Free music pulls thousands to Ephrata

People, music from Basin Summer Sounds fills town

EPHRATA - The allure of free music and warm weather brought over 5,000 people to Ephrata over the weekend for the annual Basin Summer Sounds music festival.

It's believed the bands from as far away as California and other family-friendly offerings helped surpass last year's attendance of 5,000, said Chris Youngberg, a former music teacher and community member who helped with the event.

"I think we're going to blow that away," she said. "We were into the thousands last night (Friday)," Youngberg said. "It's amazing how many people are here."

She added that more people were expected on Saturday night to hear performers. The last band took the stage at 9 p.m. Saturday.

Youngberg said that "tons of zip codes" were coming into town and all the area hotels were booked.

Final attendance numbers weren't available this weekend, but it's estimated about 1,500 people poured into the seating area at the courthouse stage just on Friday night alone, said Suzanne Dahl, the Ephrata Chamber of Commerce's executive director.

Dahl said the event's food vendors and downtown businesses reported that sales were up, but final figures weren't available.

Many people from out-of-town and out-of-state arrived in Ephrata for the two-day festival, Dahl said.

Organizers tout the event as multi-genre for all ages. A portion of downtown Ephrata was closed to traffic on Friday and Saturday and people walked through a connecting alley between the Basin Street stage downtown to C Street where another stage was set up.

Large bounce tents were erected on Basin Street for younger children to enjoy. For $5 each, children ages 12 and younger could play all day in the tents, said Ray Towry, Ephrata's recreation director.

A three-on-three basketball tournament also filled the town's streets and a beer garden and food stands were placed on C Street in front of the courthouse stage.

Rebecca Young of Seattle said she had family playing in the three-on-three basketball tournaments. She said she was mainly just listening to the music and watching basketball.

"It's lots of fun, it's a nice day, sunny weather, lots of good competitive basketball," Young said.

Cousins Kelsey Lambe of Ephrata, Justin Patterson of Seattle and Becky Vankeulen of Spokane were also watching the tournaments Saturday. They were in town for their family reunion.

Patterson said he had lots of family members watching the tournament.

But, "we lost so bad, they went home," he said with a smile.