There will be a bonanza of country music in the Upper Clutha on New Year's Eve.
Not only are Wellington country band the Warratahs playing at the Lake Hawea Hotel, Wanaka country singer Jody Direen will be on stage at the Lake Wanaka Centre and the two-day Branding Music Festival, featuring country music, will be held on a new site down the Clutha River from Luggate.
Each venue will be vying to attract the people expected to flood into the district for the Wanaka Rodeo on January 2.
As well as the three country music events, the two-day Rhythm and Alps Music Festival is returning in the Cardrona Valley.
An Otago Daily Times tour of the venues yesterday found staff at the Lake Hawea Hotel clearing up after the Rhythm and Alps pre-festival party on Monday night, attended by 1600 young people.
Andrew Hedley, who takes two weeks off from his firewood business to help out at the hotel each year, said it had been a good night, with no arrests.
The Rhythm and Alps Festival itself, being held next to the Cardrona River on Rob Rosa Station, is expected to attract about 5000 people.
The three sound stages were well on the way to being completed yesterday, and rows of teepees and tents were already in place.
The two-day festival will feature 150 music acts, 90 Portaloos, 70 caravans, 20 marquees, 15 food vendors and one clown.
At The Branding festival site, organiser Sarah Perriam would not disclose the number of tickets sold so far, but said the average age of those who had bought them was 22.
In previous years, The Branding was held at the Lake Hawea Hotel.
Ms Perriam said her decision to move the event, with its 18 New Zealand and Australian acts, to her own Queensberry property was because numbers attending had outgrown the hotel's capacity of about 2000 people.
Jody Direen said her show in the Lake Wanaka Centre this New Year was all about "quality over quantity''.
While some of the 400 tickets were still available, all the VIP tickets were gone.
Ms Direen, who has appeared at the Branding in the past, said she was aiming to create a "high end'' event that was not dependent on the weather and within easy reach of those staying in Wanaka.
Live music and fireworks will also feature on the Wanaka lakefront as part of the Queenstown Lakes District Council's New Year's Eve celebrations.
