‘A little pocket of joy’: regional music festivals get creative – and rope in the CWA – to survive

Kate Berry is the founder of OK Motels, a contemporary music festival company founded in 2018 to celebrate some of the state’s lesser-known rural destinations. Photograph: Penny Stephens/The Guardian

Last month, a music festival arrived in the flood-ravaged northern Victorian town of Rochester, via steam train.

It was the second iteration of the Sound Tracks initiative, a three-day music festival run by Geelong-based music festival organiser Kate Berry and Shaun Adams, which used the vintage locomotive to tour flood-affected towns. In April, it headed from Melbourne to Echuca and back down to Rochester, which is still recovering from the 2022 floods.