Written by Phoenix Willard & Dylan Wood
Every spring, a team of over 1,000 volunteers and staff members works behind the scenes to transform Downtown Boise into a citywide space for artists and residents to celebrate culture and community: Treefort Music Festival.
Since its debut in 2012, the festival’s crew and volunteers work months in advance, to tirelessly build the indie-rock music festival from the ground up.
While festival attendees see just one week of activities, for Marketing Assistants Katie Jones and Mae Blakeman, Treefort season is year-round. According to Blakeman, the team began discussing the theme and plans for the next festival just weeks after the previous one ended.
“It feels like it creeps up on us,” Jones said.
Jones and Blakeman work with press from all around the world, with teams flying in from England and Australia.
“A lot of people don’t realize we have really cool high-level press coming,” Blakeman said, referencing The Line of Best Fit, a well-known music magazine based in London covering this year’s festival.
Staff plug away to pull everything together as the festival fast approaches year after year.
“One memory I have from last Treefort is me and Katie running around, doing odd jobs and being so excited,” Blakeman said, relishing in “being in the madness and the music.”
With each passing day, anticipation builds and the workload increases.
“We have a pretty small team here, and it’s kind of insane what a smaller city can pull together,” Jones said.
For those seeking escape from boisterous crowds and blaring music, Storyfort is the place to go. The literary fort features a multitude of skilled storytellers from all disciplines.
“We have 60 people coming into Boise for our part of [the festival],” Max Schwartz, Storyfort’s assistant director, said. “It’s a lot of planning and running around.”
That dedication, collaboration and passion for local community-building is what brings the festival together.
“You wear many hats when you’re in this position and working with such a big festival,” Blakeman said. “It’s a labor of love.”
The Treefort team’s pride shines through in every event, turning the festival into a local staple and creating its uniquely Boise feel.
“It’s remarkably local,” Schwartz said. “There’s a whole breathing organism that is the city of Boise. And I don’t think anything encapsulates what that’s like to be a part of it better than Treefort does.”
Whether you are a band headlining the main stage at Julia Davis Park, a college student walking the Treefort-adorned streets of Downtown Boise or a staff member working tirelessly behind the scenes, the reciprocal relationship between Treefort and its city is undeniable.
“My favorite part is feeling [like] a part of something bigger,” Blakeman said, referencing the love poured into the music festival and back into the community.
For Treefort staff, the community and family feel is real. Bringing together the city means working diligently with each other.
“It’s the most literal act of community I’ve seen,” Schwartz said. “It shapes Boise just as much as Boise shapes it.”
