In 2010, the Northfield and Cannon Falls Area League of Women Voters celebrated Women’s Equality Day. Part of the celebration was a performance by a local group of women singing songs from the years of struggle to achieve the right of women to vote. The movement ended in 1920 with the final ratification of the 19th amendment to the United States Constitution, but the songs and the inspiration of their words live on.
During the Music & Democracy program on Friday, July 31 at VBF 2026, a newly formed group of local women will join us to revive the songs of the suffragists once more. Listen for the following tunes:
Let Woman Choose her Sphere (Tune: Auld Lang Syne)
Oh, Dear, What Can the Matter Be?
The Taxation Tyranny (Tune: Colombia, the Gem of the Ocean)
The New America (Tune: My Country ‘Tis of Thee)
The group has been organized by Bonnie Jean Flom, a Vintage Band Festival board member. Accompanying the singers on piano will be Mary Davis.
For soldiers in the American Civil War, music was one of the primary forms of entertainment and regimental esprit.The music was sometimes in song, sometimes instrumental and often both.After sundown in the aftermath of a battle, if opposing forces were camped in close proximity to each other, one band would strike up a tune and when it finished, the band on the other side would answer with a tune of its own.It was a whole more relaxing than shooting at each other! This could go on at length and would only end when one of the bands decided to get some sleep.
It is a Vintage Band Festival tradition to replicate this communal sharing of tunes beside the Cannon River.In 2026 five bands will participate in the exchange, three on one side of the river and two on the other.Each band will play a tune of its choosing and pass the baton to the next band in a round robin routine.Depending on the length of the tunes, this may result in each band playing three tunes or possibly just two.
The five bands will be: the Dodworth Saxhorn Band, the Independent Silver Band, the American Expeditionary Forces Headquarters Band, Newberry’s Victorian Cornet Band, and the 1st Brigade Band.This delightful spectacle will take place Saturday, August 1, at 12 p.m.on the Downtown Riverwalk between the pedestrian bridge and the 2nd St.bridge.Don’t miss it!
The evenings at VBF 2026 will be jammed with music to get your feet moving. Thursday night features K-Libre 24 and McNasty Brass. Friday we welcome La Clave Orchestra and Brass Messengers and Saturday the bill features Salsa del Soul and the MN Jazz Orchestra. It’s a mix of VBF veterans and first timers. Don’t miss a minute of it!
Can you be a Vintage Band Festival volunteer? Folks are need to staff the Information Booths at both Bridge Square and Central Park during the festival weekend, July 30 – August 2. Shifts will be 2-3 hours and task will be giving visitors advice/directions, taking donation, selling merchandise, handing our programs. Follow the link to sign up. https://www.signupgenius.com/go/60B0E48AFA92EA6FF2-vintage2/118012189#/
For information on all of the musical performances click on VBF 2026.
Come thrill to the crack of the bat and give it some ginger at a vintage base ball game; just leave the foul language at home – and look out for the daisy cutters. Watch the St. Croix Base Ball Clubtake on the Rochester Roostersin historic costume and with the original 1864 rules, also known as “The New York Game”.
The original rules demanded, among other things, the highest manners from players and spectators alike. Truly America’s sport, baseball began during the Civil War as young men looked to fill the interminable time between battles, and the game caught on like wildfire when the soldiers brought it home with them after the war. The game was full of colorful jargon: a bat was called “a willow” and the fans were called “cranks”. Pitchers were “hurlers” and batters were “strikers”. The rules challenge the contemporary die-hard: no gloves, no catching equipment, no pitching mound, the hurler throws the ball underhand, batters are out if the ball is caught in the air or after a single hop, and only one ball is used for the entire game.
Today there are 400 active clubs in the Vintage Base Ball Association. There is an annual two-day festival in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania where 24 teams play 48 games on five ball fields. For many years Northfield fielded a team known as The Silver Stars, but time and other diversions have taken their toll on the team.
The Northfield game will be played on The Bald Spot at Carleton College and the game will begin at 2:00pm on Saturday, August 1, 2026. The Bald Spot is directly north of Skinner Memorial Chapel, 405 1st St. E. Due to ongoing construction, the best place to enter the campus is at the Winona St. and 1st St. E. intersection.
Music for the afternoon will be provided by RAVE Brass, a veteran Vintage Band Festival performer.
Baseball at St Olaf College 2013Base ball at Carleton College 1889
Friday morning, July 31, Vintage Band Festival will present a multi-media program titled “Music and Democracy: Living History in America” in Northfield’s Central Park. The United States is 250 years old and the music of the nation has changed often during those years. The program will chronicle highlights of those historical and musical eras. It will include spoken word actors including Theodore Roosevelt, reenactor brass bands in period dress, a Dakota drum group and singers and a folksinging duo.
Other concurrent activities during the event include food and drink vendors, non-profit organizations tabling to educate, inform and recruit visitors, a face-painting and make-your-own art booth and an all-ages bicycle parade around the park.
This is a free and family-friendly event. Children who wish to participate in the bicycle parade are invited to decorate their bikes prior to the event. Decorating supplies will be provided.
For a limited time, Vintage Band Festival 20th anniversary clothing items will be available for pre-order. Orders will be held for pickup onsite at the Festival July 30 – August 2 or shipped to customers (with added shipping charge) on August 3 following the conclusion of the Festival.
Items include short and long sleeve t-shirts, crew and hoodie sweatshirts, a polo shirt and a baseball cap. The t-shirt and ball cap will also be available for purchase during the Festival. The online t-shirt price of $20 is aa special pricing offer for the pre-order period only.
The pre-order online store will close at 11:59:59pm on Monday, July 6.
**Be sure to use the size chart when selecting sizes as there are no refunds or exchanges with pre-ordered merchandise. Customers are encouraged to contact Larson’s Printing, Vintage Band Festival’s local partner, with questions before ordering if necessary.
There is festival within a festival at Vintage Band Festival 2026. The nested festival is sponsored by the Historic Brass Society and is their Early Brass Festival Conference.
July 31-August 2, 2026
Northfield, Minnesota
Scott Muntefering, EBF Conference Host
Paul Niemisto, Local Host
Sandy Coffin, HBS Event Coordinator
Paper presentations related to any aspect of early brass or brass bands – including but not limited to band history, pedagogy, repertoire, performance practice, and biographical/historical information.
EBF Sessions will be in the beautiful 19th Century Northfield Train Depot.
Imnizaska Drum Group is a vibrant, intertribal drum collective deeply rooted in cultural preservation and education. They not only perform at public events like powwows, festivals and the State Fair, but they’re also making an impact through school and community programs — teaching history, musical technique, and traditional values. Their efforts foster unity, intergenerational connection, and cultural awareness across Minnesota and beyond.
“Imnizaska” means “white bluffs” in the Dakota language and it refers to the bluffs along the banks of the Mississippi River in east St Paul. Wicahapi Regional Park is on the top of the bluffs and is an indigenous burial ground. The St. Paul neighborhood has been known as Dayton’s Bluff since the arrival of European immigrants in the 19th century and the park was previously known as Indian Mounds Regional Park.
Imnizaska Drum Group will sing at the Living History through American Music program in Northfield’s Central Park on Friday morning, July 31 during Vintage Band Festival 2026.
The Finnish American brass bandAmeriikan Poijat (Boys of America) has scheduled a series of concerts in southern Minnesota this summer. The Finnish ethnic brass band will visit Randolph, Nerstrand, Northfield, Owatonna, and New Prague during the last week of July. Two of their performances will be in Northfield during VBF 2026.
Poijat, with players based in Minnesota, has traveled widely, with performances is most Midwestern states, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Massachusetts, Canada, and Finland. Poijat’s 2026 program will consist of a mixture of concert pieces and old-time dance music, and American music observing the 250th Anniversary.
Ameriikan Poijat was founded in 1990 by Dr. Paul Niemisto. The band has played performances in some rather unusual settings, such as in an ice arena, in fishing boats on the Finnish Perhojoki river, on a raft in an abandoned mine, at Finnish border defense installations, at a McDonnell-Douglas military aircraft plant, in a Wisconsin cow pasture, on a Florida beach, at an instrument museum, in a barn, and in a one room schoolhouse. It’s not that they have exclusively sought out bizarre venues, but a seven-piece group is very mobile, and the Finnish brass music they celebrate seems to have drawn them off the beaten path at times.
Poijat’s members are all Minnesota residents and some are of Finnish descent. They have been sharing the charm of the old Finnish brass band music and have also performed the newer compositions for septet that have proliferated recently. Their main inspiration has been from brass playing colleagues and friends in Finland who have also been keeping the tradition alive and generously sharing their experience with us about this music. The Finnish brass septet repertoire is meaningful ethnic art and has an inherent musicality that is attractive to many listeners.
Ameriikan Poijat will perform on the Bridge Square Stage in Northfield on Friday, July 31 at 2:00pm and at Tanzenwald Brewing in Northfield at 5:00pm. For the rest of the Poijat tour schedule, visit https://ameriikanpoijat.org/.
