At last year’s Funk Fest (Promenade stage). Photo courtesy of Ashley Hectus.
To state the obvious, music is art. But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t apply scientific principles to it. And along those lines, the first three years of Summer And Music (SAM) have been a sort of laboratory, wherein co-founders Rand Foster and Justin Hectus hypothesized and experimented — usually with great success.
Year 4 of SAM might be subtitled “Dancing with What Brung Us,” focusing on the events that have proven to be SAM’s high points. And yes, that includes maximizing the dancing.
It also includes Battle of the Tribute Bands, the already-classic SAM kickoff event, which takes place Saturday at Rainbow Harbor and feature tributaries to The Beatles, The Pixies, Iron Maiden (all-female!), U2, and Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers.
Then in August will feature two more SAM classics: Long Beach Funk Fest and BuskerFest.
BuskerFest 2011 champs Wild Pack of Canaries. Photo courtesy of Ashley Hectus.
“We’ve built three brands that everybody seems to really respond to,” Foster says. “It’s variations on what you know. […] We’re organically capitalizing on the experience of the last three years.”
But Foster hastens to point out that SAM showcases new talent each year. “Everything’s new every year, except for the concept,” he says.
July, however, will feature a new component: Dancin’ in the Streets, an event designed so that listening to the music is secondary to letting it move you.
“It’s kind of an extension of the natural street dance party that happened at the end of BuskerFest [last year],” Foster says. “The first year the music ended, and we were like, ‘Everybody still wants more.’ The next year we had a DJ after Delta Spirit played, and for 40 minutes we had this unbelievable dance party that was 150 kids just dancing in the intersection. And out of that we’ve always felt like we wanted to do something that had that kind of energy, that tied into that spirit of joyousness of being outside on the streets of the city and shaking your ass and having a good time.”
BuskerFest 2011. Photo courtesy of Ashley Hectus.
SAM, which for the last three years has been named “Best Music Festival” by the OC Weekly, has proven to be a major addition to Long Beach’s calendar of annual events, drawing tens of thousands of people to the downtown area. At the June 4 media launch for this year’s series, DLBA Vice-President Kristopher Larson called SAM “a series of events that are going to bring tens of thousands of people to Downtown Long Beach and generates hundreds of thousands of dollars of economic impact for our community. So this is really an important part of what we do throughout the year to help people see not only the great things that are happening downtown, but also to experience the great music that our community is able to produce.”
Justin Hectus and Rand Foster at the 2012 SAM Media Launch.
Highlights from the SAM media launch, which was held at Fingerprints on June 4, included performances by Wild Pack of Canaries, last year’s BuskerFest winner; and by the Sea Funk Brass Band, who will be part of this year’s Funk Fest. And listening to those bands do their things lets you know that the music at SAM ain’t no joke, with Foster and Hectus capitalizing on the beautiful patchwork of musical talent found right here at home.
“Long Beach has a great music scene,” says Foster. “Part of problem is that it’s in the shadows of Los Angeles. A lot of bands think they can start out in Long Beach but then have to relocate to L.A. That’s one of the things we’re trying to fix. […] SAM came out of Schooled in Song, a celebration of a lot of the bands that laid the groundwork for the Long Beach music scene 20 years ago. When we pitched SAM, it was to put a little money in the pockets of local bands and give them a platform.”
The Sea Funk Brass Band make their way to the Fingerprints stage. Photo courtesy of Deziré Lumachi.
But as much as music takes center stage at SAM, the series also focuses on bringing the Long Beach community together. Funk Fest, for example, takes to the streets of downtown not only with two stages of groove, but a Kids’ Zone of Funkativity, a beer garden (provided by Beachwood BBQ, which means craft and not that bogus Bud/Coors swill), a “funk art” gallery, and live painting. Catalyst and Green Long Beach! are even providing a filling station for water (bring your own bottle) so we can all stay hydrated as we dance the day away into the night.
TNT evoking AC:DC at 2011’s Battle of the Tribute Bands. Photo courtesy of Ashley Hectus.
A week later, BuskerFest will close the series in high style, as 15 bands will play stripped-down/acoustic sets on wooden truck beds, giving their all to earn the wooden nickels provided to each attendee, with the winner receiving [don’t know yet; maybe budget with local designer for T-shirt printing] “A prize that allows them to be better businessperson”
For good measure, all of SAM’s large-scale events will be held on self-contained, solar-powered stages provided by Alternative Power Productions. And in an attempt to make the entire series carbon-neutral, you’ll notice a focus on on-site recycling
All of this is free to you, the listening, dancing, funky public. Life in the LBC can be pretty damn good, yeah?
View from the Pine Ave. stage at Funk Fest 2011. Photo courtesy of Ashley Hectus.
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Summer And Music 2012 calendar:
•Battle of the Tribute Bands: Saturday, June 30, 1–6pm @ Rainbow Harbor
•Dancin’ in the Streets: Saturday, July 21 or 28 (TBD) @ [location TBD]
•Long Beach Funk Fest: Saturday, August 18, noon–11pm @ downtown (c. Pine/Broadway)
•BuskerFest: Saturday, August 25, 5–11pm @ the East Village Arts District
For more information, visit http://summerandmusic.com/.