the Chattahoochee River, had been stomped into an honest-to-God dust bowl, taking on characteristics of a Hollywood boom town as concert-goers adjusted their bandanas in an effort to protect their lungs from what already coated their clothes and bodies.
Measuring the success of the Echo Project depends on one's perspective. The musical acts played high-quality shows, and although the environmental costs of the weekend outweighed the benefits, the green projects pursued by festival organizers did ease the impact and spread awareness. If anything, the Echo Project, through all of its efforts and difficulties, highlights how environmentally destructive the entertainment industry can be, and how, even coupled with the most ambitious of environmental agendas, the outdoor music festival cannot help but leave a footprint.
On Sunday, I wandered around the nonprofit graveyard before heading over to see Afromotive, a new band from Asheville, N.C., that blended afrobeat, funk and jazz into a fusion that kept the hula hoopers in perpetual motion, and inspired one dancer to a bizarre chicken dance. Before heading back to Nashville, we managed to catch Austin natives Spoon, who promptly forsook their Texas roots and claimed origins in Detroit. Wherever they're from, their set was one of the highlights of the festival.
By Sunday, what had been a pristine expanse of rolling pastures, lush with long grasses, wet with water coming off of the Chattahoochee River, had been stomped into an honest-to-God dust bowl, taking on characteristics of a Hollywood boom town as concert-goers adjusted their bandanas in an effort to protect their lungs from what already coated their clothes and bodies.
Measuring the success of the Echo Project depends on one's perspective. The musical acts played high-quality shows, and although the environmental costs of the weekend outweighed the benefits, the green projects pursued by festival organizers did ease the impact and spread awareness. If anything, the Echo Project, through all of its efforts and difficulties, highlights how environmentally destructive the entertainment industry can be, and how, even coupled with the most ambitious of environmental agendas, the outdoor music festival cannot help but leave a footprint.
Viewing Comments 1 - 2 of 2
neal turley
posted 11/09/07 @ 12:13 PM CST
The echo project never made any claims about being the "most environmentally friendly" music festival. Where and how do people jump to those conclusions? Whoever wrote this article is should seriously consider another the impact of their words?
Robyn
posted 11/09/07 @ 12:54 PM CST
From the Echo Project website: "Echo is an entirely new thinking in music festivals...Each new initiative is making sure that the environment is better for having had us there. (Continued…)
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