21st annual Gamble Rogers Music Festival

The 21st Annual Gamble Rogers Music Festival will feature national, regional and local musicians April 29 through May 1 at the Colonial Quarter, 33 Saint George St., downtown St. Augustine.

The festival honors the late James Gambles Rogers IV, a singer, songwriter, and storyteller who “balanced a love of balladry and folk songs with a passion for the oral tradition and storytelling.”

Rogers was just hitting his peak when he died on October 10, 1991, trying to save a man from drowning. The recreational area in Flagler County, where the accident occurred, was later renamed the Gamble Rogers Memorial State Recreation Area.

Headliners of the 2016 event include The Nouveaux Honkies, Richard Smith and Julie Adams, Sara Mac Band, Pierce Pettis, Grant Peeples, and the Wild Shiners.

Local performers include Sam Pacetti, Flagship Romance, The Driftwoods, The Rubies, Amy Hendrickson, Bob Patterson & Charlie Simmons as The Obscure Brothers, The WillowWacks and many others.

To see the full list of performers and purchase tickets, go to gamblerogersfest.org

In addition to the huge lineup of talent, a Youth Performance Competition will be held during the event. A two-hour block of time is scheduled for selected middle and high school students to perform. Students were asked to submit videos through YouTube and Vimeo.

The Atlanta Journal Constitution called Rogers, “an American treasure worthy of inclusion in the Smithsonian”. Rogers was just hitting his peak when he died, on October 10, 1991, trying to save a man from drowning. The recreational area in Flagler County, where the accident occurred, was later renamed, Gamble Rogers Memorial State Recreation Area.

In the liner notes of his album, Fruitcakes, Jimmy Buffett dedicated the recording to Rogers’ memory and wrote that Rogers, “taught me how to move an audience with dialogue and delivery as much as with music”. In 1993, Rogers was posthumously awarded a Folk Heritage award.