Organizers hope Happy Harry's Hot Valley Nights draws record-breaking crowd

Aug. 12—EAST GRAND FORKS — Justin LaRocque and his team of organizers are hoping this year's Happy Harry's Hot Valley Nights festival will top the 4,000 daily attendance record set last year.

"In an ideal world, we'd see 5,000 a day. Is that attainable? I don't know yet. We shall see," said LaRocque, owner of The Spud Jr. in East Grand Forks, who organizes the event with four others. "But we've grown every year."

This year's festival has expanded in terms of "the overall product we're offering," he said. "The idea from Year 1 was to take a step up every year, in talent and just the overall atmosphere that we're providing, and I think we've accomplished that so far. ... You're taking the risk that the product you're putting out is something that the people are going to want to see. We don't know until it's all said and done if we've succeeded or not."

The outdoor event, set for 5-11 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, Aug. 18-19, in the parking lot northeast of the Riverwalk Mall in East Grand Forks, will feature three acts each evening. Taking the stage Friday will be Paint and Town, Drake White and the Big Fire, and Tracy Lawrence. On Saturday, festival-goers will hear Matt Aakre and the Dirty Little Secret, Tigirlily Gold, and Dylan Scott.

Ultimately, the event would not be possible without an array of sponsors — a handful of which have been with the festival from the beginning — and the fans who come out for the show, LaRocque said.

"It's a grassroots operation," said LaRocque, who organizes the event with planning committee members, Tyler Piper, Mike Boushee, Chris Halstenson and Jenny Milling. They worked together last year, for the first time, to put together the 2022 event.

Each member brings different strengths to the table, "and everything all kind of blends well and works well together," LaRocque said. They monitor established artists they may want to invite and scan the music-industry horizon for emerging talent that would appeal to country music fans in this region.

Planning the festival "is a year-long process," he said, noting that his committee is vying with similar operations around the country, and even internationally, to secure performance dates with musicians.

"It was a six-month time frame before we finally got all the talent wrapped up and secured."

Following an entertainment model organizers felt was successful in the past, they sought to fill the Friday lineup with "classic country artists who had their heyday in the '90s and are still touring," LaRocque said, noting the success they have had a couple of times with Black Hawk. "Their supporters came out strong."

Saturday's lineup has featured a mix of "up-and-comers," musicians or bands that have had a few hits and appear to be on the cusp of a major breakthrough in the industry. One of this year's performers, Dylan Scott, fits that profile, LaRocque said. "He's someone that I've had on the radar for a couple years."

The former "Happy Harry's Rockin' Up North Fest" started as a one-day event in 2017, and has been held annually, except for 2020, when the COVID pandemic axed it — and similar celebrations — nationwide, LaRocque said.

In 2020, "I think we might have been the last festival in the country still standing" when COVID upended the entertainment industry, he said. "I don't know if any other one held out as long as we did."

In 2021, for the first time, organizers hosted a three-day festival, running from Thursday through Saturday, but in the aftermath, "we decided that two days was probably the way to go," and returned to that format in 2022, LaRocque said.

This year, general admission is $35 for a single-day ticket and $60 for a two-day ticket. VIP tickets, only for those 21 and older, are $75 for a single-day ticket and $140 for a two-day ticket.

General admission attendees will have access to a large beer tent and "tons o' Porta-Potties," organizers say. VIP ticket-holders will have access to stage front, luxury bathrooms, mixed drinks at the Bud Light Bar, and VIP-only beer sales.

New this year, concert-goers will be supporting two charitable causes. One dollar from each ticket sold for Friday's performance will go to Tracy Lawrence's foundation, Mission Possible, dedicated to ending hunger in the U.S. On Saturday, $1 from each ticket will go to support local food shelves.

LaRocque does not expect the ending of the annual Greenway Takeover to have much of an impact on the Hot Valley Nights festival, he said. That popular three-day music and arts festival took place in September, for the past few years, near the Red River just north of the Sorlie Bridge in downtown Grand Forks; it was held for the last time in September 2022.

"We kind of thought that, if anything, (its discontinuation) might open us up to better attendance, being that the offerings in the summer would be a lot more limited," he said. The Greenway festival, he noted, presented "definitely a different genre of music, which of course is going to bring out a different demographic, but I think most people in town, in my experience, are kind of country fans, first and foremost," LaRocque said.

The Hot Valley Nights festival seems to go a long way in satisfying his love of country music.

Every year, "we're always excited about all of them," he said. "The country music fan in me, anytime you get to see a country music legend like Tracy Lawrence, that's awesome."

He's also excited to see Drake White and the Big Fire.

"Drake is a very very unique artist; he came up about five or six years ago and broke onto country radio with his first single. And shortly after that single hit, he suffered a stroke. I believe it was on stage — nearly cost him his life. He got dropped from his label," LaRocque said. "He's been clawing his way back in the industry. He's just a phenomenal talent. He has a fantastic voice and great songs.

"You want to root for a guy like that all day long."

In 2021, the decision was made to hold the two-day festival in the parking lot northeast of the Riverwalk Mall. That site offered advantages, including a continuous, one-level concrete surface and space to accommodate "the natural growth of the festival as a whole," LaRocque said.

The festival had outgrown its former location, near the VFW in East Grand Forks, where there was gravel in some spots and different elevations, which led to tripping hazards, he said. "We felt (the current site) was a good location to go to."

This year, Hot Valley Nights organizers have also launched a Loyalty Club to build an email connection with country music fans and others. It's a way to give people a chance to be the first to learn about and purchase tickets for the festival and other events, LaRocque said.

Organizers want to make the festival attractive and accessible for a wide range of fans, especially given the economic pressure people may be facing, LaRocque said.

"Our goal is to keep our costs as low as possible, because we know that, with where the economy has gone in the last couple of years, expendable income for people has been getting tighter and tighter. We want to make sure we're not pricing ourselves" out of a range that people can afford.

Even so, "we've had to raise prices a little bit this year with tickets, unfortunately, " he said.

In collaboration with the Downtown Development Association, organizers scheduled the festival to coincide with the Downtown Street Fair. It also coincides with UND's Welcome Weekend.

So LaRocque is hoping that, next weekend, music lovers will find their way to the festival.

"Even if you're a casual music fan, and just want to be out, come out and spend an evening with us," he said. He encourages everyone — local residents and visitors alike — to "make it a 'destination weekend.' "