Allman Brothers Band super fans gathered at the Georgia Allman Brothers Band Association (GABBA) festival, which hosted events around Macon over the weekend to celebrate the legacy which the band created and the community it fostered through its music. It is especially present in Macon, the town where the band established its reputation as the creator of Southern rock. Included in the festivities was a concert at the Grand Opera House on Friday evening, where fans danced along to songs, chatted during intermission and enjoyed a laid back atmosphere.
One fan, Jimmie Kaye Evans, who even named her daughter Melissa after an Allman Brothers song, said she went to every single event throughout the weekend.
“People from all over the world are big fans,” GABBA president, Kyler Mosley, said. “So that’s part of the fascination, is just meeting people from all over the country and all over the world.” This year, GABBA hosted attendees from Germany, Finland, Wales, England and Sweden. The festival, he said, has even attracted people from Asia and Australia in the past.
“Even if they see each other one time a year, it’s like no time was lost and everybody is together like true brothers,” Evans said.
Each year, GABBA supports the community by having various artists play at the festival’s events. They try to host as many artists who have a connection to the Allman Brothers family, fans of the band, local musicians and up-and-coming blues acts, Mosley said.
This year, one of those acts included the Restless Natives, a local group recreating the Greg Allman “Laid Back” album which was recorded in Macon by Capricorn Studios.
GABBA honors its community through yearly tree dedications and an award for members of the group. Each year, a tree dedication takes place at Rose Hill Cemetery, where most of the band members are interred. Tree dedications are given to acknowledge the contributions of whoever the tree is dedicated to and each one has a connection to both the Allman Brothers family and the GABBA family, Mosley said.
This year’s tree was dedicated in memory of Dickey Betts, a founding member of the Allman Brothers Band who passed away in April 2024. Those who attended the dedication shared memories to honor him.
Mercer Music at Capricorn Studios received an award on Friday night for their work to support the growth of the studio and preserve its history through the Capricorn Museum. Capricorn Studios is where the Allman Brothers Band recorded three of their albums. Mosley shared that the studio went through periods of prosperity and periods where it struggled. In 2009, a board member named Alan Justice, who had plans to revitalize the studio into a non-profit, sold his share to Mercer Music, he said. Mercer then renovated the studio and opened Capricorn Museum. The studio is still in operation and the museum showcases the history of Southern rock.
Mosley recognizes that the community has faced loss over the past few years, as fans are getting older but he said he hopes GABBA will continue to keep the band’s legacy alive. He says that a big challenge the association faces is trying to reach the younger generations and locals of Macon. There is hope, however, that what originally brought together the current tight-knit group of GABBA members will entice a fresh set of fans.
“The fact that this music, most of it was written and composed in this area, from real life events, I mean, it just touches our spirit,” Evans said.
Joslyn Hicks ‘29 is a Journalism major at Mercer University. She is excited for her first year as a staff writer for The Cluster. In her free time, you can find her reading a book or singing along to Taylor Swift songs.
