HOBOKEN – The 23rd Annual Hoboken Arts & Music Festival kicks off on Sunday, Sept. 25 at 11 a.m. and will last all day rain or shine until 6 p.m. on Washington Street between Observer Highway & 7th Street.
Admission to all events and attractions is free.
As usual, the festival will offer three stages of live music, including a performance by
Spyro Gyra, featuring Hoboken’s own Julio Fernandez.
Other performances will be bySwingadelic, The Amazing Incredibles, Hudson City Rats, Zydeco Revelators, Mya Hansen, Jeremy Beck & the Uptown Horns, Chrissy Roberts, Emily & the Ideals, Preschool of Rock, Jason Didner & the Jungle Gym Jam, and more.
Over 300 artists, crafters, photographers, food vendors, local business and more. A special kid’s section will offer rides, games, face painting, sand art, entertainment and much more.
Special features
• Fine artists will be located between 2nd & 3rd Streets, 5th & 6th Streets, and artists from the Monroe Center for the Arts will be between First & Newark Streets, so if you are an art collector, these are the locations you will want to explore first. Oil paintings, watercolors, acrylics, sculpture, mixed media, photography, etc.
• Children’s activities will be on 3rd Street with rides, games, creative activities, face painting, sand art, balloons, live performances and much, much more.
• Crafters display/sell handmade pottery, metalwork, wood items, furniture, blown & fused glass, quilts, household items made from recycled materials, batik clothing, hand painted furniture, candles, jewelry, dried florals, soaps & lotions and other unique handcrafted items.
• Food: Lots of great food will be throughout the fair. Hoboken restaurants will set up street cafes offering an eclectic variety of international foods such as Thai, Indian, Greek, French, Mexican, Cajun and Italian.
The festival’s sponsors include Suez, NJ Lottery, WFUV, The Hudson Reporter and This Is It Stage Productions. Additional support provided by: Walgreens, Capital One Bank, Inserra Shop Rite of Hoboken, Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts, Anthony Davids and Losurdo Brothers Deli / Tony’s Italian Bakery.
For more information, call (201) 420-2207 or online at: http://hobokennj.gov/departments/human-services/cultural-affairs/arts-music-festival/
Spyro Gyra
Spyro Gyra is a group with humble beginnings in Buffalo, N.Y. who have continued to reach an international audience for over forty years, resulting in sales of over 10 million albums and having played over five thousand shows on five continents. They have accomplished this due to a forward looking approach combined with the work ethic of an underdog, always challenging themselves to do something new while never resting on past success. It has proven to be a recipe for longevity for this jazz group while music has gone in and out of styles in ever shorter cycles.
Spyro Gyra are contemporary jazz icons who observed their 40th year as a band in 2014 with shows that showcased their breakthrough “Morning Dance” album. After that year of looking back, they decided to spend 2015 concentrating on their more recent material, playing songs from their post-2000 releases. The audience reaction was so positive to their recent material that bandleader Jay Beckenstein decided that their albums from that period deserved a little more focus. So, in order to spotlight this innovative and productive period, Spyro Gyra is releasing “The Best Of The Heads Up Years” this spring.
They released their last, their 30th, album of new material The Rhinebeck Sessions in 2013, which Jazztimes called “inspired”. Travis Rogers of the Jazz Journalists Association picked it for Jazz Album Of The Year. Something Else Reviews called it “Their finest album since their early 80s heyday” and made it a Top Twenty pick for the year.
“My hope is that our music has the same effect on the audience that it does on me,” says group leader Jay Beckenstein.
Spyro Gyra was awarded the George Benson Lifetime Achievement Award from the Canadian Smooth Jazz Awards in 2007.