For the next two weekends, the seaside city of Newport is going to be a live music hub with the Newport Folk & Jazz Festivals taking place at Fort Adams. There’s an abundance of talented bands and musicians along with unannounced special guests providing special moments that are only going to be experienced by the people who attend. Both events are always an amazing time and it’s truly the highlight of the summer for a lot of music fans who come from all over. This year’s edition of Newport Folk is going down from July 26-28 with an abundance of awesomeness taking over the festival grounds. While it’s impossible to sum up the stacked bill in a few paragraphs, here are five acts that attendees should make an effort to check out when they arrive.
An example of how Newport Folk has been providing a spotlight for local bands over the past few years, the Eastern Medicine Singers from both Providence and Woonsocket are going to be starting things off on the Fort Stage during the festival’s first day. I got to see them perform with the guitar dynamo Yonatan Gat during last year’s edition and it was an incredible experience. This time around they’re going to be bringing former Sonic Youth guitarist Lee Ranaldo into the fold, so the energy should reach new heights when they play their unique brand of music.
There are some musicians who just perform songs, and then there are others like Allison Russell who exhibit their craft in a way that it’s an immersive experience. The Montreal native is a prime example of how someone can put their individuality into their art and she pulls this off by putting a soulful and vibrant spin on folk music. Just for the visuals alone, she’s absolutely worth seeing when her and her band grace the Fort Stage.
Before the idea of folk and punk rock merging together was even a thought in the musical lexicon, Billy Bragg was doing it around the United Kingdom and beyond when he started out during the late ‘70s. Today he is one of today’s most celebrated songwriters and his return to Newport Folk after a few years away has been greeted with joyous anticipation. I got to see him last year at the United Theater in Westerly and he was fantastic, so expect something similar to that during the festival’s second day.
A controversial element of this year’s festival among the “purists” is the inclusion of hip hop. While I somewhat understand the reaction, both hip hop and folk music essentially come from the same place, which is from America’s streets and the thoughts of the people who inhabit them. With this being said, De La Soul are hip hop legends and they’re going to be performing as part of a year-long celebration of the 35th anniversary of their seminal debut album “3 Feet High and Rising”.
We all know Conan O’Brien as one of the greatest hosts in the history of late night television, but he’s also a huge music fan. To close out the 2024 edition of the Newport Folk Festival, he’s going to be performing with the Los Angeles folk-rock act Dawes and Jimmy Vivino from the Basic Cable Band, which was the house band for Conan’s show he had on TBS. There’s going to be some special guests taking part as well, but you’re going to have to be there to see who that will be.
Along with the Fort Stage and Quad Stage, there also will be performers on the Harbor Stage, the Foundation Stage and the Bike Stage. These include the likes of Cory Wong, Killer Mike, Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway, Black Pumas, Hozier, Andrew Bird, Shovels & Rope, Rhiannon Giddens and The War On Drugs just to name a few. For the complete schedule and all the details, log on to Newport Folk’s website at newportfolk.org.
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