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■ Minnesota State Fair
The Minnesota State Fair is the state fair of the U.S. state of Minnesota. Also known by its slogan, “The Great Minnesota Get-Together”, it is the largest state fair in the United States by average daily attendance and the second-largest state fair in the United States by total attendance, trailing only the State Fair of Texas, which generally runs twice as long as the Minnesota State Fair.

With the end of the summer comes the biggest and best block party of the season: the Minnesota State Fair, a place for everyone, a place that has everything, a place where one item reigns over all – food. Here are some some stats:

500 food items from 300 vendors
80 foods on a stick
26K gallons of milk sold
Sweet Martha’s Cookie Jar makes $5 million just selling cookies

I was going for the music, as well as the food. So I made a plan to go early since I had never been to the opening day before, and I had a feeling I would not be the only one there.

9:00 am: I parked at the U of M and grabbed a free transit bus. For some reason an elderly couple next to me have a snare and bass drum, which seem odd items to get through security. Plus, where’s the high-hat?

9:30 am: Stop by the Family & Baby Care Center to say good morning to a neighbor. Mary is retired, but every summer she works at the fair, one of three thousand that make this enterprise run smoothly.

10:00 am: Wait in line under a walnut tree to get a Swedish Egg Coffee. The line isn’t as long as the one for Peaches Donuts. There may be something to the craze. After all, they are handmade by an Amish Family. Up close they are huge and almost bread-like, but are they worth an hour’s wait? You’ll have to let me know.

10:10 am: Catch the Young Fiddlers Association of Minnesota at the Cosgrove Stage. With the help of their instructor they are playing songs like “Dawn of the Day” and “Camptown Races.” A young fiddler shows up late and sneaks closer to the stage. He’s wearing a tee that says: BORN TO ROCK.

10:30 am: After a Minnesota State Highway Patrol Officer raises the flags at the Luther Auto Bandshell, the tribute band California Dreamin’ steps on stage to take a trip down memory lane by highlighting the music that came from the musicians living in Laurel Canyon.

California Dreamin is local and headlined by four singers: Mary Jan Alm, Aimee Lee, Boyd Lee and Paul Franzich, and they sang all the hits like “Mr. Tambourine Man” and “Happy Together.” Then there was the Mamas and Papas’ hit as well as this fun fact:

Did you know that The Eagles biggest hit was actually written by Jackson Browne? Before he was a well-known troubadour, Browne was a struggling musician living in an apartment in Laurel Canyon. Unlike most musicians of the time, he got up early, got his tea kettle steaming and sat down at his piano to write, but there was one song where he kept getting stuck. So over and over he played “Well, I’m a-standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona…” Then nothing. The neighbor above him got tired of the repetition and after a while walked downstairs, knocked on the door and offered: “Such a fine sight to see. It’s a girl, my lord, in a flatbed Ford, slowin’ down to take a look at me.”

The neighbor was Glenn Frey.

12:30 pm: Work my way over to the Schilling Amphitheater to see Pam Linton and The Cotton Kings. Like California Dreamin’, Linton and her band are a tribute one, mainly focusing on the music from the multi-generational Carter family, first starting with “Wildwood Flowers” a song that first appeared in 1860 and was recorded by the family in 1928 with Maybelle singing. Then a song from Maybelle’s daughter, June, who once described being with Johnny Cash as “Burning Ring of Fire.” Then Linton sang another Cash hit, rolling through “I’ve Been Everywhere” without one mistake on her geographical narration, the audience giving a roar in appreciation. And before she finished, she paid tribute to the Queen of Country by singing “I Will Always Love You,” a song made famous by Whitney Houston, but written by Dolly Parton.

1:37 pm: Thinking of grabbing something to eat, but there are lines everywhere. Plus, the costs seemed to have taken a hike from last year. Normally, I get a pronto pup and a 1919 Root Beer, but they are $8 each. So I find myself perusing the beer menu at Giggle’s Campfire Grill. Guess which food item is not in one of their beers. (Answer at the end.)

Smores
Rhubarb
Dill Pickle
Bacon
Coconut

1:41 pm: Watch a farmer fire up a tractor that was built when the state was still in its teenage years. It coughs, sputters and spews enough diesel to make me think I’m standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona when a girl in a flatbed Ford drives by.

2:14 pm: Catch the parade, but there is a large gap which makes me think it’s already done. So the announcer fills the void: “And for the first time at the State Fair it’s the Minnesota Invisible Marching Band.” (Dad joke!)

2:30 pm: Sunny Sweeney and her band take the stage at the Luther Auto Bandshell and she has an announcement: “I just had my first pronto pup.” (Bet she didn’t have to wait in line.)

Sweeney is from East Texas and she told the crowd that she is a country singer who is going to sing country songs, and off she went with a song that makes up 99% of all country songs – heartbreak. The song: “Easy as Hello.”

Being twice divorced, Sweeney said she didn’t have many love songs, but she did write one for her dog called “Grow Old Together.” Then it was back to the fuel that drives country music with a cover of Loretta Lynn’s “Rated X” and Sweeney’s great “Better Bad Idea,” a song dedicated to all the wild women in the audience.

Let’s wash our dirty minds
With a bottle of white wine
Do some things that we can’t take back
Cross every single line
Get higher than a kite
Baby, what do you say to that?

3:15 pm: At the International Bazaar to see Socaholix on the Summit Stage. It’s packed for they are the perfect band to listen to with easy-going music from the islands that dot the Caribbean.

I get a little hungry and look for a bite to eat, and the International Bazaar is the best place to find something fun and new to eat, right? One would think, but I couldn’t get my head around the Deep-Fried Nacho Cheese Bites at Shanghai Henri’s. The Midtown Global Market line snaked through the crowded Bazaar and I couldn’t see myself paying $14 for a Hmong Corndog.

3:35 pm: Spy my first concert tee: she’s green.

3:40 pm: Stop by to catch a little bit of the Armenian Dance Ensemble of Minnesota at the Cosgrove Stage. After spending a full weekend watching Irish dancers leap about it was fun to see another culture’s dance movements, which were more grounded, as the dancers shuffled, linked and moved at times like a spiraling gyre.

Fun fact: At one time it was forbidden to have male and female dancers dance together in Armenian society. So someone thought of a simple handkerchief used as a bridge for the two sexes to both hold.

4:00 pm: In less than ten minutes I go from courtly to chaotic as Not Quite Brothers took the stage at the Luther Auto Bandshell. They are an 80’s cover-band from Iowa and they play all the hard-charging hits and power ballads. They are also pretty young and have no need of handkerchiefs to meet the ladies, they being twin brothers Sam and Isaac Johnson on lead vocals and guitar, Cooper Corcoran on rhythm guitar, Nathan Klein on bass guitar and Ben Schmelzer on drums.

What can I say about this group other than I admired their verve. They jumped all over the stage and electrified the afternoon crowd with songs like “Jail Break” and “Dead or Alive.” And of course they were going to “Love Rock and Roll” and “Rock all Night” even though it was in the middle of the day. And even though they were a third the age and had ten-times more energy than the performers who played before them, there is one song on the Venn Diagram that California Dreamin’ and Not Quite Brothers both played: Buffalo Springfield’s “For What It’s Worth.”

4:32 pm: I grab a Summer Shandy and find a spot to relax and listen to Socaholix play another set as they lean into Bob Marley’s “Could You Be Loved” not as rushed, more relaxed, a little funky with a smooth sax solo.

4:50 pm: Spy a classic Triple Rock Social Club tee. (Nice!)

5:00 pm: Still in search of a root beer that doesn’t completely damage a $10 bill. I see a sign from one vendor: YES, WE HAVE DIET ROOT BEER

As US Marshall Samuel Girard said to Dr. Richard Kimball in the 1993 classic thriller The Fugitive: “I don’t care!”

5:10 pm: One thing that I like about the Minnesota State Fair is how they plow money back into the fairgrounds. A few years back they turned the West End from a dilapidated Western ghost town into the best place to hang out. They also renovated the Lee & Rose Warner Coliseum this year by updating the bathrooms and putting new seats in the arena. So I’m enjoying one of the seats as I watch the finals of the Draft Horse Hitch competition. Why not? Where else are you going to find such competition in a metropolitan city?

5:30 pm: There is a special at the Pizza Wagon: Two Slices for $4! So I order two pepperoni slices. They are piping hot and I can’t wait to burn my tongue.

6:00 pm: The Roe Family Singers take the stage at the Schilling Amphitheater and there are a lot of them, but unlike the Carters they are not all related. The only relations are a married couple, Kim and Quillan Roe. They started out as a tribute band playing Johnny and June songs twenty years ago and have evolved into a mighty fine bluegrass band with all the instruments like banjo, fiddle, mandolin, upright bass, acoustic guitar. Heck, there are even keys, an electric guitar, a washboard and a “magic” saw.

What I love about the Twin Cities is all the great musicians that live here, and if you love Americana, check out The Roe Family Singers sometime. They play at the 331 Club every Monday evening. And at the state fair they mixed it up with new originals like “Don’t Worry About the Rich Man” and classics like “Squirrel Hunters” which had Kim showing off her clogging skills. And of course they paid tribute to Dolly Parton with a rousing “9 to 5” which the crowd cheered at the first pounding chord.

7:00 pm: Order the Blue Cheese & Corn Fritz and a root beer at The Blue Barn. There might be a little too much blue in the cheese, but the root beer is fantastic. It’s from Lift Bridge, a brewery in Stillwater. It may be even better than 1919. It has something a little extra. So I look at the list of ingredients on the can and find it – honey.

7:30 pm: Watch Nur-D finish his soundcheck at the Schilling Amphitheater while dropping a corn fritz on my shirt. He tells the crowd to check out the fair, but come back for his show. My body is telling me to just stay seated.

8:00 pm: “What’s up State Fair,” Nur-D yells as he and his band step onto the stage. Instantly, I am no longer tired as he and his band launch into their first song and draw people to the front of the stage to dance and groove.

Nur-D aka Matt Allen may have been the perfect musician to close out the first day of the fair at the Schilling Amphitheater. Like most of the earlier performers he is local, proudly stating he is from Rosemount, which isn’t anywhere near the State

Fairgrounds, an unusual place to foster a musician with hip-hop/R&B ambitions. But there isn’t anything normal about Nur-D which is a good thing. If I had to describe him in one word it would be infectious. Whatever energy he brought to the stage quickly transferred into the crowd. And throughout his 90 minute set he kept saying he had the best band in the Twin Cities, which was hard to argue as he was backed by a rhythm and horn section as well as keys and a scratcher turning two turntables that kept the crowd moving as he sang songs that ranged from Dungeons and Dragons “20 Cha” to self love “Big Boi” and hot friends “All My Friends Are So Hot.” And like the country performers before he did sing songs of heartache like “Zach and Kimberly” but positivity was the overall theme of the evening, especially when he and his band brought the crowd to a united front with “Glorious.”

Heading back to the transit bus after a 12 hour day, I was surprised how I felt. I wouldn’t say I felt glorious, but I certainly was in the range of the James Brown hit song.

Top Five Favorite Tees I Saw at the Fair: