The Eschelons' appearance at Festival of the Arts was 45 years in the making. The band had retired four or five years before the Festival’s first year, so during its original existence, it had no chance to perform at Festival.

Our reunion in December of 2004 gave us that chance. I sent our performance application to Festival of the Art in January 2006. We received an acceptance notice in April. We would perform Saturday, June 3 at 8 PM.

Prior to the acceptance notice, the band had voted on which songs we would perform if we had a 45 to 60 minute show to perform. We spent several weeks selecting and practicing the songs we thought would be best and by the middle of May we’d narrowed the list to twelve songs. Each week we’d run through the set, each practice taking less time between songs to get comfortable moving from one song to the next in the least amount of time.

A bonus for the band was our interview with Grand Rapids Press writer John Sinkevics. John, and two photographers produced a wonderful article about The Eschelons that ran in the Sunday edition prior to Festival weekend. John gave us another surprise in the following Thursday’s edition of After Dark.

It was now performance day, Saturday, June 3. We’d finished loading the trailer half and hour before we had to leave. From a mix of blue sky and clouds it rained, stopped and rained again. We talked, joked, each calming a certain level of nerves. Finally, it was time to go.

Our trip down Fulton was delayed a bit by a concert being held at the VanAndel. Rain continued its on-again, off-again persistence. Fortunately a policeman was directing traffic, which eventually gave us an opportunity to make our turn toward Louis. A right turn on Ottawa and we were facing north looking toward City Stage. Though we’d made our destination with ample time to unload and prepare for our performance, what we saw over the tops of buildings wasn’t reassuring. Storm clouds loomed high above, a leading edge of bright white clouds framed by darkness.

I exited the truck and found one of the Festival volunteers at City Stage. “We are The Eschelons,” I stated. “It looks like not much is happening here.” “You’re right,” the volunteer responded. “Festival is officially closed.”

The breath went from my body. I felt myself go limp as I headed back toward the truck and signaled to the other band members, letting them know that our performance was canceled.

Another volunteer was operating a mechanism that closes the stage. I watched him and noted that the stage was pretty cool and the sound system looked great. I wondered how many people, friends, family, acquaintances, and those who had never heard us before were planning to give us a listen. I wondered how many people would have just wandered by and decided to listen to songs of the 50s and 60s we’d planned to perform.

So there it is. A storm centered right over Grand Rapids that lasted less then 45 minutes, prevented The Eschelons from performing their 45-minute set, which took them 45 years to produce.

Disappointed? Yes. Grateful? Absolutely.

Thank you to the Festival folks that said “yes” to The Eschelons and thank you to John Sinkevics, Katy Batdorff (photographer), Delbridge Langdon Jr. (photographer) and the Grand Rapids Press for helping to reintroduce us to West Michigan.

And most of all, thank you to the folks that planned to be there with us to experience the band’s first ever performance at Festival of the Arts.

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