Summergrass Bluegrass Festival Is Happening this Month!
by Dwight WordenAugust 2025
Summer is the peak festival season for bluegrass lovers everywhere and we have one of the best festivals right here at the Antique Gas and Steam Engine Museum in Vista over the weekend of August 15-17. Summergrass will present top national, regional, and local bluegrass bands in concert as well as workshops, a kids camp, camping, great food, and lots and lots of informal jamming. If you’ve never been to a bluegrass festival, now is your chance for a great experience. Bring your folding chair for the main stage action and your instrument to partake in the ever-present jamming. For a peek at the lineup, to get your tickets, and to learn more visit https://summergrass.net/.
Summergrass is a great experience for the whole family, even the non-bluegrass fan. The Antique Gas and Steam Engine Museum hosts vintage farm equipment from 1850-1950, much of it operational. Onsite you will find a working blacksmith shop, a small train, a period school house, vendors, a gift shop, and lots to see and do. Also on site is one of the largest collections of wombs and weavings west of the Mississippi. Summergrass is great for the kids and the whole family.
Bluegrass Day at the Fair
Gone Tomorrow at Bluegrass Day at the Fair. Photo by David Cupp.
Saturday, July 5, saw great bluegrass music and entertainment on the Avenue Stage at the Del Mar Fair. There were concerts by four great bands, a band scramble, and a performance by Emma’s Gut Bucket Band.
Every year the San Diego County Fair sponsors Bluegrass Day at the Fair and the San Diego Bluegrass Society and North San Diego County Bluegrass and Folk Club, both non-profits, step up to make it happen. This was our first year on the Avenue Stage, and all reports are that the performers and audience loved the location.
Emma’s Gut Bucket Band on stage. Photo by David Cupp.
The action began with a concert by Philly and the Cheesesteaks and moved from there into concerts by Muddy Mountain West, Sunnyside Strings, and Gone Tomorrow, spiced with the band scramble and Emma’s Gut Bucket Band in between.
We had five bands in the band scramble. If you’ve never seen a band scramble, here’s how it works. Players of whatever ability and age put their name and the instrument they play on a sheet of paper and put it in a hat, and we draw names at random to form bands. Each band is given about 15 minutes to meet their band mates, select a band name, and work up three tunes. Then the fun starts when they perform their tunes on the stage before our judges.
Winners are selected for best guitar, mandolin, fiddle, banjo, bass, and specialty instrument for best male and female vocalist and for best band. Prizes included Starbucks gift cards for winners and a banjo head signed by Ranger Doug of Riders in the Sky.
Here’s a run down on all the Band Scramble winners. Congratulations all!