Stitch-Fest Turns a Birthday Into Something Bigger.

I remember driving through Rapid City one morning back in the dark days of COVID. I had the radio on, and a DJ named “Stitch” came on. I didn’t know who he was then. Somewhere between the jokes, the music and whatever chaos was happening that day, he stopped and read a daily affirmation. During a time when a lot of people were decidedly not okay, he took a few minutes of his airtime to check in, offer some encouragement and maybe make somebody’s day a little better.

That stuck with me. In the years since, I’ve gotten to know Mitchell “Stitch” Stafford a little bit, and I’ve come to realize that little moment on the radio was a pretty good introduction to his character. Give him a microphone, a stage, an audience or an opportunity, and sooner or later he seems to find a way to use it to lift up someone else.

The second annual Stitch-Fest, happening Saturday, Oct. 10, at 445 Lounge & Grill. Technically, Stitch-Fest is Stafford’s birthday party, but thats not all it is, Stafford has apparently decided even his birthday can to be used to help people.

“I’ve never really been a big ‘celebrate me’ kind of person,” Stafford said. “I love throwing events and bringing people together, but the idea of having a big birthday party just because it’s my birthday has always felt a little weird to me.”

His solution was Stitch-Fest:

“Let’s throw a party, let’s have some great local music, let’s celebrate another trip around the sun, but at the end of the night, let’s make sure somebody else benefits from it too,” he said. “It gives the night a purpose beyond just celebrating my birthday.”

The first Stitch-Fest was an experiment. The event raised about $1,200 for Joanna Barnes, and Stafford remembers looking around the room at musicians donating their time, friends and family showing up and people supporting the cause.

“It felt bigger than a birthday party,” he said. “I think that was when I knew it couldn’t just be a one-time thing. If we could take something as simple as my birthday and turn it into an excuse to help somebody every year, then why wouldn’t we keep doing it?”

This year, that support is going toward the work Tom Whillock and other volunteers do through Rapid City’s Friday Meals and their collaboration with Pejuta Waste Otipi.

Whillock said the Friday Meals have been fortunate lately when it comes to both food and cash donations for the meals themselves. With colder weather arriving, he wants Stitch-Fest to help push beyond the meal and fill some of the other immediate needs facing people in the community.

“We’re getting into cold weather and I always collaborate with them to buy cold weather gear for the neighbors,” Whillock said of Pejuta Waste Otipi. “We’ve been pretty blessed with cash donations, and food donations for the meal itself so I want to push beyond that to filling other needs for the neighbors, too.”

Pejuta Waste Otipi will be the main recipient of cash donations from the event. Stitch-Fest is also collecting blankets, winter coats, gloves, beanies and other cold-weather gear Saturday night.

Stafford didn’t choose the Friday Meals from a distance. He knows Whillock, knows the work and has shown up himself.

“I think a lot of people might see Mitch as a radio personality, a show promoter or maybe just a fun guy to hang around, and he has all of those things of course,” Whillock said. “But I also keep seeing him show up in deeper, more important ways for the community.”

Whillock has seen that support firsthand.

“He uses his platforms to shine a light on good things happening in the community and puts his money where his mouth is by showing up to support these things,” Whillock said. “He’s joined us at the Friday Meal several times to help serve the neighbors in person.”

For Stafford, the appeal of the Friday Meals is their directness.

“Tom is one of those people who doesn’t just talk about helping people, he does it,” Stafford said. “There isn’t some huge organization behind it. It’s people seeing a need and saying, ‘We can do something about that.’”

That description could probably be applied to Stitch-Fest too.

Saturday’s lineup includes Flannel Unplugged with Josh and Pat at 6:30 p.m., Paradise White at 7:30, Goodfire at 8:30 and The Outside Kids at 10, with DJ Wr4th keeping music going between sets.

Stafford said the lineup was built around people he respects from the music community he has spent years working in.

“They’re different bands with different sounds, but they’re all people I respect and people who support this community,” he said. “Stitch-Fest isn’t about trying to put the biggest name possible on a poster. It’s about bringing together good musicians and good people who believe in what we’re doing.”

Then he added the other, equally valid booking criteria.

“And selfishly, it’s my birthday, so of course I’m going to book bands I want to listen to all night.”

Matt Buehner of The Outside Kids has collaborated with Stafford often enough to know that a Stitch birthday show already comes with its own atmosphere.

“Celebrating a friend’s birthday is always a great excuse to play a show, and adds a certain amount of camaraderie that can’t be replicated,” Buehner said. “But adding on a fundraiser of this magnitude, that so obviously and directly positively affects our community, adds a level of gratitude that’s hard to express.”

His recommendation is simpler.

“You’ll just have to come to the show and feel it yourself.”

Spend enough time around Stafford’s various projects and Stitch-Fest starts looking less like an outlier.

His day job puts him behind a microphone and in the middle of promotions. Stitch Productions has put him in the role of connecting musicians with venues and audiences. Four Winds has given local bands another stage and put different corners of the Black Hills music scene in the same place. When musician Joel Adams needed support following a stroke this year, Stafford organized fundraising to help him. More recently, he started a column with the Rapid City Post that turns the attention toward people doing good work around the community.

Ask Stafford whether radio, event promotion, Four Winds and projects like Stitch-Fest feel like separate pursuits, and his answer is immediate.

“To me, it’s all the same mission.” What he enjoys most, he said, is connecting people. “If I can connect a band with a new audience, a venue with a great artist or a community with a cause worth supporting, that’s what gets me excited,” Stafford said.

There is a reason he keeps doing it.

“I think that comes from me needing that help and support myself coming up,” Stafford said. “I needed people to take the time to help me and support me, so I want to try and be there to help and support others as well.”

That instinct shows up in big projects but Stafford doesn’t think building a healthy music community happens through one marquee event.

“You don’t build a music scene with one giant event,” he said. “You build it one show at a time. You give bands stages to play on, you give audiences reasons to come out, you support venues that are willing to host original music and you keep creating opportunities.”

Stitch-Fest is one of those shows, only this one comes with chili and a chance to help our community.

Doors open at 6 p.m. Saturday at 445 Lounge & Grill. The event is open to the public and all ages. A $10 donation gets you a bowl of chili, but buying chili or donating money is not required to attend. People can also bring winter coats, blankets, gloves, beanies and other cold-weather gear to be distributed to people who need them.

Stafford likes the format precisely because it doesn’t feel like a formal fundraiser.

“You’re seeing bands, hanging out with friends, eating a bowl of chili and having a good time, and while you’re doing that, you’re helping somebody,” he said. “And let’s be honest, rock ‘n’ roll and chili is a lot more my speed than a fancy benefit dinner.”

He already has thoughts about where Stitch-Fest could be several birthdays from now. There could be more bands, bigger fundraising goals or even multiple causes. But size isn’t really the measurement he has in mind.

“If five years from now we’re still bringing people together, showcasing local music and helping somebody in our community who needs it, then Stitch-Fest is doing exactly what it’s supposed to do,” Stafford said.

Then he described the tradition he would really like to build.

“I’d love for it to become one of those events where people know every October, ‘Stitch is throwing his birthday party, so who’s he helping this year?’”

Mitchell Stafford spends a lot of time shining the spotlight on those in the community who deserve our attention. On his birthday, we’re taking the liberty of returning the favor. Happy birthday, Stitch. Throw on some shades, cause we’re pointing that light right back at you!