The Village Market is where you will find artisans selling their arts, crafts and wares, and the Food Park, which features local nonprofit organizations teamed up with area restaurants to offer a variety of “grab and go” food items.
The Village Market is located at Lou Mac Park. The Food Park is just across the street, adjacent to the Labyrinth.

Village Market

Food Park

We knew her as Dottie, the soft-spoken but determined – some might say politely strong-minded – co-founder, chairwoman and director of the Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival. It may have been her 30 years teaching English to middle-schoolers in Bay Shore on New York’s Long Island that prepared her to run the sprawling, all-volunteer Ol’ Front Porch organization – and to run it well.

Dottie and her husband, Dick, both avid sailors, retired to Oriental in 1994. In 1998, they co-founded Harbor Sounds, a popular bluegrass gospel group whose mission was to raise money for charities. Over $350,000 has been raised by the group in its 22 years of performing. Dottie was lead singer and Dick continues to play guitar.

Dottie was involved in many local organizations, including HOPE Clinic, the Hospice Thrift Shop, the Garden Club, and the Oriental Dance Club (she loved to dance!). She was president of the Oriental Woman’s Club in 1999-2000.

Dottie in a frequent pose during the festival… coordinating on the phone. From left, Leslie Kellenberger, performer Brittany Jean, Dottie.

After her arthritis forced her to stop performing with Harbor Sounds, she and her longtime friend and neighbor, Leslie Kellenberger, began discussing ways to promote local musicians. Leslie had an idea. What if bands could play on the porches of homes and businesses around Oriental? It could be a way to revive the spirit of pick-up roots music played back in the day on the porch of Captain Billy and Lucille Truitt’s Ol’ Store.

The festival was born. That first year, 2014, it lasted just four hours with 13 bands playing on Broad and Hodges streets. A few hundred people attended, and all the musicians played for free. The festival has grown every year since, with 2021 featuring 26 bands on 12 porches and a riverfront stage. An estimated 3,000 people attended that year during a rainy October weekend.

In the beginning, Dottie talked to everyone she knew and asked them to help, eventually marshalling hundreds of volunteers over the years. She led the effort to form a nonprofit organization with a board of directors to manage the festival. The board sought grants from organizations like the North Carolina Arts Council to help pay the musicians in order to keep the festival free to the public. Fundraising grew to include selling collectible buttons, Dottie’s idea, and merchandise, and obtaining sponsorships from local businesses – all with the goal of improving the musical lineup and growing the festival each year while keeping it free.

Of course, Dottie didn’t do it all by herself. She knew how to “hire” and delegate, and like a good teacher, she always gave others the credit and praise. She also insisted every year after the festival that personalized thank you notes be sent to everyone who helped in any way.

In her obituary, it was said that her students back in Bay Shore had described her as “insightful, dedicated, challenging, and gracious.” For those of us who worked with Dottie, we were her students, too.

A final thought. As an English teacher from New York, Dottie did not adopt many ungrammatical Southern colloquialisms, but we’ll offer this one anyway:

You done good, Miss Dottie. You done good.

Admission to the Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival is free, but financial support is needed to help with all of the administrative, behind-the-scenes work that goes on to keep the Festival going and growing. For a $5 donation, or more, you can purchase a 2022 Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival Button.

Purchasing and wearing a button is a great way to show your support for the Festival and to help advertise it. And they are also a collector’s item – get one each year. Buttons are available at Inland Waterway Provision Co, Nautical Wheelers, Oriental Deli & Subs, New Village Brewery, Marsha’s Cottage, Yawl’s Cafe, Studio 55, Village Hardware, Oriental Village Veterinarian and Village Health & Fitness.


Another great way to support the Festival is to become a Festival Sponsor. To become a sponsor, print an application found under the Get Involved section of this website. Fill it out and mail it to: Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival, Donna Crothers, P.O. Box 775, Oriental, North Carolina 28571. The deadline is Sept. 1. Your sponsorship will be publicly recognized in the Festival Program.

The Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival is committed to ensuring accessibility for all. We are continually listening and learning from the disabled community in order to improve the festival experience for everyone, and striving to exceed accessibility standards.


In continually trying to make our event more accessible, we encourage you to contact us at info@olfrontporch.org for any accessibility-related needs. Additionally, if you have any questions about ADA policies or our services, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us.

The festival board has decided to give away 2020 festival buttons at businesses around town as a sign of hope that the virus will abate and the festival will go on this fall, as scheduled. These buttons are usually sold for $5 apiece as a way to raise funds to support the festival. Admission to the festival is free.





Wearing a button is a great way to show your support for the Festival and to help advertise it. And they are also a collector’s item – get one each year. Buttons are available at Inland Waterway Provision Co, Nautical Wheelers, Oriental Deli & Subs, New Village Brewery, Marsha’s Cottage, Yawl’s Cafe, Studio 55, Village Hardware, Oriental Village Veterinarian and Village Health & Fitness.


Another great way to support the Festival is to become a Festival Sponsor. To become a sponsor, print an application found under the Get Involved section of this website. Fill it out and mail it to: Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival, Donna Crothers, P.O. Box 775, Oriental, North Carolina 28571. The deadline is Sept. 1. Your sponsorship will be publicly recognized in the Festival Program.

Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival logo t-shirts and ball caps are now available. Shirts are $25, $30 for long sleeve. Ball caps are $15.

Get a festival decal/bumper sticker for just $2:



2022 OFPMF bumper stickers, buttons, t-shirts (short and long sleeve), and hats help fund the festival. Shirts, hats and bumper stickers are on sale during the festival at the Festival Command Center and Information Booth in the Village Market, South Avenue and Freemason.

You also may order logo merchandise by contacting Trish Mead at 252-675-9818, or trishmmead@gmail.com.

Admission to the Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival is free, but financial support is needed to help with all of the administrative, behind-the-scenes work that goes on to keep the Festival going and growing. For a $5 donation, or more, you can purchase a 2019 Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival Button designed by local artist Marguerite Garrett.

Purchasing and wearing a button is a great way to show your support for the Festival and to help advertise it. And they are also a collector’s item – get one each year. Buttons are on sale at Inland Waterway Provision Co, Nautical Wheelers, Oriental Deli & Subs, New Village Brewery, Marsha’s Cottage, Yawl’s Cafe, Studio 55, Village Hardware, Croakertown Coffee, Oriental Village Veterinarian, Wit’s End and Village Health & Fitness. You may also contact Ned and Ann Albee at 252-249-7249, or at nedalbee33@gmail.com. Buttons are $5.


Another great way to support the Festival is to become a Festival Sponsor. To become a sponsor, print an application found under the Get Involved section of this website. Fill it out and mail it to: Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival, Donna Crothers, P.O. Box 775, Oriental, North Carolina 28571. The deadline is Sept. 1. Your sponsorship will be publicly recognized in the Festival Program.

• 2023 Vendor Application – online form
• 2022 Vendor Application – downloadable form
  
  
• 2023 Sponsor Application – online form
• 2022 Sponsor Application – downloadable form
  
  
• 2022 Volunteer Application – online form
• 2022 Volunteer Application – downloadable form
  
  
• Performer Application
  The 2022 performers schedule & lineup is complete, however performers interested in future festivals are encouraged to fill out the Performer Application.

Frequently Asked Questions about the Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival

• live musical performers, story tellers, clowns performing at the annual Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival, free and open to all
• advertising and marketing to promote local musicians (and the Town of Oriental!) regionally and statewide
• a scholarship each year for a member of the Pamlico High School Marching and Symphonic Band to attend an out of state competition,
• musical groups to perform for free at special events like the 2017 Cycle North Carolina three-day Coastal Ride event, the 2016 grand opening of the local Piglet grocery store and its first anniversary in 2017
• musical groups to perform for free at the Oriental Rotary Club’s annual three day In-Water Boat Show

Our Board and volunteers work hard in the following three areas with specific emphasis on offering opportunities for seniors, for at-risk youth and our Hispanic neighbors:

1. Provide the region’s multi-cultural and racially diverse musical talent with encouragement, support, and venues to perform

2. Provide and promote these events to the local and regional public to
(a) come see and listen to live music
(b) learn about the region’s rich and diverse musical heritage, and
© bring economic benefit to local businesses and the broader area

3. Build and improve community relationships, bring our diverse neighborhoods together, lessen community tensions and prejudices, bridge cultural, racial and generational divides by engaging broad community support and volunteer opportunities
Are you a non-profit and is my donation tax deductible?

The Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival, Inc., is a nonprofit with tax-exempt status under Section 501©(3) of the United States Internal Revenue Code. With the IRS designation, contributions to the Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival are tax deductible to the extent allowed by law.

Donations can be made to OFPMF at PO Box 775, Oriental, NC 28571. Our Federal Employer Tax ID number 47-4931628.


What is your mission?
Our mission is to organize musical and educational events which provide performance venues for our region’s diverse range of musicians, while also fostering economic vitality in Pamlico County, and bringing people of different racial and cultural backgrounds, young and old, together to perform, affording both the audience and the performers the opportunity to learn about and appreciate their shared musical heritage.


What is the history of the Festival?
The Ol’ Front Porch Music Festival was founded 2014 by Dottie and Dick Osmun and Leslie Kellenberger. Its roots are in music played on the porches of Oriental, decades ago: