WYEP Announces Annual Music Festival
April 28, 2019
Last week WYEP (91.3) announced the lineup for its annual Summer Music Festival, set to take place at Schenley Plaza on Saturday, June 29 from 3:00-10:00 p.m. The event is free and open to the public. “WYEP’s 2019 Summer Music Festival promises cool summer fun for music fans of all ages,” said Mike Sauter, WYEP’s director of content and programming. “It’s a day of live music discovery made in Pittsburgh and beyond, and it’s an eclectic, diverse, and really fun lineup.”
WYEP Summer Music Festival is presented by UPMC Health Plan, with additional sponsorship from Dollar Bank, Green Mountain Energy, and the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy.
WYEP Reimagination artists Pierce Dipner and Elias Khouri kick things off at 3:00 with original music created in part through the station’s teen recording project. Critically-acclaimed Pittsburgh band Nevada Color, which formed while its members were students at Point Park University, brings its polished and instrumentally complex indie-rock sound to the stage at 4:30; at 6:00, Pittsburgh Neo-soul artist Clara Kent brings her unique style to the line-up. At 7:30, discover the soulful sound of Cautious Clay, which NPR music describes as “magnetic and cool R&B that features his honeyed voice and his skills on the saxophone.” Eclectic, colorful Colorado-based four-piece multi-instrumental and vocal ensemble DeVotchKa headlines the evening.
Visitors can enjoy the beer garden hosted by The Porch (under the big tent on Schenley Plaza; ID required to purchase alcohol), shop for locally handmade crafts at I Made It! Market, and purchase a WYEP limited edition 45th Anniversary tee (available only at Summer Music Festival!) from Commonwealth Press. A portion of the proceeds from each of these vendors will benefit WYEP.
Throughout the day, festival attendees can participate in WYEP’s Elaborate Picnic Contest and stop by the WYEP booth to play music trivia, enter to win prizes, and meet WYEP on-air personalities. More information is at wyep.org/smf19.
“WYEP is committed to supporting and nurturing Pittsburgh’s music community. In service of that commitment, we are changing our approach to events this summer,” stated Abby Goldstein, WYEP General Manager. “We have expanded our local lineup for Summer Music Festival. We are expanding our Singer Songwriter competition to include more artists and more neighborhoods. We’ll be applying resources that we once used to produce free Final Friday concerts to collaborate with festivals and community events that support the local music scene throughout the coming year. What I am most excited about is our plan to expand Summer Music Festival in 2020 to a two-day event with greater opportunities for participation from local and regional musicians as well as national acts.”
Who: All ages
What: WYEP Summer Music Festival
When: Sat. June 29, 2019 from 3:00-10:00 p.m.
Where: Schenley Plaza, Pittsburgh
Cost: Free
I still pine for the YEP of old, monophonic, ragtag, direct access community radio from 4 Cable Place in Oakland. That was real radio for the people. Once they went ‘uptown,’ changing frequency, boosting the power and going stereo, they became a station for someone else, plain, not distinctive, and I stopped listening.
..but, you know, hats off to them.
Boomer