BLACK MOUNTAIN, N.C. (WTVD) — In the same music hall that served as a lifeline for food and water distribution during Hurricane Helene’s devastating aftermath, the community of Black Mountain is now finding a different kind of sustenance through healing.

The inaugural Healing Hearts Festival, taking place this week at The White Horse music hall, offers free healing services to the town’s 8,500 residents as they continue to recover from the storm that cut off their community and destroyed 60% of their water supply.

Richard Garzarelli, a local wellness guru, conceived the festival as a way to help ease the town’s collective trauma through healing arts.

“They’re giving acupuncture, massage therapy, psychic readings, healing sessions – a whole variety,” Garzarelli said.

The festival comes just ahead of Black Mountain’s 2nd Annual Blues Festival, creating a weekend focused on community healing and connection.

Storm’s Devastating Impact

Hurricane Helene knocked out Black Mountain’s main water line from Asheville, leaving the historic mountain town isolated by flooding and landslides. The disaster transformed The White Horse from an entertainment venue into an emergency distribution center for basic necessities.

“The day we left, the water went brown,” recalled Vishnu Dass, a local resident who, along with his wife Cricket, is offering Ayurveda treatments at the festival. The couple practices the 5,000-year-old Indian holistic medicine aimed at healing mind, body, and spirit.

Since Helene, neighbors have flocked to healing services seeking relief from trauma. “A lot of folks are looking for some sort of refuge and respite from that,” Dass explained. “So a lot of the treatments we offer help calm and replenish and regulate.”

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Community Connection Through Crisis

Garzarelli, whose own property was flooded during the storm, sees the festival as more than just disaster recovery. He believes the crisis created an opportunity for deeper community bonds.

“We were devastated by this storm. The silver lining is it created a tremendous amount of connection in our community,” he said. “We saw this after 9/11, we all came together, and then after a little while, we all go back into separate silos. We are bringing it back!”

The timing of the healing festival before the blues festival feels particularly meaningful to Garzarelli.

“The root and origin of the blues is around suffering and potentially the redemption from suffering,” he noted. “We’re going to be singing the blues together, brother!”

Looking Forward

Garzarelli envisions the Healing Hearts Festival becoming more than an annual event, hoping to organize it multiple times throughout the year to maintain the community connections forged during the crisis.

The White Horse, which hosts both festivals, recently began charging for memberships with all proceeds supporting four local nonprofits created specifically to help heal the community.

As Black Mountain prepares to transition from healing to music this weekend, residents are finding that recovery comes in many forms – sometimes through a gentle touch, sometimes through the cathartic power of the blues.

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