rise up Rochester

The Rochester Music Fest failed. But it makes total sense as to why this happened…

Great Duffster, the City gave 250,000 toward this event which happened the day after the 2 week Jazz Fest. I could’ve predicted this one. Basically thousands and thousands came to the East End to watch free concerts for almost two weeks, and were then faced with the prospect of buying tickets for an overpriced Music Fest.

To be fair, the Jazz Fest did draw in people who would probably never attend the Music Fest (upstate NY tourists, older city crowd, people from the surrounding suburbs, etc.) Still, the date of the event hindered it from getting proper attention. Mayor Duffy totally acknowledges this and I really think it m

Props to organizers for using Paetec–it could have really helped the stadium to get some people to fill it. Also, props to organizers for the talent they brought in: The Roots and Kool and the Gang are notable acts. And while I haven’t heard of Ledesi, Barbieri, or Black August, they seem to be cr

edible acts as well. A friend who attended said, “It was a great concert–it’s just too bad no one was really there to see it. It looked empty.”

But, there still are some problems. There used to be two days for this festival–one day had more “new school” acts and the second day had “old school” acts. When the event was at Genesee Valley Park, thousands came out (including myself). Another problem: WDKX did not have a hand in organizing the event. This is Rochester’s urban station–somehow it should have been able to be involved moreso than just promoting the event on its station.

Another argument: Should the Fest have more acts than just R&B, hip-hop and rap? I think that organizing the event around urban music and people who live in the city is just fine. Why is it that in today’s “Everyone is Special” society, we feel the need to include everyone in everything. This is a festival for those who like the types of acts that attend. If we rope in big acts (like Mary J. Blige, who has attended) then people will come. People have come before, and they will again…

I couldn’t believe that in the D+C review forum someone would have the nerve to say that Music Fest caters only to those who are on welfare–that is an absurd assertion that I shouldn’t even deal with, but I just wanted to point out that while we have some great people in this city who care about its arts and culture, there are so many ignorant people out there who fail to analyze situations and simply use their prejudices to make assertions about people who they know absolutely nothing about.

What do you think about the Music Fest? Is the City trying to kill it? Mayor Duffy responds here. Did the Jazz Fest affect this year’s turn out? How can we improve it?
Any memories of the Music Fest?