The Red Hook Fest, a waterfront favorite featuring Valentino Park and local talent, returns Friday, June 4, 2021, with 3 nights of live performances, family-friendly activities, vital resources, and much-needed celebration.
Hook Arts Media has proudly produced the annual Red Hook Fest since the early 1990s. The dynamic lineup presents a powerful array of New York’s most talented and progressive artists, including Laura Anderson Barbata with the Brooklyn Jumbies, Jive Poetic, DJ Mikey Palms, Los Cumpleaños, LayeRhythm Jam, and Cora Dance’s Mateo Vidals.
Red Hook Fest will kick off with a dance party for the whole family in the PS15 Schoolyard on Friday, June 4, 2021, from 4pm to 6pm. DJ Mikey Palms will curate an evening full of your favorite hits. Cora Dance will present an original work, choreographed by Mateo Vidal and performed by Mateo Vidal and Phoebe Pfaffman. Family-friendly activities will include t-shirt design, book giveaways, sidewalk chalk, and more. Free food giveaways offered on a first-come-first-served basis.
On Saturday, June 5, 2021, join Laura Anderson Barbata and the Brooklyn Jumbies in a processional through the Red Hook Houses beginning at 5 pm. The processional starts at Clinton St./Centre Mall at 5 pm and will end in Coffey Park at 5:30 pm. And if that doesn’t get you on your feet, you won’t be able to resist dancing while Cornelio Joseph leads a drumline performance! Keep the party going in Coffey Park with live music, outdoor dance classes, and free food giveaways!
Red Hook Fest will wrap 2021 programming with an evening of music and dance on Saturday, June 12, from 4pm to 7pm on Richard Street, emceed by Jive Poetic. Featuring performances by LayeRhythm Jam and Los Cumpleaños, audiences can sing and dance (socially distanced) with their neighbors. With local organizations, resources, food giveaways, and activities for the whole family, June 12th will bring a fun and festive close to two weeks of much-needed celebration.
LayeRhythm Jam
“[LayeRhythm is a] brew of partying and performing that unfolds as a series of interactive sessions in which suggestions from the crowd beget songs and steps. Imagine an improv comedy show where dancing, not laughs, is the currency. Then imagine a musicians’ jam session where the band is compelled to keep the dancers’ pace instead of the other way around. […] what’s distinct about LayeRhythm is the way it bridges the two groups with crowd participation.”
James Thomas for The New York Times
Los Cumpleaños
Los Cumpleaños brings you Psych-Synth, Post-Truth Tropical Futurism from NYC. “Exciting and avant-garde… a pleasant surprise to find out where the [music] would take us from minute to minute.”
Shade Adeyemo, Lincoln Center, NYC
With an unmistakable, freewheeling style, Los Cumpleaños mixes tropical rhythms and experimental sounds into an energetic, danceable, free-form musical experience. Citing influences as diverse as Colombian accordion legend Lisandro Meza, free jazz iconoclast Sun Ra and genre-defying tastemakers like Flying Lotus and Tame Impala, Los Cumpleaños is a group that could only emerge from the cultural landscape of New York City. The band features virtuoso percussionist/vocalist Nestor Gomez from Barranquilla, Colombia, Lautaro Burgos from Chaco, Argentina on Drumset as well as Eric Lane on Keyboards and Alex Asher on Trombone from the USA. Members of Los Cumpleaños have played with a variety of notable artists including: Anival Velazquez, Lizandro Meza, Porfi Baloa y sus Adolocentes, Juan Piña, Alfredo Gutierrez, MAKU Soundsystem, Orquesta Dee Jay, Beyoncé, Joan as Police Woman, People’s Champs & The Superpowers
