Returning to the Cedar Falls forest for the third iteration of Lost Woods Music Festival felt like stepping into another dimension—a place where we could escape the chaos and stress of the real world for a single night of bliss. The brainchild of Iowa’s hardest working musicians, the Cedar Falls based indie pop group Salt Fox, Lost Woods 2025 went bigger and better while retaining its authentic, intimate, identity.
Iowa Music Festivals
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Five questions with Salt Fox’s Andy Fuchtman on the Lost Woods Music Festival, a party turned nonprofit in Cedar Falls
The Lost Woods Music Festival returns to the Cedar Falls area for its third iteration on Saturday. What started as a party in the woods in 2023 has… kept on being a party in the woods, actually. Salt Fox, the band behind the fest, have resisted the scope creep that plagues so many other festival […]
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This Iowan attends up to 100 concerts a year. Here’s what he’s learned — and why he’s not slowing down
You meet a lot of music fans as a professional concert photographer, but over the past couple years, one has stood out to me the most. When culling through my photos from events across the state, I kept seeing the same guy, always up front by the barricade. Show after show, photoset after photoset, there […]
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‘The Hinterland vibes are back’: Iowa’s biggest music fest returned with a vengeance for 10th year
This August, as festivalgoers streamed into the new grounds of Hinterland Music Festival, the question wasn’t just whether the music would be good, it was whether organizers could recapture the magic that made Hinterland among the biggest and best music festivals in the Midwest over the past decade.
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Iowa City Jazz Festival starts Friday, bringing ‘one of the most important artists in jazz,’ jam sessions and fireworks
The Iowa City Jazz Festival kicks off at 5 p.m. on Friday as the city’s annual Summer of the Arts continues. Like all Summer of Arts festivals, the jazz fest is free and open to the public. The three-day music event in downtown Iowa City will feature local and international jazz artists and performances covering […]
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Concerts and camping are a match made in heaven. And rural Iowa.
Backbone Bluegrass Festival 1358 110th St, Strawberry PointThe Backbone Bluegrass Festival has been around since 1981 and brings a mix of bluegrass, country and gospel acts to the northeast corner of Iowa. Held in Strawberry Point on the last weekend of July, this summer’s fest is Friday to Sunday, July 26-28. Aspiring musicians can check […]
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Pella’s new one-day, all-Iowa music festival kicks off Saturday
Four months after Tulip Time and less than three months before Kerstmarkt, the Dutch Christmas Market, Pella is hosting a slightly edgier event in their picturesque downtown. The Pella All Original Music Showcase is a free concert featuring exclusively Iowa-based bands making original rock, electric and alternative music. Bands scheduled to perform at the debut […]
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Already claiming ‘goat’ status, the new Greenbelt Music Festival wants to kick off the outdoor fest season for years to come
One detail that’s still being confirmed is whether or not the goats will be in attendance at the new music festival. “A lot of people don’t know there’s a large number of goats at Clive City Hall that take care of the Greenbelt Trail and we’ll hopefully have them here as well,” said Tariq Lundy, […]
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Forty years ago, volunteers pulled off the first Iowa Arts Festival. Summer in Iowa City has never been the same
What started 40 years ago as a volunteer-led labor of love is now a downtown Iowa City institution: the Iowa Arts Festival. Back in the summer of 1983, Joyce Carroll and Kristin Summerwill helped organize a multi-day event on the Ped Mall that brought together artisans, visual artists, poets, local musicians such as Greg Brown […]
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Photo Gallery: GDP Festival 2022
GDP festival returned to Des Moines this past weekend with a lineup of heavy-hitting locals. The single-day festival played out on stages across Des Moines at a handful of venues, acting as a sort of musical tour of the city’s art scene. The lineup boasted acts from across the state including Iowa City’s Blake Shaw […]
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Camp Euforia’s 2020 festival will be its last
Organizers of the Camp Euforia music festival, including the founding band Eufórquestra, have announced that the event will discontinue after the 17th annual fest this summer. Camp Euforia began as an appreciation party for fans of Iowa City-based funk-fusion group Eufórquestra. But since that first festival in 2004, the event has expanded
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Leon Bridges, Of Monsters and Men, Old Crow Medicine Show and more set for Hinterland Fest
Iowans will be rockin’ like a wagon wheel at the sixth annual Hinterland Music Festival, Friday, July 31 to Sunday, Aug. 2. On Tuesday, Fest organizers announced 24 artists on their 2020 lineup, including classic country stars, alt-rock bands and everything in between.
