Farm AidThis year’s Farm Aid benefit show will take place on September 13 in Raleigh, North Carolina, and the lineup includes all the usual suspects, plus one new face: Jack White.
White will join Farm Aid board members Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp, Dave Matthews and Neil Young on the bill at the event, which takes place at Raleigh’s Walnut Creek Amphitheater. Tickets go on sale August 1 at 10 a.m. ET. Others on the bill include country star Jamey Johnson, the Preservation Jazz Hall Band, and the group Delta Rae.
In a statement, Willie Nelson, Farm Aid’s president, says, “In North Carolina and across the Southeast, family farmers have struggled to stay on the land, but they have also pioneered new roads to economic sustainability. This region knows the value of its farmers and offers increasing opportunities for new farmers to build a strong regional food system.”
He adds, “On the Farm Aid stage Saturday, September 13, we’ll celebrate family farmers and the healthy communities they’re growing for all of us.”
Mellencamp added in a statement that Farm Aid has a “fair-like feeling,” explaining, “All day long, people are performing onstage and food from family farmers is being served. It’s a great occasion for families to come listen to great music and teach their children about where their food comes from.”
Farm Aid was inspired by something Bob Dylan said at Live Aid in 1985: he noted that he hoped some of the money raised would go to help farmers who were in danger of losing their farms because they couldn’t pay their mortgages. Later that same year, the first Farm Aid concert was held in Champaign, Illinois, with a massive lineup of performers, including Dylan, Mellencamp, Nelson and Young, plus Bon Jovi, Bonnie Raitt, Lou Reed, Carole King, Huey Lewis, Roy Orbison, Billy Joel and dozens more. Since then, Farm Aid events have raised $45 million to support family farmers.
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