One of our favorite & most renowned Festival traditions.

The purpose of the homestay program is to give visiting performers a home away from home – a relaxed, comfortable setting in a part of our community. A secondary purpose is to offer local community members the opportunity to connect with artists and performers, sharing insights and building a fanbase, rooted in community.

Things to know about our Homestay program (for Artists & Hosts):

• Bands generally want to be housed together, in town, near their venues.
• Many groups come and go during the festival; it’s likely that one group will depart and another will need housing.
• In exchange for hosting performers, JFFA provides you with 1 or 2 full festival passes, depending on the extent of your involvement.

Basic logistics:

• Hosts provide beds for your guests. Sometimes performers are willing to sleep on air mattresses and/or in living rooms, but they have got to know up front what’s being offered – no surprises with sleeping!
• Hosts offer coffee and breakfast in the morning.  Dinner, lunches or extras (sightseeing tours, etc) are not required although some hosts do offer.
• Once we have needs and offers from both performers and hosts, it can take weeks to line up all placements.
• Once plans are finalized, our Homestay Coordinator sends an email to both performer and host. Then, hosts will need to communicate with their performers before the festival begins. The performers will need to know where you live, how to reach you, a basic plan for meeting up so you can give them the keys and tour, and generally have a sense of what to expect.

Homestay hosts who are virtually guaranteed placements:

• have housing in town or close by;
• have 2 or (preferably) more bedrooms to house multiple people;
• are available all four nights of the festival;
• will host more than one group on possibly consecutive nights.

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