Despite a coming storm from the south and only a few weeks of planning, the annual Mazzstock Festival returned this weekend to Marlboro. The brainchild of local resident Lee Mazzola, the long running music festival was staged once again after people said they missed their time on the “farm.”

Mazzola’s 10 acre property was once part of a 100 acre family farm that was founded in 1921. This year is the 14th festival he has hosted, calling it this year a Mini Mazzstock festival, as it was paired back a little. He had to call the festival off last year because of the pandemic, saying it broke his heart; “It was terrible.”

Although Mazzola was leaning toward canceling it again this year because Covid is still around, “but people begged us, we can’t go two years without Mazzstock, so I said let’s just do it. I contacted bands and I contacted vendors and all were ready for it. We got to work throwing up tents, getting stages ready and here we are.”

Mazzola said people are drawn to his festival, “because of the love they feel here. Everybody is happy and it’s the same theme every year. People just love one another and get along. They love music, dance and have a good time.” He acknowledges his debt to the original Woodstock Music festival’s ‘Three Days of Peace and Love’ that was held at Yasgur’s Farm in 1969.

Mazzola pulled this off by using Facebook and word of mouth. In 2018 and 2019 the festival became too crowded, forcing him to limit the number of attendees.

“There wasn’t an inch of real estate to be found here and we really didn’t want that. We decided that we’re going to go back to our roots. There are probably 500 people here and it’s perfect. This is great, I love it and I can relax for a change.”

Mazzola thanked his partner Vinnie Pomarico for his long time support in helping run Mazzstock.

“I also want to thank everybody here for supporting us [despite] the terrible weather forecast for this weekend, but the Mazzstock gods are with us,” he said. “Also a big thank you to the bands because we didn’t have a budget this year because we didn’t plan on this. Every band played for free today and for donations only. I think we’ll make a little money today and we will split it evenly with all the bands.”

Rookie vendor Gucciardo retired early from his regular job and decided to work the festival circuit.

“I do Philadelphia water ice and hot dogs,” he said, adding that because he is a Marlboro graduate, “I figured I’d start here. Everything is great and Mazzstock is the best.”

Josey Fyah and his band Aqua Cherry came up from Long Island to perform a mix of Reggae, Rock and Pop music.

“It’s there to make people wanna have fun,” he said. “Not only is the performance and dancing a part of it, but we try to put out good, positive messages for the growth of the whole human culture; that’s our aim.”

Frank Rezac had nothing but praise for Mazzola and the hard work that goes into bringing this festival to life every year.

“He’s wonderful because he believes in music and he thinks that people should get together and enjoy it and he goes out of his way to make this work,” he said. “There’s no judgment here; it’s a small little Woodstock here. I can’t thank him enough. There’s somebody who believes in this and does this.”