Last weekend, the Music and Art Festival showcased the valley’s artistic offerings at the Temecula Community Recreation Center.

Three stages featured constant performances from more than 85 musicians, featuring music from all genres from punk to folk. Inside, 30 visual artists staked out tables to display and sell their canvases, custom-made bags and unique jewelry.

Festival-goers of all ages, shaded from the sun by neon-colored fedoras and decorated with their own body art, tapped their feet to The Riders’ country beat and lingered over Carl Jepsen’s plumed masks, hung in simulated flight over the healing feathers art display.

"There was nothing for me to do growing up around here, so I thought, ‘I’ll do this,’" said Bill Gould, organizer of the Fifth Annual Music and Arts Festival and owner of Full Value Entertainment. Gould has been a musician since age 13 and has lived in Temecula since 1999.

Wood-burning and fantasy artist Lynn Dobbins echoed Gould’s sentiments with the wish that the valley would offer more art venues. A professional artist since the age of 4, Dobbins was selling necklaces with musical symbols burned into wood medallions.

Outside, people spread blankets in the grass and swayed to the reggae, hip-hop sound of Redeye. The San Bernardino group’s lead singers, Thomas Montana – a.k.a. Paradise – and Kelley Mak, danced despite the heat, trailing their corded microphones behind them.

Mak, dressed in fishnets, leather boots and a checked newsboy cap, sang out the lyrics in a deep, grinding alto voice, alternating between raspy shouts and rippling sustained notes. The crowd shouted requests and gave into the temptation to shake their hips to the congas.

"The type of music has determined the kind of crowd we get each day," said Oceanside-based artist Jenny Burton.

Her feminine images made from origami paper and watercolor pencil didn’t get a lot of attention from Friday night’s youth-populated crowd.

She preferred the more mature audience lured in by the bands on Saturday and Sunday afternoon.

Even when the day slowed down, the artists continued working. Pearl Harris bent over a circular canvas and added brushstrokes to her oil painting of a curled, emaciated child being lifted from the ground by a disembodied hand. Across from her, Michelle Howard continued to knit together wispy, jewel-toned scarves behind a display of her handmade baskets.

The event ended late Sunday night with a packed amphitheater. At the end of the show, the artists packed up their pieces and the bands gathered their instruments, leaving the CRC to the sports teams and community meetings until next year.