The Stonewave Taiko drummers were not the only ones creating new notes of interest at Merimbula's eighth Eat Festival March 6-8.
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Nigel Ayling, who organised the Craft Beer Festival at Club Sapphire said that with ticket sales of 425, everyone was very pleased and wanted to do again next year.
"The idea was to pad out the weekend to make it a three-day event and it drew a lot of people from out of town," Mr Ayling said.
The club had craft beer stalls, beer trivia, talks and on Sunday evening a degustation dinner accompanied by various beers.
On Sunday the Eat Festival got underway with people arriving before the official opening at 10am.
Sapphire Coast Tourism's Anthony Osborne said numbers were up on the previous years.
"It's hard to be exact but we know that there were 16,000 serves of food sold with possibly each person having between three and four dishes," Mr Osborne said.
"Everyone did increased numbers and the new layout with a bigger oyster area worked well.
"The food went to another level. The most feedback was on the quality of the food in terms of interesting menus, high quality. It was a big weekend and the town was pretty full. It seemed like a really good day," he said.
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Mr Ayling said the Sunday beer degustation dinner had about 60 people and the feedback was positive.
"It was the same 10 breweries who had stalls at Club Sapphire on Saturday but with different beers. There were some very good beers there including one that was brewed especially for the event by Camel Rock Brewery," he said.
Manager at Merimbula Tourism Chris Nicholls said it had become a unique event, something very special for Merimbula and the Sapphire Coast.
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He said the combination of Eat, the Craft Beer Festival, the degustation dinners at the Wharf Restaurant on Friday evening, Club Sapphire on Sunday and Wheelers long table lunch on Saturday "gives the creative spirit of food provision a chance to stretch its creative legs".
Everyone agreed that having all the events made for a better festival. "They support and increase the pulling power," Mr Osborne said.
