Riverblast ends

enthusiastically with small crowd

By RON LARSEN

Journal Staff Writer

NEW ULM -- Even the soggy sky with its intermittent bouts of rain and drizzle couldn't dampen the enthusiasm of the hardy few who stayed to the end of the Riverblast festival's three-day run Sunday.

By 2 p.m., the farmers' market had been reduced to one vendor of apples. Even though the market was scheduled to continue until 5; she left at 3:15 p.m.

But the entertainment tent remained occupied as the hardy few, with toes tapping silently on the grass floor, listened and sang along with the offerings of the Dick Kimmel Four-piece Bluegrass Band during two hour-plus sessions, separated by an "old tyme music" session provided by Smiley Wiltscheck of New Ulm.

Those entertainers plus brats, beer, pop and water were more than enough to keep spectators entertained on a gray, wet afternoon.

Plus, there was the 28-foot war canoe in which to ride the gently flowing Minnesota River.

As an added plus, the slower pace and smaller crowd gave the visitor an opportunity to get to know the entertainers and the lone vendor better.

"It wasn't bad yesterday (Saturday)," Nancy Cox of Cox Orchard in Cleveland said, glancing sideways at the spot where pumpkins, squash and other produce had lain in an artistic arrangement the day before. "But there haven't been too many around here today," she added, as her eyes surveyed the gray sky. "I suppose they were scared away by the rain."

She and her husband Bill have grown apples -- 32 different varieties on 600 trees -- since starting the orchard just outside of Cleveland 28 years ago.

During those years, Nancy has been the marketer while Bill tends to the orchard, selling direct to several grocery stores and a co-op, going to area farmers markets four times a week during the season and setting up shop at festivals like Riverblast.

"Our harvesting season generally runs from the end of August to the end of October or into November," she explained, "and, yes, we stay pretty busy."

Cox Orchard doesn't do the "you-pick-em" thing because of the potential liability.

"You'd end up having people fall out of trees and everything," she said. "It just isn't worth it. But we do have children come out sometimes on tours, and we have some dwarf trees that they each can pick an apple from."

Meanwhile, Dick Kimmel's band is nearly mid-way through its first set, and its music seems to almost hang in the heavy, wet air, giving it a haunting quality as if crossing a fog-shrouded glen.

Kimmel is a New Ulm resident whose inter-twined bluegrass, gospel and country sounds are reaching well beyond the boundaries of New Ulm, or even the United States. He's produced more than two dozens records and has one or two pieces on countless others. He and his band went on five tours to Europe during the '90s.

For a guy who grew up in Philadelphia, migrated to West Virginia and, in 1981, to New Ulm, that's not too shabby.

Despite those successes, he hasn't quit his day job. He's a wildlife research biologist with the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources regional office in New Ulm.

But, Sunday he was Dick Kimmel the musician, the one who started playing nearly 40 years ago and has kept music as a "serious avocation" ever since.

Sunday he sits holding his guitar or electrified mandolin or "claw hammer" banjo on a flat-bed trailer inside a tent, surrounded by his group.

To his right is Darrell Fuhr of Redwood Falls on the "Dobro" or resonanic guitar. Darrell knows New Ulm well; he had a music store here for years. To Dick's left is the group's other new member and another 40-year musicmaker, Tim O'Connor of Renville, on the banjo. Behind and between Kimmel and O'Connor is the band's other veteran, Paul Horrisberger of Mankato, on the bass fiddle. He's been making music for 25 years.

Quickly, efficiently, the four reel off up-tempo renditions from many different musical areas: Stanley brothers pieces from the sound track of "Oh Brother, Where Art Thou" movie, then a piece made famous by country singer Jimmy Rodgers, followed by a Earl Scruggs and Lester Flatt banjo-flailing song.

It doesn't get any better than that.