In the first few days of October, the town of Oriental transforms. 

An expected 3,000 music fans descend on the sleepy, riverside town, turning it to a lively party. Some walk out their front doors to watch the bands. Others fly in from out of state to see the shows.

This year, on Oct. 3 and 4, they’ll watch 28 bands play on a dozen porches. It’s a festival that requires an army of volunteers and an entire calendar year to produce. 

Together, these volunteers make the Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival one of Pamlico County’s biggest annual events. And a core part of their mission is keeping the festival free.

“The amount of people from the town here who volunteer is incredible,” said Dick Osmun, one of the festival’s founders. “(The festival) is all free. They just lend their time.”

“I remember thinking the first couple of years, there’s not going to be any audience because the whole town is volunteering,” said Leslie Kellenberger, another festival founder and Ol’ Front Porch’s archivist. As archivist, she maintains a collection of festival ephemera that includes maps, programs, t-shirts and pins.

I spoke with them, along with Board Chair and Operations Lead Marjorie Dufek, to learn more about how this vibrant festival came about and what is involved in making it happen every year. 

Many people might be surprised to learn Ol’ Front Porch hasn’t been going on for decades. The festival is only in its 11th year.

It was founded in 2014 by Kellenberger along with Dottie and Dick Osmun. The trio, along with other local friends, were discussing the music festivals they enjoyed attending throughout the country. 

“We thought it would be nice to have one in the county,” Dick Osmun said. Originally, they considered hosting it at Pamlico Community College in Bayboro.

“They were happy to have it, but then we got to thinking: If we do that, we’re not in Oriental!” he said. So they started talking to people at Oriental United Methodist Church and St. Thomas Episcopal Church, which is next door. 

“But then the Methodist minister had a heart issue,” and that got in the way of hosting, Dick Osmun said. “We figured we wouldn’t do it that year.” 

Dottie Osmun emailed Kellenberger about the bad news, saying maybe they’d do it next year. But Kellenberger had stumbled upon an even better idea before seeing Dottie's message. 

“I went out for a run and I was running down Broad Street coming back home,” she said. “And I ran into Alan Price. He and (his wife) Leigh had just moved into town. I was looking at their house and realized there’s a porch up there.” 

She continued to look at neighboring houses and noticed how many had large, accommodating porches that would make great improvised stages.

Leslie says it put her in mind of the music played on the porch at Billy and Lucille Truitt’s Ol’ Store at South Water and New Streets. The Ol’ Store was torn down in 2005. A plaque now commemorates the site. But its musical legacy inspired what would become one of the region’s biggest music festivals.

“I’m like, wow, there’s a porch, and there’s a porch, and there’s a porch there. I’m hauling butt (to Dick and Dottie’s house),” Kellenberger said. “I bang on the door and Dottie, who’s in a wheelchair, wheels up. She’s about to tell me about the email, which I didn’t get, and I said to her, ‘We can do it on porches!’”

The pair sat at the Osmuns’ table and started making a plan. “What we did was, we laid it out on the dining room table,” Kellenberger said. “We started at Broad Street and made markers for all the places we were going to go.”

The first festival was so small many local musicians didn’t even know about it. “We had a group that would play at Sailcraft Marina,” said Perry Cheatham of Brant Island Strings, a frequent Ol' Front Porch act. “And suddenly a bunch more musicians showed up! We asked where they came from, and they told us Ol’ Front Porch!”

There were no flyers, no schedule, no map of porches. People heard about it by word of mouth. “Yeah, we didn’t print anything,” Dick Osmun said. “But for the second year, they printed the schedule, the bands that were going to play, and the map.”

All the bands who performed the first year played as volunteers. As funding grew, festival organizers were able to offer small payments. 

“We paid mileage if they came from further than 20 miles away,” Kellenberger said. “Maybe the third or fourth year, we could afford to pay the bands to play. And we started making money.”

Part of the money came from selling merchandise. They made their first festival pin in 2015. Every year since then, there’s been a new pin design, stickers and a T-shirt. Other funds come from donations and grants. “All the bands get paid, and some of them get a fairly good amount of money,” Kellenberger said. “But we make sure the festival is free.” 

Ol’ Front Porch has been held nearly every year since its inauguration. Pandemic restrictions put a pause on the festival in 2020, but since then, the music has gone on even in the wake of major storms.

After Hurricane Florence, there was widespread damage and debris that organizers thought might hinder the festival. But, they said that music and levity was much needed.

“So, we just did the footprint,” Kellenberger said, referring to the area within the 2018 festival map. “Keith Smith put an APB on TownDock for anybody with wheelbarrows and whatever, and it was like Dunkirk. All these pickups showed up, and wheelbarrows and trucks (to clear up debris). In the footprint, you would not know anything had happened.”

From the very first OFP, organizers made giving back to the community part of their mission. This started with a scholarship from the first year on. The inaugural recipient was Connor Daniels, who now runs sound for the festival and plays multiple events per year as a member of the Southern Hellcats. The yearly scholarship is now known as Dottie’s Movement, in honor of Dottie Osmun, who died in 2022.

“Every hurricane that’s impacted the festival — Matthew, Durian, Ian, Florence — we’ve raised money during the festival, mainly just passing a bucket at the main stage,” Kellenberger said. “Last year, we raised money and sent it to areas affected by Helene. Because, we get it. We were spared, but we get it.”

Dufek said she became the board chair almost by accident.

“Dottie asked me to help her organize her files. She was very paper-based,” Dufek said. “I was helping her with that and with getting things on the computer, and then she up and died on us. I wasn’t on the board, but I loved the festival. I’m just a music geek and an old Deadhead. And I love organizing things. That’s what the job is, just organizing a lot of people.”

About 200 volunteers take part in making the festival happen each year. “Dottie and Leslie set it up beautifully,” Dufek said. “Lots of different people lead teams. So, we have a team that leads the information booth, a team for the shuttle, a team for the emcees. Each team has a head and they recruit their own volunteers.”

Dufek said the work distribution means no one job gets overwhelming. “With volunteers, you don’t want to burn them out,” she said. “We figure out ways to make the jobs doable, because all of us like to take vacations. Most of us are retired, but those who aren’t have jobs and families to deal with.”

While most volunteers are local, there are also many who come to town specifically to help out with Ol’ Front Porch. “My nephew is coming,” Dufek said. “He’s coming from Hawaii. He’s coming a few days early specifically so he can help.” 

She said other regular volunteers originally came to visit friends but now come back again and again to help put on Ol’ Front Porch.

The organizing for next year starts the very next day after the end of the current year’s festival.

“I send a note to all the teams and say ‘write down all the things you wish we had done differently,’” Dufek said. 

A volunteer appreciation breakfast and a planning meeting usually happen within a month.  She said the people in charge of booking also usually start right after the festival.

“Especially the last few years, it’s getting bigger,” Marjorie said. “Word’s getting out.”

The list of bands has expanded to 28.

“We try not to repeat musical acts too much,” Dufek said. 

She and other board members look at which acts have been popular and also for bands that offer something different on the stage.

“This year, we happen to have a lot of country, which we’ve never had much of before,” Dufek said. 

The Saturday night headliner will be Rissi Palmer, who is one of the first Black women to win country music awards. On Friday night, the headliner will be Sweet Megg, a country swing artist who previously performed with Postmodern Jukebox.

“We like to think we’re getting folks right before they take off,” Dufek said. “And we like to have music people might not otherwise hear.”

“The other thing we want to do is give an audience to local artists,” she said. “It puts them in front of a large crowd they might not otherwise see.”

In addition to the music, the festival grounds will include a vendor market where attendees can find local arts and crafts. There will also be more food than ever before. 

“I think it’s become as much of a food destination as a music destination,” Kellenberger said. “We have such healthy stuff.” 

All food sold from tents and food trucks within the Ol’ Front Porch vendor areas is made by either local nonprofits or local restaurants. Leslie shared a list that included options like fish plates, black beans and rice, vegan chili, chicken poblano stew, pulled pork sandwiches, chicken pot pie and a range of home-baked desserts. 

This emphasis on food has grown over time. The first year of the festival, “Jimmy and Mary Ellen Hamm were cooking for lunch, and they didn’t want to overbuy,” Dick Osmun said. Not knowing how many attendees would show up, they quickly ran out of food.

“So they went to the restaurants,” Dick Osmun said. 

Originally, they asked whether the restaurants would be willing to set up food stands, but no restaurants were interested. “The state charges a fee for it, so we were told they can’t do it,” he said. “But someone had a brainstorm.”

Terry Halpern had an idea that would benefit both local restaurants and area nonprofits.

“The nonprofits (associated with the festival) bought the food from the restaurant at a reduced price and took it back to sell,” Kellenberger said. “All the profits went to the nonprofits. It was a win-win situation.”

“And we don’t run out,” Dick Osmun added. “Hopefully, some people will still run out, but because it’s popular.”

Although the festival has grown every year, organizers say they don’t see it getting much bigger. Expanding the festival would make it more expensive, which could put sponsorships out of reach for previous donors. 

Raising funds by selling tickets is not on the table. “Part of our mission is that it stays free,” Kellenberger said. 

“We think it’s hit the perfect size,” Dufek said.

Donate and become a vital part of growing a visual and written history of the county.

Down in the County has its own Instagram page! Check us out @downinthecounty