Adam Voith, publisher and editor for independent publishing house Little Engines, spoke with The Morning Show’s host Nilufer Arsala about curating the Writers in Residence program at the upcoming 2026 Eaux Claires Festival.

During the week of Eaux Claires, The Current will broadcast live with guests from the festival at SHIFT in Eau Claire. Find out more at thecurrent.org/eauxclaires.

Listen to the full interview in the player above, and find a complete transcript below.

Interview Transcript

Nilufer Arsala: You're listening to The Current's Morning Show, I'm Nilufer Arsala. The Eaux Claires Festival is returning after an eight-year hiatus, and luckily you don't have to wait too long for the festivities. They kick off this Friday at Carson Park in Eau Claire with a lineup that includes Aaron Dessner and Fred Again, Dijon, Gully Boys, and Justin Vernon doing his take on Bob Dylan songs with Bon Dylan. But while the music is happening at the park, a different kind of event will be happening right down the road. Poets, writers, illustrators, and more will gather to discuss their work for the Writers in Residence program that's happening as part of the Eaux Claires Festival. And joining me to talk about it is Adam Voith from Little Engines, which is a magazine and publishing house. Adam has combined his love of music with his love of writing and helped put together the Music Festival and the Writers in Residence program. Adam, welcome to The Current's Morning Show.

Adam Voith: Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Nilufer Arsala: So it seems like much of your adult life, you've really had two loves, and that's music and writing. I was researching and reading up on you, and you used to manage artists like Bon Iver and Dijon, The Mountain Goats, and Vampire Weekend. But writing has also been a very big part of your life. Tell me a little bit about your journey.

Adam Voith: Sure, I was an English major in college, and when I graduated, I was publishing some books of my own and some other people's books and a literary magazine, which I thought was going to be a career. And I was going to do this booking bands thing on the side, it was going to be my side hustle. But it very quickly became clear to me that that was my real job and that the writing was the side hustle. So after a few years of trying to do both, I really started focusing on music primarily, and that consumed my life for 25 years. And I was still writing and reading and very interested in the literary side of things, but the job was all consuming. And then when COVID happened, my job completely stopped. You know, touring stopped overnight. I had this huge break with nothing to do, and so I threw myself back into writing again, and I kept that going even when the job came back to life. And then a few years after that, I decided that it was time to move on from music as the main gig and really focus on the writing and publishing again. So that's what I've been doing, and I left that music job about two years ago. And about a year ago, Justin [Vernon] was like, "Would you want to help do the festival? And so I've dipped my toe back into music a little bit with Justin. I'm not going back to music aside from this, but it's been an awesome project with him. He and I have stayed close. We've worked together for a long time, so it was cool to get to keep doing something with him and find something new to do with him. And he has been super supportive of my writing and my publishing stuff. So he was very generous in giving us a real platform to do something at the festival this year to expand the literary offerings. In the past, there has been a small literary program, but it's very robust this year.

Nilufer Arsala: So you helped curate the music lineup. You also helped curate the Writers in Residence lineup too.

Adam Voith: That's true. Justin and I worked together on the music, and Michael Perry, a local writer to Eau Claire or to Fall Creek, right by Eau Claire, and I curated the literary side together. Michael Perry has a lot of experience with different festivals. He's been doing this for a really long time, and I had been visiting the past few years a few small boutique festivals that have mixed a literary and music element. So there's Mission Creek in Iowa City was a key one, and Tree Fort in Boise was another one that I went to, took part in on the literary side, and saw how you could combine the two.

Nilufer Arsala: You're listening to The Current's Morning Show. I'm Nilufer Arsala talking with Adam Voith from Little Engines, which is a magazine and publishing house. Adam helped curate the lineup for the Eaux Claires Music Festival and its Writers in Residence program. So, Adam, tell me how the Writers in Residence program works. Is it songwriting, poetry, short stories, all of the above, like how does it work?

Adam Voith: It is a combination of novelists, poets, essay writers, and we even have a couple cartoonists. No songwriters, although there are plenty of songwriters participating, obviously on the music side. But this is all written words, and I would say it's a healthy balance between poetry and prose, sort of half and half. In the prose part, probably a healthy mix between nonfiction and fiction. People will be reading from their own works in a traditional reading setting. There's a few conversations that will be happening with writers on a specific topic. We've got a live podcast, there's a literary podcast called One Story Pod that will be doing their podcast live, talking about, I believe they're going to talk about East of Eden, Steinbeck's novel East of Eden. Sheila Heti, who is a great writer, is doing a writing workshop. It's an incredible chance to get Sheila to talk to you about about her craft, and then there are a few what I'm going to call spontaneous things, one being a segment we're calling "I Remember," which is going to be a collaborative memoir on real time where people are just throwing out key memories that they have that will build upon each other. And then my favorite part of the festival, which hasn't happened yet, so I hope this is going to be my favorite part, is the one-on-one readings where audience members will get a chance to go into a room with a writer and themselves only and get a personalized reading one-on-one, which I think could be very cool.

Nilufer Arsala: You're listening to The Current's Morning Show. I'm Nilufer Arsala, talking with Adam Voith. Adam helped curate the lineup for the Eaux Claires Music Festival and its Writers in Residence program. So the festival goers that are going to see the music, can they attend any of the sessions that are happening with the Writers in Residence?

Adam Voith: Absolutely. It's open to all festival goers, and it's on the same ground, so it's a very quick little walk over to where our little Writers in Residence stuff happens. And we've got two small venues, and if you are not able to get in one of the venues, there's going to be PA projecting what we're reading out into the grassy area out front of the schoolhouse and the museum, so everyone should come by and enjoy either getting into the venues with us or just listening from outside.

Nilufer Arsala: Why is it important to have this writing component alongside the music at the Eaux Claires Festival?

Adam Voith: What a great question. We're in a bit of a crisis with reading at the time, and there is not a fix coming. There is no fix coming. So I personally, and I think a lot of the writers that are coming, are really focused on the smallest approaches we can find to make an impact on letting people know what's important about reading and writing, and I think Justin empowering us to do that at the festival alongside music sends a really powerful message that we're going to put these things on the same level, you know. My guess is almost everybody's coming for the music, but I think that we'll turn some people on to what's going on with these books as well. So the only solution to the problem is this sort of hand-to-hand combat. I like to call it of letting people know why this is vital and why this art form, especially you know books, is so important. And you know books have been around a lot longer than records, if you can believe it, and so we're just fighting to make sure that that is taken as seriously as the other arts out there that might be easier or more accessible or more in the zeitgeist. But all of us take this very, very seriously, and we are really motivated to share why we are so moved by by words.

Nilufer Arsala: Adam Voith runs the magazine and publishing company Little Engines and helped to curate both the music portion and the Writers in Residence program at the Eaux Claires Festival. Heads up that The Current will be broadcasting live from Eau Claire starting Thursday at 3o'clock and you can learn everything you need to know about the Eaux Claires Festival at thecurrent.org/giglist. Adam, thank you so much for coming on The Current's Morning Show today.

Adam Voith: Thanks for having me.

Find the full schedule of the Writers in Residence program below.

Credits

Guests – Adam Voith
Host – Nilufer Arsala
Producer – Nilufer Arsala
Digital Producer - Natalia Toledo

External Link

Eaux Claires Festival – Official Website