After a yr of silence in 2020 and a “mini” socially distant model in 2021, the Seaside Highway Weekend music pageant on Martha’s Winery will return at full energy for the primary time since its inaugural weekend in 2019.
Headlining this yr’s three-day occasion at Veterans Memorial Park in Winery Haven might be eight-time Grammy Award winner Beck, Wilco, the Avett Brothers, and an inventory of greater than 30 different bands in what’s shaping as much as be presumably the largest live performance to ever happen on the island.
“That is stocked with 10 hours of stable music day by day,” says Adam Epstein, pageant founder and CEO of Innovation Arts and Leisure in addition to the president of the Associates of Martha’s Winery Live performance Collection. “There aren’t a bunch of filler bands on right here. From starting to finish, it’s unbelievable. For those who’re lacking it, you’re going to remorse it.”
The live performance invoice additionally options native expertise you’re positive to be aware of, comparable to Falmouth’s personal Crooked Coast and Boston-born funk/rock group Lettuce. Loads of distributors and good eats might be out there for what some would take into account the final word summer time weekend.
“It’s a celebration of the island,” says Epstein.
The highway to Seaside Highway weekend
Epstein is a local New Yorker who now owns property on Martha’s Winery and “feels built-in into the group.” He spent his first summer time on the island in 1988 as a university pupil selecting up trash in Winery Haven through the day and washing dishes at night time.
The island that “birthed James Taylor” has an “unbelievable historical past of reside music,” Epstein says, however what he observed as he got here again as a customer later in life didn’t reside as much as the fame.
“A few of that wealthy musical historical past and integration with the remainder of the world had began to vanish,” he says. “There (weren’t many) touring musicians touring right here. There’s loads of native music, however for some motive it appeared that integration with the remainder of the world had appeared to vanish.”
Epstein says he determined to make use of his assets to create what he describes as a setting the place music from all around the world could be embraced. His lineup this yr contains people, funk, rock and pop.
Who’s enjoying?
Seaside Highway Weekend hit the bottom working in 2019 with a invoice that included John Fogerty and Phil Lesh, and returned in 2021 with Tedeschi Vans and moe.. Epstein is selecting up the place he had hoped to be in 2020 by getting who was presupposed to be that yr’s headliner, Beck, again on the schedule. Beck’s Saturday efficiency, Epstein says, might be Beck’s first-ever present on Martha’s Winery. People rock group the Avett Brothers will headline Friday’s lineup, and different rock band Wilco will shut out the reveals on Sunday.
These planning to be on the three-day occasion can have loads of completely different bands to see carry out reside as teams might be enjoying on two completely different phases — the Lighthouse stage and Black Canine stage — starting every day at 10:45 a.m. and ending at 8 p.m.
“We’re honored and we’re pleased that we’re (a part of Seaside Highway Weekend) and we are able to’t wait to come back to Martha’s Winery and play with such an unbelievable lineup,” says Lettuce guitarist Adam Smirnoff. Lettuce — enjoying on the Lighthouse Stage at 2:15 p.m. Saturday — bought its begin in Boston 30 years in the past and is a Grammy-nominated band, however Smirnoff doesn’t recall the group ever enjoying reside on the Winery.
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As for what listeners can count on to listen to the funk rock veterans play, that’s up within the air, though it’s potential there could possibly be some new tracks from their newest album, “Unify.”
“There’s no actual components to how we go about it,” Smirnoff says about selecting a set listing. “Hopefully no matter we find yourself enjoying is one thing that we get pleasure from enjoying that day and we’re capable of dig deep and pull probably the most from our souls and put probably the most emotion we are able to behind the music.”
Falmouth’s Crooked Coast band is touting a brand new album, “Image This” and might be enjoying Seaside Highway Weekend scorching off the heels of headlining its very personal music pageant, Coast-Fest, and enjoying Boston Calling. Crooked Coast will carry out at 11:15 a.m. Saturday on the identical stage as Lettuce.
“I’m undoubtedly trying ahead to seeing Beck, that’s an enormous bucket listing, and simply hanging out with all of our buddies from the Winery and all our buddies from Falmouth who’re going to come back over,” says Crooked Coast guitarist Luke Vose. “And like something once you’re in entrance of a bunch of latest folks, that chance to share our music with them and hopefully make some new followers out of it.”
Touring to Seaside Highway Weekend
Live performance goers have a number of choices in terms of deciding how they wish to journey to Seaside Highway Weekend. Relying on the place they’re departing from, these embody Hy-Line Cruises in Hyannis; the Seastreak that makes stops in New Jersey, New York Metropolis and New Bedford; the Steamship Authority ferries from Woods Gap; and the Island Queen in Falmouth. There’s a quick ferry that leaves Rhode Island for Martha’s Winery, too.
Cape Air, Delta, Jet Blue and American Airways may get attendees there by air. Martha’s Winery Airport is situated six miles from Veterans Memorial Park the place the pageant is going down.
As soon as on the island, there’s a shuttle service supplied for a payment by the live performance organizers that makes stops from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. in Oak Bluffs, Edgartown and West Tisbury. There can even be a “water taxi” being supplied completely to Seaside Highway Weekend ticket holders from Martha’s Winery to “the mainland,” in keeping with the occasion’s web site, the place you possibly can reserve a spot, together with late-night.
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What’s nonetheless out there, as much as $2,500 seats within the Skydeck, could be discovered on the Seaside Highway Weekend web site.
Wanting forward
Seaside Highway Weekend has but to make a revenue since its begin in 2019, Epstein says, when its prices exceeded its revenue by about $1.5 million. However Epstein says that isn’t uncommon when investing in an occasion which you could construct off of yr after yr.
“We’re constructing an attraction, an occasion, and that occasion comes with a major multi-million-dollar funding,” he says. “So, with the pageant within the first yr, it was in regards to the idea and doing it once more. You get better somewhat extra annually you do the pageant.”
Epstein not too long ago signed a three-year deal – counting this yr – with the city of Tisbury to make sure that Seaside Highway Weekend won’t be going wherever and can have an opportunity to recoup its bills.
As a part of the deal, the city will get a sure share of the revenue after the pageant reaches the purpose of overlaying its prices, on high of the gross sales tax revenue the city already receives from every thing offered on the pageant.
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“There’s a fund created for offering providers for sure organizations, however it goes right into a fund and the city decides what it is going to be for,” Epstein explains. When requested how a lot of a lower of the revenue the city of Tisbury will obtain, Epstein says, “I don’t bear in mind.”
Regardless of anticipating about 12,000 folks to attend this yr’s Seaside Highway Weekend, when requested if the occasion would see a revenue in 2022, Epstein says, “We have been.” However the spike in costs for every thing from diesel gasoline to lodge rooms for employees and expertise has made that appear much less seemingly, he says.
Epstein stays optimistic for the following two years of Seaside Highway Weekend, repeating that’s why “You construct a system which you could repeat yearly.” The curiosity and buzz across the occasion continues to extend yr after yr, he says, and the assist from Tisbury has been “unbelievable.”
“We’re devoted to having a protected, enjoyable occasion that everyone involves and sees this island in its greatest gentle: welcoming, hospitable,” Epstein says. “We wish to welcome folks to our house right here, present them an excellent time, after which see them off safely.”
The right way to be a part of Seaside Highway Weekend
When: 10:45 a.m. – 8 p.m., Friday, Aug. 26 by means of Sunday, Aug. 28 (doorways open at 10 a.m.)
The place: Veterans Memorial Park, off Causeway Highway, Winery Haven
Tickets: $150 single-day go common admission, $275 three-day go common admission, $2,000-2,500 Skydeck, $1,500 three-day VIP
Reservations and data: https://www.beachroadweekend.com/