For a weekend in September, Fairfield Hills will be transformed into an arts mecca for Newtown's relatively young arts festival, meant to rival the famed locals arts festivals around the world.
And since an arts festival is nothing without music, organizers have assembled a "who's-who" of local musicians to take the stage for the kind of packed schedule that will be familiar to veterans of music festivals.
"There's a ton of stuff to do," says organizer Robert Rabinowitz (whose band Boplicity will perform Saturday.) "You could come and sit and watch music all days long in between looking at the vendors and the other activities of the festival."
From Americana acts like My Dad's Truck to the dirty reggae of the Skanktones, these names are familiar to many Newtowners. Organizer Robert Rabinowitz says festivalgoers will have the chance to hang around all day and enjoy a wide variety of genres.
"The festival this year features some of the top bands from the tri-state area -- everything from jazz to funk to rock to country to folk," says Rabinowitz.
In between the music, festivalgoers will get the chance for even more entertainment: Chaz from radio's Chaz and AJ in the morning will be appearing as well at 4:00 p.m. Saturday in the music tent.
Not only have many acts routinely performed in area venues, even more have been part of benefits and live performances in the past year for smaller arts events, including those put on by HealingNewtown."Nearly all of them have done benefit performances for HealingNewtown," said Rabinowitz, a founding member of HealingNewtown. "So when it came to hiring bands for this year's festival it seemed to make sense that one good deed deserves another. Since they all gave generously of their talent to help us, we felt that it made a lot of sense this year to bring them to the Festival."
On Thursday night, the broadway show and the Rooster Ball on Friday night.
Admission to the festival is $5 on Saturday and Sunday.
The Lineup:
Saturday, Sept. 21:
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- Goldrush: 11:00 – 12:00
- Peter Ferreira: 12:30 – 1:30
- Flagpole Radio Cafe: 2:00 – 2:30
- Matt Rae Trio: 3:00 – 4:00
- OutFunked: 4:30 – 6:00
Sunday, Sept. 22:
- Newtown High School Singers directed by Jane Matson: 10:30 – 11:00
- My Dad's Truck: 11:00 – 12:00
- Boplicity: 12:30 – 1:30 (with special guest Brett Boles)
- Otis and the Hurricanes (featuring Johnny Boots): 2:00 – 3:00
- The Skanktones: 3:30 – 4:30
- The Jay Willie Band: 5:00 – 6:00
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