Yahoo News Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp, Neil Young and More to Headline Farm Aid 2023 as It Returns to Indiana
Dave Matthews and Margo Price are also set to headline the annual music and food festival, which will take place on Sept. 23
Lester Cohen/WireImage, Jim Spellman/WireImage, Chelsea Lauren/WireImage
Willie Nelson; John Mellencamp; Neil YoungFarm Aid is back for another year of fundraising for family farmers.
Willie Nelson, John Mellencamp, Neil Young, Dave Matthews and Margo Price are all set to headline Farm Aid 2023, which will take place on Sept. 23 at Ruoff Music Center in Noblesville, Indiana.
The annual music and food festival will also feature performances from Bobby Weir & Wolf Bros featuring The Wolfpack, Nathaniel Rateliff and The Night Sweats, Lukas Nelson, Allison Russell, The String Cheese Incident and Particle Kid.
"Family farmers have the solutions to some of our toughest challenges," Nelson, Farm Aid president and founder, said in a statement. "As we face a changing climate, farmers in Indiana, across the Midwest and all over the country are farming in ways that create more resilient farms to build healthy soils and protect our water."
The first Farm Aid concert was organized by Nelson, Mellencamp and Young in 1985, with a mission of helping small family farmers thrive. Since then, the organization has raised more than $70 million. Matthews joined the Board of Directors in 2001, and Price came on board in 2021.
This year will mark the third Farm Aid in Indiana, Mellencamp's home state and the country's eighth-largest farming state. The Hoosier State has been experiencing the effects of climate change in recent years, and has the most polluted rivers and streams of any state thanks in part to manure run-off from large-scale concentrated animal feeding operations, according to a press release.
The "Jack and Diane" singer opened up about his work with Farm Aid in an interview with PEOPLE last year, and expressed disdain for large farming corporations filling grocery store shelves with “s---.”
"It's nice to give back, there's nothing like it. But the reason I got involved in it was because the government does not care about the small family farmer, nor do they care about me or you. There's a big club, and you and I aren't in it," he said. "Farm Aid is really good at helping the small farmer, but all the laws and regulations and embargoes are not for the small American farmer, they're for corporate America, they're for corporate farmers. And corporate farming, they don’t give a f---. They're putting chemicals in our food, hormones on chickens, you name it."
In a statement that accompanied the festival announcement, Mellencamp said he was "honored and excited" for Farm Aid to return to Indiana.
"My home state holds deep meaning for me and for the generations of family farmers who have dedicated their lives to caring for the Earth and bringing us good food," he said.
Tickets will range from $75 to $315, and will be available for purchase at LiveNation.com on July 15 at 10 a.m. ET.
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Read the original article on People.
