When I got the last-minute invitation to attend this year’s Maha Festival in Omaha, Nebraska, one of my first thoughts was, “There’s a music festival in Nebraska?” The short and simple answer is “yes.” The better answer is “… and it’s awesome!”
Omaha loves music just as much as it loves its Reubens. It’s no surprise that Lizzo shone a light on the city during her recent tour appearance or that Tracy Morgan found himself inspired in the Omaha airport recently and broke out singing while waiting for his flight. So while immediate visions of cornfields swirled in my head, I was beyond hyped to be greeted with a buzzing city full of Midwest flare that was definitely ready to get down.
PART I — The Festival Grounds
Maha has called Omaha’s Aksarben Village home since 2011. The name was bizarre to me until I realized it’s literally “Nebraska” spelled backward. Flagged by a tall LOTR-inspired tower, the park is everything you’d think it to be in a major Midwest city. Beautifully landscaped grass welcomed the 12,000 attendees, an interior patch of trees shaded the park’s edge, and it was adjacent to plenty of local restaurants and businesses.
On the first day, the festival was a ripe 100 degrees with 90% humidity. I was sweating in places I didn’t know could sweat. That was unusual for Omaha (or so I was told) and the second day was mellower. I was greeted by a beautiful 80-degree summer day and a light breeze.
Aside from the two adjacent stages, attendees milled in an open-air space that featured a cooling, air-conditioned pop-up comedy and poetry tent, a Community Village featuring 19 nonprofit-led activities, and the NFM silent disco dancefloor, which kept hundreds of people dancing well into the late night after the stages closed.
PART II — The Music
As someone who regularly tours the electronic and jam band scenes, Maha Festival was a whole different scene for me. Did you know Omaha is home to one of the biggest hot spots for indie and hardcore? Neither did I. But it totally checks out considering Saddle Creek Records was founded here, bringing up notable national bands Bright Eyes, Spoon, Tokyo Police Club, Big Thief, and more.
Friday and Saturday each offered up their palette of sonic flavors, full of tasting nods to alternative, hardcore, and folk. After a heavy (and much-needed) rainstorm on Friday afternoon, the evening was filled with a horizon dusk-setting performance by Alvvays, who made attendees swoon with alternative dream pop renditions.
It was the closing night’s performance by Turnstile though that really shook things up. I’m not one to call a band “cool,” but that’s exactly what they were. Strolling onstage, the whispering indie tones of Alvvays were soon blown away by Turnstile frontman Brendan Yates’ infectious hardcore energy. Meg Mills – the group’s newest touring member – went into a full-fledged hair-flipping rock out throughout the whole set, shredding in what literally looked like Princess Peach’s best dress. It seemed as if the whole city came together to rage during this set. It was awesome.
Saturday was a whole different ball game. With the weather boasting a milder day, the festival was decorated with cheeky attendees ready for a full day of programming. Omaha Girls Rock made their annual mark on the Union Pacific Stage mid-afternoon, granting the opportunity to female city-bred youth to play the stage. The day continued to be decorated with a breezy and light concoction mixed with the heavenly vocals by Say She She, guitar ballads by Black Belt Eagle Scout, alternative anthems by Peach Pit, and the soothing, twangy folk closing performance by Big Thief.
PART III — Nebraska’s Greenest Event
With half a million people living in the city of Omaha and an attendance of 12,000 people throughout the weekend, Maha Festival maintained its Zero Waste designation – an accolade the event officially achieved in 2022. By Zero Waste International Alliance (ZWIA) standards, “zero waste” occurs when 90% or more of waste has been diverted from a landfill or incinerator via responsible composting or recycling. A counted 2,543 pounds of waste generated on-site — 94% of the total figure of 2,688 — was diverted from a landfill.
Attendees utilized 15 Zero Waste Stations throughout the park to separate their food scraps for composting, recycle their drink cans, and generally limit items going into the landfill bin. Even excess materials were reduced, with all beverage and food vendors using standardized compostable or recyclable service ware onsite and the free use of reusable water bottles stations that translated to over 9,600 plastic water bottles being saved from landfill, making Maha Festival the greenest event recorded in the state of Nebraska.
“Sustainability is all about innovating and making continuous improvements,” Maha Festival Co-Director Rachel Grace said. “It’s great to know that together we are capable of diverting 94% of waste and leaving only two standard trash bins after a weekend-long festival. We’re inspired by those results and look forward to maintaining this initiative and exploring new areas of sustainability in the future.”
PART IV — Where To Stay
While most of my festival attendance has seen me sleeping in tents and hammocks, Maha Festival takes place right in the city of Omaha. Because of this, I traded my sweat-fueled camping attire for a more primed and proper stay at the city’s newest hotel, The Farnam.
Walking in, I was invited into a warm and upscale aesthetic as soon as I stepped foot into this place. The hotel is in a prime location within the Old Market District and is close to a lot of the city’s favorite restaurants, bars, and a short drive to Aksarben Village.
Ever since my trip to Spain, I’ve had somewhat high standards when it comes to hotel rooms. I was pleasantly surprised by the room I stayed in. While I wasn’t lucky enough to secure one with a view of the city, the mood within the space exuded high-end finishes with a blend of Nebraska’s Midwest charm and industrial details. The bathroom was probably the best part of the whole room, with the walk-in shower big enough to fit a whole group (if that’s your thing). I enjoyed the big space for myself, including the raindrop shower head.
Aside from the room itself, the hotel’s Dynamite Woodfire Grill was an exceptional place to fuel up for the day ahead of the festival. The interactive menu was helpful to see exact photos of what you’d be ordering, which helped make my decisions pretty simple:
- Hot Tea: I’m a tea drinker through and through. Usually, when I order tea I’ll be lucky enough to be asked what kind I want or given a small selection to choose from. Not here. The server came over with a beautiful display of teas all within a wooden box that tickled my fancy for the morning. The heaping serving of honey was perfect as well.
- Avocado Toast: You’ll never get avocado toast the same way anywhere you go. Because of this, most places like to jack up the price (this is why we apparently can’t buy a house). While this was expensive, it did fill me up for most of the day. I loved the toppings of radish, grape tomatoes, goat cheese, and cilantro with poached eggs on top.
- Bagel & Lox: If I see Lox on any breakfast menu, I usually get it. This came as a whole smorgasbord to put together yourself, which I appreciated since there’s a fine line of how much cream cheese you can use before you hit a saturation level. The capers were insane. Perfectly air-fried and crispy, I asked for a separate side of them to munch on like a bag of chips.
- Buttermilk Pancakes: My sweet tooth kicked in on this one and I shamelessly ordered them with bananas and chocolate chips. The bananas were cooked into the pancakes with the chocolate chips spread on top, which I thought should’ve been the other way around. Either way, I couldn’t even finish them because they were so huge and rich.
To book a room at The Farnham, click here.
PART V — What To Do Within A 10-Minute Uber Of The Event
With the festival not opening its gates until the early afternoon, there was plenty of time to do some sightseeing and food tastings around the city.
Just three blocks from The Farnam is Block 16, a delicious garden-to-table restaurant that stands for all things Omaha. Each dish is prepared with local, humanely raised, and preservative-free ingredients, something that makes my mouth water just by hearing those words. Make sure to get the Crab Rangoon fries – they were perfectly crispy with a perfect topping of the sweetened Asian creamy sauce.
From there, take a short drive and park at the National Park Service Midwest Region building and be in two places at once on the Bob Kerrey Pedestrian Bridge. The 3,000-foot-long bridge is suspended in the air by mere cables and connects Iowa and Nebraska over the Missouri River. It’s a somewhat cheesy tourist attraction, but who doesn’t want to snap a photo of being in two states at once?
Round out your day at Coneflower Creamery in the Blackstone neighborhood. You’ll most likely encounter a line out the door when you arrive, but make sure you wait it out as it’s the number one ice cream shop on Yelp’s list of 100 best ice cream shops in the country. The ice cream uses local ingredients and handcrafts its cones and sprinkles. Yes, even the sprinkles. You’ll find the classic flavors of vanilla bean, cookies and cream, and dark chocolate, but it’s the signature flavors of Tart Cherry Crumble, Grandma Millie’s Lemon Bar, and Blackstone Butter Brickle that had me swooning.
Maha Festival has already announced its move to Omaha’s renovated Heartland of America Park at The RiverFront for next year’s 16th gathering. The festival’s new home, which will have large green lawn space and ample room for Maha to expand to three music stages, twice as many Community Village booths, and thousands of additional guests, is scheduled to open later this month. It’s looking to be lit and definitely has me eager to get back to Nebraska.
For more information on Maha Festival, the plans for 2024, and future years at the new Heartland of America Park at the Riverfront and more, visit Maha’s website.