DIVERSITY | Offering a place for everyone
30 June 2008
Summer Music Festivals Dot Landscape Across America
Genres include classical, folk, jazz, blues, country, rock and more
Washington -- The hills are alive with the sound of music -- and so are the valleys and the flatlands.
As Americans seek out live entertainment this summer, they’ll find music festivals abounding from coast to coast and border to border.
Indeed, these events may be even more plentiful than their performing-arts cousins, the seasonal theater festivals. (See “Americans in Search of Summer Theater Needn’t Travel Far.”) A recent New York Times compilation previewed almost 100 music festivals in 33 U.S. states, and the list was nowhere near exhaustive.
The fare at music festivals large and small includes classical concerts, Broadway show music, folk, jazz, blues, country, bluegrass and rock. In fact, some of the more ambitious festivals offer all those genres in a single season.
To help music lovers plan their itineraries, America.gov is providing a brief overview of what to expect this summer at various U.S. festivals.
MOSTLY JAZZ
Tanglewood (Massachusetts) -- Mention the words “summer” and “music” and this facility in the Berkshire Hills town of Lenox springs immediately to mind. Site of both the Tanglewood Music Festival and the Tanglewood Jazz Festival, it has been the summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) since 1937.
Like several other locations nationwide, Tanglewood offers attendees the choice of taking in the performance from inside an open-air structure or listening while picnicking -- or stretching out -- on the adjacent lawn. A separate hall for indoor concerts was added in 1994.
This summer’s schedule features 12 programs -- from opera to cutting-edge music -- conducted by James Levine, in his fourth year as music director for the BSO. Other headliners include cellist Yo-Yo Ma, pianist Emanuel Ax, folk singer James Taylor, and Broadway singer Barbara Cook, on a tour celebrating her 80th birthday. Not to be outdone, jazz pianist Marian McPartland will celebrate her 90th birthday with a late August appearance.
Monterey Jazz Festival (California) -- A suspension of the four-year-older Newport (Rhode Island) Folk Festival in the 1970s permits Monterey to proclaim itself “the longest-running jazz festival in the world.” Now in its 51st season, the California fest boasts such performers this year as Cassandra Wilson, Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Christian McBride, Joshua Redman and Nancy Wilson.
In addition to the performances, the three-day September event features panel discussions, workshops, exhibitions, clinics and “an international array of food, shopping and festivities spread throughout the 20-acre [8.094-hectare] Monterey Fairgrounds.”
BROADWAY TUNES, OPERA AND POP MUSIC
Wolf Trap (Virginia) -- This facility occupies rolling, wooded countryside in Vienna, Virginia, near Washington. It resembles Tanglewood, both in the indoor/outdoor layout -- complete with picnics dotting the spacious lawn -- and in the breadth of its musical offerings. And it boasts a singular distinction, as well, as the country’s only national park for the performing arts, operated collaboratively by the National Park Service and the nonprofit Wolf Trap Foundation.
This summer’s fare -- running from May to early September -- ranges from road companies of Broadway shows like Rent and Les Miserables, and 10 performances by Washington’s National Symphony Orchestra, to the “Riverdance” Irish dance company, The Gondoliers (a light opera by Gilbert and Sullivan), and individual artists including singers Gladys Knight, Donna Summer and Smokey Robinson, saxophonist Kenny G, and Brazilian musician Sergio Mendes.
Central City Opera (Colorado) -- Tucked away 8,496 feet (2,590 meters) high in Colorado’s rugged Rocky Mountains, the former gold-mining town of Central City (population 515 in the 2000 census) provides an unlikely setting for an annual summer opera festival.
But the combination of a classic opera house -- built in 1878 and lovingly preserved since its refurbishment in 1932 -- with casino gambling, introduced in Central City and neighboring Black Hawk in the 1990s, draws a steady stream of visitors. Many make the mountainous drive from Denver, 35 miles (56 kilometers) to the east.
The 2008 season, running from June to August, features three 20th-century works in English: new productions of Benjamin Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia, Leonard Bernstein’s quasi-operatic West Side Story and Carlisle Floyd’s Susannah.
ROCK MUSIC -- WITH SOMETHING EXTRA FOR KIDS
Lollapalooza Festival (Illinois) -- One of the United States’ best-known summer rock festivals, Lollapalooza takes place in Chicago’s Grant Park during the first three days of August. The festival’s name can be traced to an American idiom of the early 20th century, originally meaning “remarkable or wonderful person or thing.”
Alternative rock, hip-hop and punk bands typically dominate the festival’s lineup. Lollapalooza also features dance and comedy performances, as well as craft booths. This year’s musical headliners are English alternative rock band Radiohead, U.S. rap musician Kanye West, U.S. industrial rock band Rage Against the Machine, the Chicago-based alternative rock group Wilco, and U.S. alternative rock/blues band the Raconteurs.
Tickets are not cheap -- a three-day pass for the festival costs $205 -- but children under age 10 are admitted for free, as long as they’re accompanied by a ticket-holding adult. To sweeten the deal, Lollapalooza offers a program of activities called Kidzapalooza, aimed at children and family groups. According to festival organizers, “kids will party down with their parents for an amazing interactive three-day musical experience” that includes breakdancing workshops, an invitation to try out different musical instruments, entry to a mobile recording studio that lets kids make their own CDs, and more.
At Lollapalooza, “we’re cultivating the newest generation of music fans,” say the festival’s organizers. Thanks to such efforts, the U.S. summer music scene seems destined to thrive well into the future.
