Maha Fills Stinson Park With Music, People for Two-Night Return

On Friday and Saturday, July 29 and 30, the smell of wood-fired pizza and fresh gyros plumed into the air as people walked (and in some cases rollerbladed) through the crowd for the Maha Music Festival’s return to Stinson Park.

Car Seat Headrest made their Maha return Friday, sending beams of red, green and blue light over the crowd. Frontman Will Toledo sang into a gas mask with bunny ears pinned to the back as LED lights flashed over his eyes.

The day also included local acts Las Cruxes and Bad Self Portraits. Bad Self Portraits guitarist Cole Kempcke said the experience of didn’t feel real. This was the band’s first Maha, performing songs from the band’s new EP, titled “Fear of Missing Out,” that had dropped earlier that day.

Olli Wells, a 16-year-old Omaha Burke student, also got to share the Union Pacific main stage. She performed with her band through Omaha Girls Rock, a nonprofit and summer camp that encourages girls to form bands, write songs and build friendships along the way. This year Wells played guitar with Reflections, singing a three-act song that begins with a character coming to terms with societal expectations, questioning those limitations and then finally — following a thunderous building of tom and snare — accepting themselves for who they are.

“It’s always really good to see exactly where she came from and where she’s at right now,” her dad Chris Wells said. “She’s just fearless.”

Space Cats, another Omaha Girls Rock band that played the Union Pacific main stage, sang about a rat and cat who form an interstellar friendship. The set ended with Wells helping lead the crowd, many of them Omaha Girls Rock alumni, in singing the camp theme song.

“This is just such a unique organization,” said Wells’ mom Don. “It’s indispensable for girls or for anyone to have…this completely different opportunity.”

Saturday featured a wide range of music, from local acts like The Real Zebos and Dominique Morgan to Australian indie band Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever and pop-punk auteurs PUP. Sudan Archives set briefly halted due to technical difficulties on the Tito’s stage, but Brittney Parks kept the music going, ditching her full gear to sing over looped violin tracks. After the tech issues resolved, Parks ended the set with her and her producer’s full setup to applause from the crowd.

“That was the most punk rock shit I ever did,” she yelled, wearing a sequin silver bikini and skirt.

Princess Noika walked onstage as the sun set on Stinson Park with a Kirby backpack attached to a star wand, the pink Nintendo character’s item of choice. Following a brief DJ set of songs like “We Like to Party! (the vengabus)” by Vengaboys, Princess Noika sprayed down the dancing crowd before launching into bass-heavy raps.

Beach House’s Victoria Legrand and Alex Scally rounded out the festival, flipping between reverb-soaked synth swells and anthemic melodies that thundered through Stinson Park. The audience swayed their arms as the lights switched from minimalist purple backdrops to flashing strobes and billowing smoke that created silhouettes of the band, as well as longtime live drummer James Barone, while they played songs like “Myth” and “Lemon Glow.”

While music was the main attraction at Maha, many Omahans gravitated toward activities on the outskirts of the festival.

Ziggy Quinn, a local performance artist and inclusionary chair for Benson arts organization BFF Omaha, shepherded kids and adults through the group’s ’90s themed art gallery inside a multi-colored trailer near the festival’s front entrance. 

It was her job to make sure that everybody can access and experience art. At Maha, that means creating a space for all ages to enjoy. 

“We try to bring in some type of nostalgia or something that multiple generations can glob on to,” Quinn said.

Following the tune of ’90s nostalgia for all ages, BFF staff dressed as “troll dolls” and walked throughout the Maha festival grounds, waiting for people on scavenger hunts to find them, collect a gem and claim a Fanny pack, hat or other BFF gear as a prize.

Near the midpoint of the festival grounds, some Maha attendees sat back on sun-soaked quilts, weaving fabric, yarn and other materials. Amy Rummel said the idea behind the circle weaving follows the Joslyn Art Museum’s longtime interest in providing communal art projects for festival-goers. In the past Rummel said the Joslyn has had people create webs of connections between shared mental health challenges as well as zip tying colorful cardboard squares together to make 3D sculptures. This year felt a little more important to connect with Maha-goers as the Joslyn is under construction and won’t reopen until 2024.

“This is one of our ways to stay connected with the community,” Rummel said. “We have programs happening at our wonderful and generous partners all around town that allow us to continue to offer some of the programming that people have really come to love.”

Erin Higgins sat close by weaving a thick ball of lilac purple yarn through a circular loom. It’s the first time she’s really felt comfortable back at Maha since the pandemic, and it’s nice to feel less anxious moving through the crowd as well as sitting down and trying a new way of weaving.

“I have never seen a circle like this before,” Higgins said. “But now I kind of want to try to make a rug using one.”

As the synths faded into the cool Saturday night air and the crowds made their way out of Aksarben, many festival-goers already had next summer’s Maha festival on their minds.

“My favorite part is really all of it,” Laurie Zagursky said of her first Maha experience. “It’s just really fun to see all the diversity and enjoy the fun atmosphere. I was also surprised by just how many families are here, it really is a family friendly event which is so fantastic… Oh I totally plan [on returning]…this is just such a fun time.”

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