Destination Bluegrass happens for the first time on the weekend of Nov. 13–15, and most of it is older than it looks. Bluegrass Today describes it as a new festival in its first year. The headliner and the Saturday night stage are new. The open jams that fill Friday night and close out Sunday are a habit downtown Waynesboro has kept for 37 years.
The schedule shows where the old part and the new part meet. Most of the free events fall on Friday night and Sunday: a set at a brewery, a gospel sing, and a hootenanny. The Saturday brunch may be free too, though its listing is unclear. The paid tickets sit in the middle. If you live within a short drive of Main Street, you can enjoy a good share of this weekend without buying a ticket, as long as you know which doors are open.
A Jam That Outlived Its Hardware Store
The Arts Alliance of Greater Waynesboro is putting on the weekend through its Destination ARTS! program. Alliance board member John Lanehart came up with the event. He told LocalNews1 that it grew out of Waynesboro's history as a bluegrass town, which goes back to one storefront.
"That's when musicians first gathered for a jam at Beck & Benedict's on Main Street. When Beck & Benedict's closed, the hootenanny tradition continued — and it's currently thriving, thanks to support from the Arts Alliance of Greater Waynesboro."
LocalNews1 reported those comments from Lanehart, and the year he was talking about is 1989.
The jam went on to outlast the store, and the Alliance has kept it going. The Alliance has a short history of its own. Its steering committee first met in spring 2012, and its first board formed that September, when it incorporated as a 501(c)(3). Its first big project, Destination ARTS!, turned vacant Main Street storefronts into galleries. Now that same program has its name on a bluegrass weekend. The Alliance is building on the format that first put its name on Main Street.
According to LocalNews1, the jam now runs as a monthly Bluegrass Hootenanny at Music Makers, 46 W. Main St., on rotating Sundays. The Alliance built Music Makers with the Cumberland Valley School of Music as a home for forums, workshops, classes, jams and performances. A 2025 hootenanny listing on the county visitor site invited anyone to bring an instrument to a free session led by Johnny Calamari and Brad Munn. Calamari is back on the November bill, hosting the Saturday brunch.
How the Three Days Are Built
The festival listing on Visit Franklin County spreads the weekend across six venues. Each day starts at a different hour.
Friday, Nov. 13
- FrankCo Penn, 5:30–8 p.m. at Music Makers, 46 W. Main St. Tickets are $10 plus a $2.51 fee.
- Tatum True Band, 7–9 p.m. at Michaux Brewing Company, 11657 Buchanan Trail E. Free.
- Shale Pile Fam Jam with Nate Clendenen, Jamie Collins and others, 8:30–11 p.m. at Trigger's Table & Taproom, 118 Walnut St. Tickets are $5 plus a $2.18 fee.
Saturday, Nov. 14
- Johnny Calamari's Bluegrass All Star Brunch, 11 a.m.–2 p.m. at Rough Edges Brewing, 91 W. Main St.
- Bluegrass Meet and Greet, 3–5 p.m. at Music Makers. Tickets are $10 plus a $2.51 fee.
- Main event with the Jason Carter Band, the Martha Spencer Duo with Jamie Collins, and FrankCo Penn, 6–10 p.m. at the Eagles Club Event Center, 16 E. Main St. General admission is $40 plus a $4.52 fee.
Sunday, Nov. 15
- Martha Spencer and Friends Gospel, 10:30 a.m.–1 p.m. at Trinity United Church of Christ, 30 W. North St. Free.
- Hootenanny Wrap Up, 2–4 p.m. at Music Makers. Free.
Friday overlaps by design. The Tatum True set at Michaux Brewing starts while FrankCo Penn is still playing on West Main Street, and Michaux is the only stop out on Buchanan Trail East instead of downtown. The Shale Pile jam at Trigger's starts at 8:30, half an hour before the free brewery set wraps, so catching both means leaving Michaux early or getting to Trigger's late. Trigger's calls itself a restaurant and bar with a taproom and a separate dining room. It pours beer from Hidden Key Brewing Company in Greencastle.
The pricing for the Saturday brunch is unclear. The listing shows a $25 ticket with a $3.52 fee, then the word "FREE" with food and drinks sold a la carte. Check the Eventbrite ticket page before you count on a table. A July 2025 LocalNews1 brewery roundup called Rough Edges downtown Waynesboro's oldest microbrewery and noted that it is women-owned.
The Night That Is Actually New
Saturday night is the part Waynesboro has never had before. The festival bills the Jason Carter Band as Grammy Award-winning. In the LocalNews1 piece, Lanehart said Carter spent 30 years playing fiddle with the Del McCoury Band, which he called "the most awarded group in bluegrass history," before starting his own band "with hot young players from Nashville."
The festival's top ticket prices are set by that show. Here is how the paid options compare:
- Every paid event bought separately. Friday's FrankCo Penn, the Shale Pile jam, the meet and greet and the main event add up to $65 at face value, or $76.72 with ticket fees.
- VIP All Weekend pass. $100 plus an $8.55 fee, or $108.55. It covers all events except the Saturday brunch and includes the best seating and a gift bag.
- Saturday main event VIP. $60 plus a $5.87 fee for VIP seating at the Eagles Club Event Center.
The VIP weekend pass costs $31.83 more than buying every paid ticket on its own. That extra money pays for seating and the gift bag, because the free events are already open to everyone. If you only care about Carter, the $40 general admission ticket covers it. If you came for the jams, the two free Sunday events and the Friday brewery set cost nothing.
One practical detail for Saturday night: festival materials quoted by LocalNews1 put the Eagles Club Event Center on the second floor, reached by stairs. The Eagles Club's own site lists the building at 16 East Main Street.
Who Is Paying for a First-Year Festival
New festivals need money up front, and this one got some of it from a county program. LocalNews1 lists the Franklin County IMPACT! Grant among the event's funders, along with local businesses and Alliance volunteers and donors.
Destination Bluegrass is also part of a full year for the Alliance. On Sept. 6 it ran the seventh Jammin' in the Park at Main Street Park, with Brad Munn playing a bluegrass set. LocalNews1 describes that festival and its winter counterpart, Jammin for the Arts, as the Alliance's main fundraisers. The nonprofit turns 15 in 2027. No published source says whether Destination Bluegrass will come back next November. The organizers are calling this weekend a launch.
Lanehart also pointed to what is around the venues. In the LocalNews1 piece he said visitors can explore shops on Waynesboro's revitalized Main Street, antiques malls, restaurants and independent craft breweries between sets. Most of the venues are on West Main Street, so it is easy to walk from one to the next.
The Calendar After Nov. 15
The weekend ends at Music Makers with a free hootenanny, and the Alliance's regular programs keep going there afterward. According to LocalNews1, the Alliance offers:
- Free live music every Friday night at Music Makers, 46 W. Main St.
- The Bluegrass Hootenanny on rotating Sundays each month
- A Songwriter's Workshop on first Mondays
- A Songwriters and Poets Open Mic on third Mondays
- A seasonally rotating art show at Gallery 50, 50 W. Main St.
The Arts Alliance of Greater Waynesboro posts its programming and sells tickets for its fundraisers. The Sunday hootenanny on Nov. 15 will look a lot like any month's hootenanny, except that it closes out the town's first bluegrass festival and comes the afternoon after a Grammy-winning band played East Main Street.
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