EJ Igao had a theory about Grande Prairie. He thought the people calling it boring were wrong they just had not seen enough of it yet.
So he built a festival to prove it.
The first-ever GP Youth Fest ran at Muskoseepi Park on June 25, starting at 5 p.m. Igao, a graduating student at Composite High School, raised more than $40,000 in sponsorships and donations to make it happen all while finishing final exams and preparing for graduation.
"GP Youth Fest is taking place on June 25th at Muskoseepi Park. The main attraction of it is a regional youth talent show, which will give youth an opportunity to showcase their skills, showcase their talent, and also just give them the chance to start building their roots here," Igao said ahead of the event.
Why he built it
Igao did not start with a festival in mind. He started with a problem he kept noticing through his leadership roles in schools and in the city teenagers in Grande Prairie felt disconnected. They wanted to be more united, more collaborative, more engaged. Too many of them were leaving for school or work and not coming back, partly because they had written off Grande Prairie as a boring place to grow up.
Igao disagreed with that assessment. His answer was not to argue about it. It was to create something that demonstrated what Grande Prairie's youth could actually do.
What happened at the festival
The event brought together music, sport, food, and community programming in one evening at Muskoseepi Park.
The talent show took centre stage at the park's Amphitheatre. Among the performers were the Quarterzips, a four-person band of 2026 Composite High graduates who played a cover of Niall Horan's Heaven alongside rock and country originals. The basketball showcase drew approximately a dozen teams competing for first place. Fellow Composite grad Gabrielle Oyetunde was among the players. "There's a lot of competition all around, but I think we could get it done," he said before tip-off. "My team's pretty solid."
Food trucks lined the park. Guest speakers including youth leaders, local elected officials, and business leaders addressed attendees. The Aquatera Outdoor Pool at Muskoseepi was available for the evening.
What it actually takes to raise $44,000 as a teenager
Raising $44,000 as a high school student with no track record and no organization behind you means cold outreach to businesses that have no reason to say yes. It means building a sponsorship package, making the pitch, following up, and doing all of it while attending class and writing finals.
Most adults find that process difficult. Igao did it at 17 or 18 while also booking performers, recruiting volunteers, building a website at gpyouthfest.ca, and coordinating a full event production at one of the city's main parks.
The fact that he raised more than $40,000 not $5,000, not $15,000 signals that the local business community took the pitch seriously. That kind of backing for a first-year event run by a high school student does not happen unless the person asking made a compelling case. Igao clearly did.
What Muskoseepi Park is and why it mattered
Muskoseepi is a Cree word meaning Bear Creek. The park runs along Bear Creek through the heart of Grande Prairie and is one of the most significant urban parks in northwestern Alberta. It has an outdoor pool, sports fields, a reservoir, trails, and the Amphitheatre a proper outdoor performance venue that hosts Canada Day concerts and the city's biggest summer events.
Choosing Muskoseepi was not incidental. The park is central, accessible, and familiar to virtually every Grande Prairie resident. Staging GP Youth Fest at the same Amphitheatre the city uses for its biggest events was a statement this was not a small community gathering. It was a real event built to be taken seriously.
What it means for Grande Prairie
Youth retention is a genuine challenge for mid-sized northern Alberta cities. Young people who leave for post-secondary in Edmonton or Calgary often do not come back. Building a sense of local identity before that departure decision is made is one of the few things a community can actually do.
Igao did not frame it that way. He just wanted to throw a good festival and show people Grande Prairie is not boring. That is probably the better pitch anyway.
The festival was designed as an annual event from the start. GP Youth Fest will be back.
Sources:
CBC News, From music to athletics: Grande Prairie teens in the spotlight at new youth festival, June 20, 2026 (cbc.ca)
EverythingGP, New youth-focused festival coming to Grande Prairie, April 7, 2026 (everythinggp.com)
GP Youth Fest, official website (gpyouthfest.ca)
