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Date: 8/1/2023
HOLYOKE — Fiestas Patronales de Holyoke is returning for its second iteration and is gearing up for a bigger and better celebration.
The four-day celebration from Aug. 3-6 at Heritage State Park will highlight a portion of the rich and cultural diversity that makes up the city of Holyoke. This year, Fiestas Patronales of Holyoke is part of the yearlong celebration commemorating the 150th anniversary of the city of Holyoke.
The first two event days will begin at 5 p.m. while Saturday and Sunday will start at 1 p.m. Each day goes until 9 or 10 p.m.
Main organizer of the event Nueva Esperanza shared that last year’s Fiestas Patronales brought in over 20,000 people to Holyoke over the weekend. Nueva Esperanza has much pride behind the event as it has been touted as the largest Latino event in Western Massachusetts.
Holyoke’s Hispanic residents make up a majority of the city’s population and last year’s event was focused on the city’s diverse identity and also celebrated Mayor Joshua Garcia for being the city’s first Puerto Rican mayor.
Fiestas Patronales is celebrated in different Hispanic and Latino municipalities over the world and are festivals put on in honor of the town’s patron saint. The way people celebrate changes based on where the festival is, which is why Holyoke’s Fiestas Patronales is focused on the city’s rich cultural diversity.
Festival Committee member Melvin Sanchez told Reminder Publishing the biggest lesson learned from last year’s event was that so many people were interested in a celebration like this.
“We weren’t expecting such a huge crowd over those four days, and we miscalculated with the amount of food vendors that we had,” Sanchez said. “It was a blessing and a curse, the curse was people were waiting an hour to get food, but the blessing was the other downtown restaurants there had huge success because of the overflow.”
This year Sanchez says they have 18 total food vendors set up for the four days, 10 more than last year, so there should be no issue where festival goers have to leave the area for food. He also added that there is more variety of options outside of the given Hispanic food for the event this year and was happy to share many of the vendors are local restaurants.
Sanchez said they expect a few thousand more people to make their way through the Holyoke event over the four days as an increase from last year. He said buzz on social media has him believing there is more interest, and this event is quickly becoming a tradition for families and those in the area to enjoy music, food and a nice afternoon or night in the park.
Local and international talent will perform on stage throughout the four days as well, giving different options to people every day for their interests. Starting the festival off on Thursday Aug. 3 is what the committee is calling “Worship at the Park” as the religious component of the festival.
That night starting at 5 p.m. there will be four different performances by four different performers or groups each hour until the night ends at 9 p.m. On Friday night, performances at 7 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. will be headlined by George Lamond and band Optimo, respectively.
Saturday, Aug. 5 has an afternoon full of sets featuring local artists before headliners Alex “El Bizcochito” at 7 p.m. and Michael Stuart at 8:30 p.m. Sunday features a similar structure of afternoon performances and closing out the weekend are headliners SBM at 5 p.m., Banda Algarete at 6:30 p.m. and Manny Manuel at 8 p.m.
“For the response that we got last year it was phenomenal. With the lessons that we learned, we strategically did things differently this year, so that we have the opportunity to gradually increase the audience,” Sanchez said.
Sanchez added that featuring local bands and artists was important for the committee as it gives an opportunity to showcase local talent and give them the opportunity of networking and potentially finding future work with the talent that is coming to Holyoke from out of the area.
According to Sanchez it was important the committee do its best to reflect all the different cultures that make up Holyoke through Fiestas Patronales.
“There’s a lot of Latin countries that do Fiestas Patronales and the difference is we want to describe the Fiestas Patronales of Holyoke. This is specific to Holyoke. We take out some of the traditions or some of the cultural aspects that other countries do, but because Holyoke is so unique in the aspect of the diversity of the Latin community that’s here, whether your Columbian, or Dominican, or Mexican, or Peruvian, or South American, it’s not only Puerto Ricans. So, for us, that’s a reflection of the music that we’re bringing. It was important that we recognize that, and we want to demonstrate that with not only our music selection or vendors that come in, but to be inclusive of all these different Latin nationalities that live in our area now,” Sanchez said.
Sanchez said Fiestas Patronales will still be accepting sponsors through four different opportunities up and through the weekend festival. If interested in sponsoring visit https://nuevaofholyoke.org/fiestaspatronales/.
Sanchez also took time to thank Nueva Esperanza and Executive Director Kayla Rodriguez for their help as fiscal sponsor of the event and said the event was not possible without the group.