Audible Art: Music On MAIN Jams

FORT WORTH–MAIN ST. Fort Worth Arts Festival (MAIN ST.) surveys 25 years in music–from icons Leon Russell and Kirk Whalum to young guns Jonny Lang and Los Lonely Boys–in its 2010 Music on MAIN schedule of live concerts.

“We’re celebrating 25 years of Music on MAIN with the soundtrack of a quarter century,” Dr. Marie Holliday, Entertainment Committee chair for festival producer Downtown Fort Worth Initiatives, Inc., said. “The music schedule is a retrospective of audible art with a range that encompasses institutions of the music scene as well as new voices.”

MAIN ST. jams with live music daily on three stages at the 25th annual festival April 8-11. Follow the full concert line-up, including local bands and festival favorites, at www.mainstreetartsfest.org.

ROCK
Los Lonely Boys, the latest little band from Texas, brings Texican rock to MAIN ST. for the festival’s top-billed concert at 9 p.m. Saturday, April 10 on the Sundance Square Stage. Los Lonely Boys’ tour follows its latest release, 1969, which bridges generations with covers of 1969 hits like Santana’s “Evil Ways” and The Beatles’ “She Came In Through The Bathroom Window.”

Leon Russell singled with tunes like “Lady Blue” and “Tightrope” but is best known as a session man whose work has spanned musical eras in collaboration with artists from Jerry Lee Lewis to The Rolling Stones. See him at 7 p.m. Friday, April 9 on the Green Mountain Energy Company Stage.

BLUES
Blues wunderkind Jonny Lang isn’t 30 but has spent half of his life onstage. Lang recorded his first independent album at age 14, just two years after he took up the guitar, and his multiplatinum release, Lie to Me, came at age 16. Hear Lang live at 9 p.m. Friday, April 9 on the Sundance Square Stage.

JAZZ
Jazz holds sway with a marquee performance by smooth jazz saxophonist Kirk Whalum, an eight-time Grammy nominee and icon of the Caravan of Dreams era of live music downtown. See his opening night concert at 9 p.m. Thursday, April 8 on the Sundance Square Stage.

Jazz pianist Patrice Rushen takes the Green Mountain Energy Company Stage at 9 p.m. Saturday, April 10. Rushen will be joined onstage by friends Eric Marienthaland award-winning guitarist Paul Jackson, Jr., both stars in their own right.

DEFIES CLASSIFICATION
Voted a Windy City favorite in the 2009 Chicago Reader poll, Poi dog pondering fuses rock, soul, orchestral, electronic, Americana, rock band disco and international music to carve out a genre of its own. See and hear the ensemble, which has roots in Austin’s music scene, at 9 p.m. Friday, April 9 on the Green Mountain Energy Company Stage.
Brave Combo’s nuclear polka ignites the Green Mountain Energy Company Stage in concert at 4:30 p.m. Sunday, April 11.

LATIN & TEJANO
If it’s Latin, Latin Express plays it for a North Texas audience that has made these hometown heroes a MAIN ST. tradition. Catch their show at 6:30 p.m. Sunday, April 11 on the Green Mountain Energy Company Stage.

GOSPEL
James Kings Gospel opens the Sunday (April 11) music schedule at 11 a.m. on the Sundance Square Stage, but the influence of this sound will be felt across the music schedule, whether in performances by preacher’s son Kirk Whalum or in Jonny Lang’s Grammy winning and nominated work.

COUNTRY
Kelly Willis’ alternative country sound was honed in Austin’s music scene and blends with contemporary to cowboy country performers appearing across the Music on MAIN schedule of concerts on stage and street. See Willis at 7 p.m. Saturday, April 10 on the Green Mountain Energy Company Stage.

MAIN ST. Fort Worth Arts Festival celebrates its 25th year April 8-11 with a celebration of fine arts and crafts, music, film and food a mile long, stretching from the Tarrant County Courthouse to the Fort Worth Convention Center.

More than 200 juried artists and fine crafts exhibitors will line brick-paved Main Street, joined by musicians and dancers on three stages. Performance artists and food and drink vendors complete the scene.

The festival is among the most honored shows in its class. MAIN ST. is ranked among the top shows nationwide in Art Fair SourceBook, the bible of the art show world, and was chosen one of the American Bus Association’s Top 100 Events in North America for group travel in 2010.

MAIN ST. Fort Worth Arts Festival is presented by Coors Light and produced by Downtown Fort Worth Initiatives, Inc. Festival hours will be 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Thursday, April 8; 10 a.m. to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday, April 9-10; and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sunday, April 11, 2010. Admission is free to the public.

FOR MORE INFORMATION
Media should contact Diane Wolfe at metro 817-577-1779 [email protected].

For public information, visit MAIN ST. Fort Worth Arts Festival online, and get all the news from MAIN ST. as a Facebook festival fan at http://www.facebook.com/mainstreetartsfest.