SWAYING TO THE MUSIC
ALL- AGES EVENT BRINGS PEOPLE TOGETHER
Georgia Aurelia Kollias hula hoops to the beat of the music during the fourth annual Lethbridge Electronic Music Festival in Galt Gardens Saturday.
There was rumbling coming from downtown Saturday and it wasn’t thunder, it was music.
It was that very music which brought so many people together at Galt Gardens for the fourth annual Lethbridge Electronic Music Festival (LEMF).
The all-ages event was free to the public and lasted from 11 a.m. until 11 p.m. This year there were 24 acts playing and each set was an hour long. The festival had two stages which gave the people the opportunity to choose what they were interested in hearing.
Jose Streeter, president of the LEMF planning committee, has been a DJ for the last 15 years. After he graduated from university he grabbed a few friends together to start throwing some events and he said he thought to himself, “there’s no big festivals in Lethbridge at all for this kind of music,” so that's how LEMF came to light.
For the event to happen at Galt Gardens, it needed to be all ages and Streeter used that to his advantage to help bring a positive image to electronic music.
“We took that as an opportunity to not only have an event that can be appreciated by the entire community, but also as a way to kind of help dispel some of the negative myths around electronic music events in general.”
Chanelle Ashton, a mother of three, agreed there is a negative misconception about music festivals. She decided to bring her children, all under the age of 10, to the music festival because she has a very positive perspective on music festivals.
She arrived to the event dressed up, as did her children and she said that this was an outlet for them to express who they are.
“Music opens up your mind, your spirit — it’s expression,” she said. “It’s awesome that my kids can come, we love the music.”
“The music that’s playing right now, we play at home in the house and dance together. To be able to come out in public and enjoy the fresh air and all the other people around you. Everybody at music festivals is loving. Everybody loves everybody, it's just a big happy hippy party,” she laughed.
While the cool weather wasn’t ideal for Saturday’s event, many were able to warm up by dancing the day away.