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The Asparagus Festival, Live!

We did a whole show live from the stage at the NEPM Asparagus Festival in Hadley!

Since this is our first time trying something like this, we figure we'd pull out all the stops and have a show just jam packed with guests. So that's exactly what we do.

For something as iconic to Hadley as asparagus, we need to bring along someone who's been immersed in the crop for ages. So we bring in Wally Czajkowski of Plainville Farm, who not only has been growing Hadley grass for decades, but has the most delightful way of saying it as well.

We have Ashley Randle of the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resourses, Scott Soares of the USDA, andRep. Jim McGovern join us to chat about the state of not just asparagus, but farming in western Massachusetts in general, especially in the fall out of a series of terrible weather events.

We have a Tina Turner Memorial Wine Thunderdome with Michelle Kersbergen of Black Birch Vineyards, and a beer tasting with Jeff Goulet of Loophole Brewing, who gets to share more about the brewery's upcoming move to Springfield.

And Latin Grammy Award winning local artist Mr. G regales us alongside the Global Citizen Ensemble.

It's a wicked good time.

Christopher “Monte'' Belmonte is host and executive producer of NEPM's The Fabulous 413. He was born and raised in Massachusetts and has been a radio host in western Massachusetts for the last 20 years — the last 17 of them as host of Mornings with Monte on The River 93.9/WRSI.
Kaliis Smith is a radio host and producer for NEPM's The Fabulous 413. She was most recently host and producer at The River 93.9/WRSI where she appeared on Mornings with Monte for the Nerdwatch segment and hosted weekday evenings.