.png)
Lovers of bluegrass, roots and Americana flowed into the Old Settlers Music Festival last weekend for the annual event, which returned to Camp Ben McCulloch in Driftwood for the first time since 2017. Tents and RVs began popping up across the rolling Hill Country acreage as the event kicked off, and a relaxed and happy vibe settled over the participants.
I’ve been wanting to attend Old Settlers for a long time, and this year I finally got my chance. While normally I might cover this from the objective reporter’s viewpoint, this will be my last article for the Dripping Springs Century News before I start a new job, and I decided to share the experience with our readers in a more personal way.
My husband’s boss, Mark, gifted us with tickets to the festival this year, with all the bells and whistles - including, literally, a bell tent and glamping experience. We rolled in on Friday afternoon and immediately made ourselves at home. I don’t usually have the luxury of tent camping with a real bed, and I can tell you that was a definite upgrade.
We set out to explore the grounds and get oriented. We visited a few booths and grabbed our souvenir shirts, and then made our way over to the pavilion stage. Lots of people were already set up with their camp chairs, spilling out under the beautiful oak trees. The weather was warm but comfortable, and we settled in for some good tunes from bands like Feeding Leroy, Foggy Memory Boys and Two Runner.
Our favorite of the afternoon was Magoo, a quartet out of Denver that describes its music as bluegrass with a “fresh, contemporary approach.” Disclaimer here: while I love live music, I’m not a music critic by any stretch. But I can tell you that these guys can PLAY. They’re touring right now in support of their debut album, “What A Life,” and they brought the audience a fun, joyful and moving experience. If you ever get a chance to see them, do it.
That evening, we listened to Lindsay Lou on the main stage, and wrapped up the night with a rocking performance from The Brothers Comatose. Their high energy set had the crowd jumping, and they concluded by pulling a bunch of audience members on stage for the IPA song, which was a fun frolic.
Our campground neighbors, Pepper Fisher and Suebee Hagener, declared The Brothers Comatose a new favorite.
“Frankly, I thought that they knocked it out of the park,” Suebee said.
Pepper and Suebee came to Old Settlers from Port Angeles, Washington, which likely means they traveled farther than almost anyone else in the lower 48. However, reportedly there were a couple of participants from Alaska, and even some international visitors - two fellas from New Zealand probably hold the record for traveling the farthest.
Pepper has attended Old Settlers several times now. His first visit was in 2017 at Camp Ben.
“I brought all my own camping gear and I stayed down by the Onion Creek and camped in a little tent,” Pepper said. “But the whole time I was here I was thinking how much Suebee would love it here, and I was gonna bring her one of these days.”
Last year, he finally did bring Suebee, and he was right, she did love it. They were both excited when they heard Old Settlers was returning to Camp Ben this year, so they decided it would be a great way to celebrate their 20th wedding anniversary this week.
Pepper said that whatever happens with the venue in the future, there’s one thing about Old Settlers that he’s sure will stay the same.
“What is most important about this place is never going away, and that's folks,” Pepper said. “It's the folks and the feeling we all create together here. It's probably not the only place in the country where this happens. But it's our favorite. It's the one we keep coming back to.”
On Saturday, a cool front blew in, and so everyone had on a few more layers. The morning started off with a performance from 12-year-old Ira Thorne, winner of the 2025 Old Settler’s Youth Talent Contest, who blew listeners away with his talent and stage presence. Next up was Brother Thunder out of Austin, followed by Louisiana Surf Department and Warren Hood Quartet with Emily Gimble, all putting on solid performances. The final performance on the pavilion stage was by Michael Cleveland & Flamekeeper.
Cleveland is a bona fide fiddle phenom. He was born blind and partially deaf, and started playing the fiddle at just four years old. He’s gone on to win Fiddler of the Year twelve times from the International Bluegrass Music Association, and was inducted into the National Fiddler’s Hall of Fame in 2018. He also won the Grammy Award for Best Bluegrass Album in 2019 for Tall Fiddler.
“This unassuming guy walked in there and blew the roof off the place,” my husband Eric said. “I had no idea who he was, but I’ll never forget who he is, for sure.”
Not long after Cleveland wrapped up, the weather took a turn for the worse, with guests advised to take shelter in their cars or vehicles for potential hail and high winds. Luckily, we escaped any serious consequences, but the evening lineup had to be shifted around a bit. The Last Revel moved to the pavilion stage, and we ended up missing their show. Then Railroad Earth performed on the main stage. Fiddler Tim Carbone was mesmerizing.
“Railroad Earth. Oh my goodness. They just cast a spell,” Pepper said. “I really like jam, especially for night concerts - to just get a groove going and stick with it for 15 minutes. It’s not everybody's cup of tea, but I really like that.”
The band was just settling into a good vibe when the rain came. I hate to admit it, but we headed for cover. Getting soaking wet while temps were in the 50s just didn’t sound like the vibe I was there for. We could still hear the band from our tent for a bit, and then the lightning and thunder began, and the gig was up.
The rain and wind continued for most of the night. I was very glad for Sunday to show up with lots of sunshine and temps in the 70s. I spent some time doing some interviews, and missed the first few acts - including the Youth Talent Contest and the Billy Bright Band. We did get to hear bassist, singer and songwriter Shelby Means, and she and her band were a delight.
We made a couple of new friends, Lisa Edwards and Laurie Palmer. They’ve been coming to the festival since 2018. This is their first time to see it at Camp Ben.
“I like this vibe. It’s smaller, the pavilion is awesome, the infrastructure is here,” Lisa said. “This is super cool.”
Laurie agreed.
“It’s good people, and it’s a huge family,” Laurie said. “When you look around and see how many people meet each other and greet each other, and they’ve known each other for many years, it's amazing.”
I also interviewed Sparkle Joe, a tall guy with long white hair wearing a flowing sparkly top. He’s hard to miss. Joe said he’s been coming to Old Settlers since 2009. The year before, he had retired and had also gotten a knee replacement. He finally took the advice of his neighbor and decided to go to the festival.
“My beginning year, I volunteered. Because I was retired, I had plenty of time and I got to work on the crews that did their work before the music and after the music,” Joe said. ”So I got to see how the festival was created from the ground up.”
Back then the main stage was across the highway at Salt Lick, and getting it set up required a lot of hard labor.
“I did a lot of lifting and squatting, stretching, and of course, when the music came, I did a lot of dancing,” Joe said. “And the great thing was, my new knee just performed fine, no problems. I realized, oh, I could do this again and again and again.”
And so he did. Joe started going to more and more festivals. And soon, he started experimenting with ways to express himself more with his dance. He began with ribbons, and over the years, moved along into flowing, sparkly tops - earning him his nickname.
These days he still volunteers, and he still dances. He likes to share the love, so he brings lots of sparkly tops for people of all ages to borrow. And they do. Small kids to big burly men don their sparkly tops and dance to the music.
Every single shiny top - appropriately - was being borrowed for the final act of the festival, a performance from Shiny Ribs, led by the inimitable Kevin Russell. I’ve been a fan of Russell’s since his days with the Gourds in the 90s, and I’m always down to spend a few hours with him. Russell knows how to work the crowd. By the last song, he was leading a conga line weaving through the crowd and around the pavilion. It was the exclamation point for a fantastic weekend.
Once the music stopped, the farewells started. Instead of a mad dash for the exit, people gathered with their friends to make the weekend last just a little longer.
Like many others, we made some new friends along the way, exchanged some phone numbers, and are already waiting for next year’s tickets to go on sale so we can do it again. If you’ve been postponing your weekend at Old Settlers, take it from me and Sparkle Joe - don’t wait any longer.
“I just kind of wonder what my adult life might have been like if I had started going to music festivals when I was young. As it was, I was in my 60s before I really got into the vibe,” Joe said. “Check it out when you're younger, so you can have more years of enjoyment.”
