The Resilient Farmer Fund Concert: A Benefit Concert for Appalachia's Forgotten Farmers

The Resilient Farmer Fund benefit concert at the Paramount Theatre almost didn't happen. A city sewage malfunction threatened to shut down the venue before the first note could sound, before the first dollar could be raised for the farmers still digging sand out of fields that Hurricane Helene had rendered useless. 

But the crowd—attendees, musicians, organizers, farmers, and sponsors alike—made a pact: hold it or use the restrooms elsewhere, but keep the doors open and let the music play. The show would go on. 

It was a small moment of collective problem-solving, the kind that gets overlooked in disaster narratives obsessed with federal failures and bureaucratic betrayals. But it was also a microcosm of the evening itself: a community facing an obstacle, deciding what was needed, then figuring out how to make it happen together. 

By the time the final act left the stage, the concert had raised $75,000—halfway to the $150,000 goal designed to help farming families rebuild land that insurance companies refuse to cover. More importantly, it had created a space where the exhausted and the hopeful could gather, where the crisis could be named without shame, and where the recovery could be reimagined as something more than charity: as solidarity. 

The Ground Beneath Their Feet 

To understand why several hundred people packed into the Paramount on a warm evening in late 2025, you have to understand what Hurricane Helene did to the soil itself. 

When the storm stalled over the Southern Appalachians in September 2024, it unleashed a hydrological catastrophe. The Nolichucky River, swollen to twice the volume of Niagara Falls, scoured valley floors and deposited massive dunes of sterile sand across 1,300 farm parcels. Some fields were buried under three to six feet of sand that holds no moisture and retains no nutrients. Others were smothered in silt that hardened into what farmers call "crust-like concrete." 

The cost to remediate this land—to strip the sand, break the silt, and import organic matter to rebuild topsoil—runs into the tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars per farm. And crucially, devastatingly, insurance doesn't cover it. 

"There's that phrase, if you have farmland, that you're 'cash poor but land rich,'" Emily Bidgood, Strategic Partnerships Director for Appalachian Resource Conservation & Development Council (ARC&D) and the evening's organizer, told community leaders earlier this year. "And this year, for a lot of farms, it's more like land poor and cash poor." 

The University of Tennessee Knoxville estimated $1.35 billion in agricultural losses across the state, with timber damage alone exceeding $59.9 million. But those numbers don't capture the existential threat: that aging farmers, many in their 60s, are doing the math on rebuilding and deciding to sell instead. The sandy soil that can't grow corn can still support concrete foundations. The cultural landscape of East Tennessee could be permanently redrawn, turning working farms into subdivisions for remote workers fleeing coastal cities. 

The concert at the Paramount wasn't just about raising money. It was about buying time—time to prove that these farms could be saved, that the land could heal, that the community was worth the fight. 

A Stage Set for Survival 

The Paramount Theatre, Bristol's historic jewel on State Street, offered the kind of setting that elevated the evening beyond a typical benefit show. A delicious spread of food greeted arrivals, while beer and wine flowed freely—lubrication, perhaps, for generosity. 

But the real draw was the lineup: five acts spanning the breadth of Appalachian and American roots music, each bringing their own energy to the existential question hanging in the air: What do we owe each other when the ground gives way? 

The evening opened with three singer-songwriter contest winners—college kids whose names (Jeff Benedict, Camden Benoit, and Alaina Majkrzak) may not have been familiar, but whose songs carried a depth that belied their years. They effectively set a tone for the evening of pleasant surprises and seriousness laced with hope. 

Then came Linda Lay and Wayne Henderson, prominent figures in the Appalachian bluegrass world. Lay, a respected vocalist and bassist, and Henderson, a world-renowned luthier and award-winning guitarist, brought the weight of tradition—a reminder that the music and the land have always been inseparable in these mountains. At the end of their set, Emily Bidgood and her husband joined them onstage in an impressive fiddling display, the organizer herself stepping into the music she'd worked so hard to make possible. 

Scott Miller, the American Southern rock and alternative country artist known for narrative-driven lyrics and rural imagery, continued the momentum, rocking the house with songs that felt like dispatches from the exact lives being lived in the flood zone. 

But the pinnacle—the moment that seemed to rewire the room—came when Paper Wings took the stage. 

The duo delivered harmonies that one attendee described as "hauntingly beautiful," weaving ethereal verses with pensive, expressive delivery that felt both mournful and hopeful. They captivated the audience with a precision that prompted audible "Wow"s after particularly perplexing harmonic passages.

"It was particularly meaningful for us to be a part of this event as we grew up in small rural communities and have a deep respect for people who tend to the land," the band later explained while sewing their own merch at the table in the lobby. “A lot of our songs are inspired by the natural world and our relationship to it, and no one understands this more intimately than a farmer." 

It was that synthesis—art meeting agriculture, beauty meeting crisis—that seemed to define the evening. The music wasn't just entertainment or a distraction. It was a translation of what the farmers themselves couldn't always articulate: the grief of watching land die and the stubborn hope of trying to bring it back. 

The night's headliner, Cruz Contreras and the Black Lillies, closed out the live performances with an electric alt-rock/alt-country sound that felt like a Saturday night despite the somber occasion. The lead guitar work was wild, genuinely impressive in its raucousness, the kind of playing that shakes loose whatever you're holding onto, whether it's grief or a tight wallet. 

After the music ended, a short film screened that documented the organization's efforts on the ground, a visual reminder of why everyone had gathered, what the dollars would accomplish, and how much work remained. 

The Sponsors Who Stepped Up 

Major support came from Equinox Environmental, whose employees filled the theater with palpable energy and enthusiasm. Their presence underscored a broader theme: this wasn't a room full of donors looking for tax write-offs. These were people who genuinely cared about the farmers, who understood that the recovery of the land was also the recovery of the community. The phenomenal music was a happy byproduct. 

The ARC&D, which has been coordinating the Resilient Farmer Fund since the immediate aftermath of Helene, designed the initiative to fill the gaps that federal and state aid refused to touch. While FEMA Individual Assistance came with high denial rates due to "deferred maintenance" classifications and Tennessee's HEAL program offered only debt-burdening loans to counties, the Resilient Farmer Fund provided flexible grants—money that could be used for fences, seed, or equipment without the red tape that often strangles emergency relief. 

The fund's model is explicitly grassroots: families with the same last name have submitted multiple applications to pool resources for shared equipment, maximizing the impact of limited dollars. It's survival through collaboration, the kind of innovation that desperation demands. 

The Weight of What Remains 

Over the course of the evening, an air of hope mixed with something heavier: the awareness that this was not a victory lap. The organizers and attendees seemed hyper-aware that there was still so much work to do. 

The "Roots and Reins" anniversary event in Cocke County in September provided meals to over 1,000 attendees, one year after the storm, revealing that food insecurity remains a pressing reality. At that gathering, organizers identified families who had fallen through the cracks of federal aid, including one family that had lost their entire farm and had been trying to make it on their own. 

The reluctance to ask for help is baked into Appalachian identity.

"Residents of Cocke County are fiercely independent people, as a rule," LaTisha Raulston-Sloderbeck, volunteer coordinator for the Cocke County Long Term Recovery Group, said.

The Paramount concert was designed to bypass that barrier. By framing the evening as a celebration of music and community rather than a plea for charity, the organizers created a space where farmers could show up without shame, where asking for help felt less like failure and more like solidarity. 

Emily announced this round of fundraising had netted $75,000 so far—halfway to the $150,000 goal. But the real metric of success was harder to quantify: the connections made, the stories shared, the sense that the struggle was collective rather than isolating. 

The Recovery That Never Ends 

More than a year after Hurricane Helene, the television crews have packed up, and the national donation portals have cycled on to the next catastrophe. However, along the banks of the Nolichucky, the disaster remains a daily reality. 

Less than 1% of residents in hard-hit mountain counties had flood insurance because outdated FEMA maps vastly underestimated inland flood risk. Standard homeowner policies excluded the water damage that defined Helene's destruction, leaving tens of thousands of claims denied. The collapse of the Sgt. Elbert Kinser Bridge and the Taylor Bridge severed economic lifelines for months, turning fifteen-minute supply runs into ninety-minute odysseys. 

The window for effective intervention is closing—disaster recovery experts note that fundraising saliency typically lasts only one year. As the region moves past that anniversary, the flow of external dollars is drying up just as the most difficult work—soil reconstruction and long-term housing repair—begins. 

The Paramount concert was an attempt to keep the momentum alive, to push back against the narrative that recovery has a deadline. Because for the farmers still staring at sandy fields, for the families still living in campers next to the skeletons of their homes, the recovery has only just begun. 

What the Music Made Possible 

By the time the last notes faded and the crowd filtered out onto State Street, something had shifted. The money raised would support families like the ones the ARC&D has already assisted with 35 farms and counting, each grant a lifeline that insurance and government programs refused to throw. 

"We really have to do all we can to show our local farms our support, even if the dollars are a drop in the bucket," Bidgood said. "The Paramount evening proved that the community understood the assignment."

The organizers are continuing to accept donations through arcd.org/farmerfund, knowing that every dollar represents time—time to remediate land, time to plant again, time to hold onto what would otherwise be lost to developers or despair. 

In Appalachia, the recovery is not a past-tense event. It is a daily labor of moving sand, rebuilding trust, and trying to coax the land into being a home once again. The concert at the Paramount didn't solve that crisis. But it proved that the community refuses to let the farmers face it alone. And in a region where silence is often the default response to trauma, that might be the most powerful outcome of all: the sound of people collectively refusing to be quiet and refusing to give up. 

How You Can Help 

The recovery in Appalachia is entering its long-haul phase. While the cameras have left, the need for resources has shifted from emergency triage to long-term reconstruction. For those moved by the Paramount's message of solidarity, here are some ways to turn empathy into action. 

Direct Support for Farmers 

The most immediate way to help the agricultural sector is through the Resilient Farmer Fund. Contributions directly support replacing fencing, replanting forage and soil testing for farmers who were denied federal aid. Donors can allocate 100% of their contribution to the farmers themselves through arcd.networkforgood.com or arcd.org/farmerfund. 

But dollars alone won't solve the "land poor" crisis—where farmers own acreage they can't afford to remediate. Policy changes are needed to ensure that land reclamation is covered by insurance.  

Awareness is currency: sharing stories and supporting organizations like the Appalachian Resource Conservation & Development Council that are lobbying for systemic reform can amplify pressure on insurers and lawmakers. 

Volunteer Your Time 

Recovery groups are now seeking skilled labor and long-term commitments rather than just debris hauling. Volunteer United serves as the primary portal for Northeast Tennessee, listing opportunities ranging from hardwood floor installation to general support for county-specific long recovery groups. 

The Tennessee Stream Team is actively seeking volunteers to help replant trees on damaged riverbanks to stabilize the watershed and prevent future erosion. The Appalachia Service Project is managing home rebuilds in Cocke and Washington counties and needs volunteers for construction and repair work. 

Support Community and Mental Health 

The psychological toll of the disaster is rising as the initial adrenaline of survival gives way to the grinding reality of rebuilding and subsistence. The McNabb Center is providing critical crisis counseling and substance use support in the affected regions, funding programs like the Elevate Recovery High School and general indigent care. 

The East Tennessee Foundation has established the Neighbor to Neighbor Disaster Relief Fund, which issues grants to local nonprofits and Long Term Recovery Groups in Carter, Cocke, Greene, Johnson, Unicoi, and Washington counties. 

Strengthen the Local Economy 

As farmers return to market, purchasing directly from area farmers' markets provides the immediate cash flow needed to bridge the gap between harvest and insurance payouts. Support for small businesses matters too: the United Way of East Tennessee Highlands is administering the Avante Business Recovery Program to help small businesses in Cocke County reopen. 

The recovery of Appalachia will not be won with a single concert or a single donation drive. It will be won through sustained attention, through the accumulation of small acts of solidarity that remind isolated farmers and displaced families that they have not been abandoned. The music at the Paramount was a beginning, not an end—a demonstration that the community's resolve is as deep as the sand covering the fields, and far more fertile.