Vermont Cultural Pursuits

Vermont festivals include the Vermont Maple Festival, Festival on the Green [4], the Enosburg Falls Dairy Festival, the Apple Festival (held each Columbus Day Weekend), the Marlboro Music Festival, and the Vermont Mozart Festival. The Vermont Symphony Orchestra is supported by the state and performs throughout the area. The Poetry Society of Vermont publishes a literary magazine called The Green Mountain Troubadore which encourages submissions from members of various ages. Every year they hold various contests - one being for high school age young people. The Brattleboro-based Vermont Theatre Company presents an annual summer Shakespeare festival. Brattleboro also hosts the summertime Strolling of the Heifers parade which celebrates Vermont's unique dairy culture. Montpelier is home to the annual Green Mountain Film Festival. In the Northeast Kingdom, The Bread and Puppet Theatre holds weekly shows in Glover in a natural outdoor amphitheater.

One of Vermont's best known musical exports was the group Phish, whose members met while attending school in Vermont. The state had always held great importance for Phish—for example, lead singer and guitarist Trey Anastasio built a studio in Vermont used by the band and others, called The Barn. Phish ended their tenure together as a band with a farewell concert weekend in the state's Northeast Kingdom, which was dubbed "Coventry" after (in part) the venue city of Coventry, Vermont, on August 16, 2004.