Frog Island Swamped; '95 In Doubt

Frog Island swamped;

'95 in doubt

By DAVID HOROWITZ

NEWS SPECIAL WRITER

YPSILANTI - One of the area’s spring and summer traditions may have had its last day in the sun.

Or more to the point, its last day in the rain. It’s possible last June’s Ypsilanti-based Frog Island Music Festival was the final one.

“As of this moment, according to a board (of directors) vote six months ago, there will be no Frog Island Festival next year,” said Daivid Siglin, director of The Ark coffeehouse and producer of the festival in recent years. “The board voted that if the festival didn’t make money this year, after several years of losses and bad weather, there would be no festival next year.”

The Ark owns the rights to Frog Island, and has been responsible since the late ’80s for the operation of the three-day roots music festival, which started 15 years ago. “It comes down to a question of finances,” Siglin said. “Some years we may have lost only a couple of hundred dollars, but it was still a loss.

“Putting the festival together is also very time-consuming, and because of the time it takes, we can’t book the Ark either the week before or after. And that’s a loss of $10,000, which we can ill afford.”

Siglin also noted that the festival seems jinxed by the weather. Even this year, when it was scheduled in late June to enable better weather conditions, the festival’s jinx hit again: It rained every day.

“We had some decent crowds, but not enough to break even,” Siglin said. “If the weather had been better, there’s no question we would have drawn a lot more people.”

Siglin discussed several options other than outright cancellation for the festival’s future. It could be sold to another party, relieving the Ark of its financial and operational responsibilities. “Another option would be for another party to buy the festival, and hire the Ark to produce it,” he said.

Siglin also is hunting for a major corporate sponsor for Frog Island. "We have several co-sponsors, but I we’d like to find one who could help out to the point where the weather wouldn’t matter.”

If none of the alternatives work out, The Ark’s board still could elect to operate the festival for another year. “In order for Frog Island to come back, the Board will have to take another look at it and re-vote. This may happen in the fall,” Siglin said.