BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Events Listing for 2018

    When:
    June 28, 2018 all-day
    Repeats:
    June 10, 2018; june 13, 2018; june 14, 2018; june 16, 2018; june 20, 2018; june 21, 2018; june 22, 2018; june 23, 2018; june 28, 2018; june 29, 2018; june 30, 2018; july 6, 2018; july 7, 2018; july 12, 2018; july 13, 2018; july 14, 2018; july 19, 2018; july 20, 2018; july 21, 2018; july 25, 2018; july 26, 2018; july 27, 2018; july 28, 2018; august 2, 2018; august 3, 2018; august 4, 2018; august 7, 2018; august 9, 2018; august 10, 2018; august 11, 2018
    Click to view map
    Where:
    Prospect Park
    Brooklyn, NY 11225
    USA
    Cost:
    Free

    BRIC CELEBRATE BROOKLYN! Festival 2018 LINEUP

    June 5 – August 11

    AT THE PROSPECT PARK BANDSHELL
    Festival Launches BRIC’s Year-Long 40th Anniversary Celebration

    Visit as well the official pages here…

    Tuesday, June 5, 8:00 pm
    BET Opening Night Concert!
    COMMON
    Free

    “An artist’s duty,” Nina Simone once said, “is to reflect the times.” The rapper/poet/actor/activist Common has embodied this statement his whole career. From his ‘90s breakout in underground progressive hip hop, through mainstream success with the Soulquarians, and on to Hollywood stardom and beyond, he has remained an eloquent narrator of the injustices, challenges, conflicts, and hopes of his cultural moment. In the spirit of Simone’s quote, the Festival’s 40th season is a summer-long celebration of democratic ideals and social justice—and there’s no better way to kick it off than with a free show by this inspiring artist-citizen.

    Following the concert, at 10:00 pm, gala guests and Friends of the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival (i.e. members) are invited to the Opening Night After-Party featuring a celebrity guest DJ to be announced.

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    Sunday, June 10, 3:00 pm
    Family Concert
    LOS LOBOS
    Free

    For decades, the celebrated Mexican-American rock band Los Lobos have been seamlessly “moving back and forth between their Chicano roots and their love of American rock & roll” (Billboard), with hits like “La Bamba,” which was the first Spanish-language song to reach No. 1 in the U.S. charts. Lesser known, but equally as powerful, are their family music bona fides: the outstanding concept album Papa’s Dream (1995) and a whole record of Disney tunes (2009).

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    Wednesday, June 13, 7:00 pm
    THE DECEMBERISTS
    Ticketed BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Benefit Concert
    $45 (General Admission – Standing) 

    Tickets can be purchased by visiting BRICArtsMedia.org or Ticketfly.com.

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    Thursday, June 14, 7:30 pm
    VANCE JOY | ALICE MERTON
    Ticketed BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Benefit Concert
    $54.50 advance / $60 day of show (General Admission – Standing)

    Tickets can be purchased by visiting BRICArtsMedia.org or Ticketfly.com.

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    Saturday, June 16, 7:00 pm
    THE JAYHAWKS | MANDOLIN ORANGE | PARSONSFIELD
    Free

    For more than 30 years, The Jayhawks “have crafted widescreen power-pop with country-western affectations, summoning an easygoing romanticism and a skyward sound that makes even their sad songs seem happy.” (Portland Press Herald) 2016’s stellar record Paging Mr. Proust and a more recent collaboration with Ray Davies show they’re still at the top of their game. The sublime harmonies of North Carolina duo Mandolin Orange, who “approach traditional roots music from a fresh, modern perspective,” (Rolling Stone) and the raucous foot-stomping Americana of Parsonsfield round out a perfect Saturday at the Bandshell.

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    Wednesday, June 20, 6:30 pm
    GRIZZLY BEAR + SPOON
    Ticketed BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Benefit Concert
    $46 advance / $51 day of show (General Admission – Standing)

    Tickets can be purchased by visiting BRICArtsMedia.org or Ticketfly.com.

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    Thursday, June 21, 7:30 pm
    Bud Light Music Series
    AIMEE MANN | SUPERCHUNK | JONATHAN COULTON
    Free

    Aimee Mann, whom NPR named one the 10 best living songwriters, is at the height of her powers: her 2017 record Mental Illness is her “quintessential statement.” (Pitchfork) The seminal pop-punk band Superchunk co-headlines, riding a wave of angsty momentum generated by their 2018 release What a Time to Be Alive, a snarling polemic against our current political moment. Singer-songwriter and raconteur Jonathan Coulton opens.

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    Friday, June 22, 7:30 pm
    Bud Light Music Series
    R+R=NOW featuring ROBERT GLASPER, TERRACE MARTIN, CHRISTIAN SCOTT aTUNDE ADJUAH, DERRICK HODGE, JUSTIN TYSON, TAYLOR MCFERRIN | PAUL BEAUBRUN
    Free

    Each member of Robert Glasper’s exceptional new collective is an underground icon in his own right, contributing to prestigious releases from the likes of Snoop Dogg, Jill Scott, and Herbie Hancock. The name stands for Reflect+Respond=Now, and the mission is to create music that speaks to the current socio-political moment. BRIC has commissioned the group to write a new piece of music for this show called The Liberation Suite, which will have its world premiere at the Bandshell as part of their set. The Haitian-American singer and guitarist (and Brooklynite) Paul Beaubrun opens.

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    Saturday, June 23, 7:30 pm
    FISCHERSPOONER | JULIANA HUXTABLE
    Free

    “The art-pop duo and original poster-boys for New York City’s electroclash scene” (NPR) have come storming back with a fresh embrace of sensuality, lust, and love, and a new stage show that is not for the prudish. Sir, Fischerspooner’s first new record in nine years, boasts a gaggle of name-drop-worthy collaborators (Michael Stipe, Caroline Polachek of Chairlift, Boots) and is packed with dance floor ready singles. The DJ/author/conceptual artist Juliana Huxtable, “a mind whose output transcends prescribed limitations,” (artnet) spins.

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    Thursday, June 28, 8:00 pm
    THE BLUES PROJECT FEATURING DORRANCE DANCE WITH TOSHI REAGON & BIGLOVELY CREATED BY MICHELLE DORRANCE, DERICK K. GRANT, TOSHI REAGON, AND DORMESHIA SUMBRY-EDWARDS
    Free

    This joyful and explosive collision of dance and music solidified Michelle Dorrance’s reputation as “one of the most imaginative tap choreographers working today.” (The New YorkerThe Blues Project brings together Dorrance’s exceptional company with the elemental musical force that is Toshi Reagon & BIGLovely to reveal “a deep merging of forms: As Ms. Reagon’s music envelops the dancing, the dancing seeps through to the last chord and sometimes even beyond it.” (The New York Times)

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    Friday, June 29, 7:30 pm
    BRANFORD MARSALIS | ROGER GUENVEUR SMITH: FREDERICK
     DOUGLASS NOW
    Free

    The GRAMMY Award-winning New Orleans-based sax player and bandleader Branford Marsalis is “a jazz chameleon…with a swooping tone, supple phrasing, and witty licks.” (AllMusic) His two sets tonight bookend Roger Guenveur Smith’s startling one man show, Frederick Douglass Now, which incorporates elements of poetry slam, rap, and revival minister to recast the words of the runaway slave-turned-abolitionist into a 21st century context and “makes a striking statement about where America has come and still has to go in terms of race.” (LA Times)

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    Saturday, June 30, 7:00 pm
    RICKY SKAGGS and KENTUCKY THUNDER |
     SIERRA HULL AND JUSTIN MOSES | MAMIE MINCH
    Free

    Mandolin master and 2018 Country Music Hall of Fame inductee Ricky Skaggs “is without peer as a combination vocalist and instrumentalist.” (AllMusic) This living legend will get a run for his money from Sierra Hull, who as a teenage mandolin phenom “emerged as one of bluegrass’ most celebrated prodigies” (NPR) and the multi-instrumentalist (and former Skaggs bandmate) Justin Moses. Brooklyn’s own Mamie Minch starts the show.

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    Friday, July 6, 8:00 pm
    LES BALLETS JAZZ DE MONTRÉAL: LEONARD COHEN’S DANCE ME
    Free

    Originally commissioned before Leonard Cohen’s death and with his blessing, Ballet Jazz de Montréal’s sprawling homage to his songs “is a grandly executed hodgepodge of performance art that pushes the entertainment value of contemporary dance closer to the level of a rock concert or big-budget musical.” (Ottawa Citizen) It debuted in Canada to great acclaim last year and the full piece will have its American premiere at the Bandshell.

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    Saturday, July 7, 7:00 pm
    Eventbrite Music Series
    RHYE | NATALIE PRASS | OVERCOATS
    Free

    From a mysterious studio project to sold-out shows, Rhye has expanded their downtempo R&B sound with a sprawling live band and concerts that now stretch “into extended jam sessions that touched on everything from the irrepressible soul-funk of Curtis Mayfield to late ‘60s psychedelic soul bands like Vanilla Fudge and Rare Earth.” (Billboard) The night begins with the “slow neo-soul simmer” (Stereogum) of the dynamic singer-songwriter Natalie Prass and the “magnetic harmonies” (Billboard) of electro-folk duo Overcoats.

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    Thursday, July 12, 7:30 pm
    ANTIBALAS | COMBO CHIMBITA | DJ NICKODEMUS
    Free

    The Brooklyn afrobeat juggernaut Antibalas’ live shows have become the stuff of legend. Last year’s Where the Gods Are in Peace, released on the storied Bushwick label Daptone Records, “takes their lustral party vibes and adds layers of activist lyrics, satire and incendiary rhythms to create their strongest, and most politically charged, album to date.” (Drowned in Sound) With an opening set of high energy, locally-sourced tropical futurism from Combo Chimbita and DJ Nickodemus of Turntables on the Hudson fame presiding, it’s a global dance party born in Brooklyn.

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    Friday, July 13, 7:00 pm
    Eventbrite Music Series
    MALA RODRIGUEZ |
     ANA TIJOUX | GIRL ULTRA
    Free

    The Latin Alternative Music Conference returns for its annual showcase with a night of fierce women headlined by the Spanish MC Mala Rodriguez, whose fiery hybrid style “marries flamenco, boom-bap hip-hop, laptop trap, and ‘70s soul.” (Remezcla) Ana Tijoux, a French-Chilean rapper “who melts and reworks the Spanish language like a blacksmith,” (NPR) and Girl Ultra, “a bleeding-heart R&B diva from Mexico City,” (Remezcla) complete the bill. Presented in association with the Latin Alternative Music Conference.

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    Saturday, July 14, 7:30 pm
    KRONOS QUARTET
     | TRIO DA KALI
    Free

    No group has been more adventurously omnivorous in its collaborations than Kronos Quartet, and last year’s Ladilikan, with the Malian supergroup Trio Da Kali, is a high point in a career of high points. Inspired by gospel queen and civil rights pioneer Mahalia Jackson, the record runs the gamut “from subtle harmonic counterpoint, to circular riffs reminiscent of Steve Reich’s minimalism, to grander phrasings that seem to join the dots between Malian blues and Appalachian folk.” (The Guardian) The two bands grace our stage, separately and together, for a magical evening.

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    Thursday, July 19, 7:00 pm
    JOE RUSSO’S ALMOST DEAD
    Ticketed BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Benefit Concert
    $45 (General Admission – Standing)

    Tickets can be purchased by visiting BRICArtsMedia.org or Ticketfly.com.

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    Friday, July 20, 7:30 pm
    ANOUSHKA SHANKAR | MY BRIGHTEST DIAMOND
    Free

    Melding Indian classical raga with other world music influences and electronica beats in her new project Land of Gold, the sitar master Anoushka Shankar creates a sound “whose shimmering textures seem to offer a hotline to the divine,” (The Australian) honoring tradition while boldly embracing the future. The indie experimentalist Shara Nova, who as My Brightest Diamond makes music that “feels simultaneously micro-orchestrated and entirely, ecstatically spontaneous,” (NPR) brings a brand new lineup to the Bandshell in advance of a new record out this fall.

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    Saturday, July 21, 7:30 pm
    Music & Movies

    BRIMSTONE AND GLORY W/ LIVE SCORE BYWORDLESS MUSIC ORCHESTRA | SONIDO GALLO NEGRO
    Free

    One of the biggest movie screens in NYC will explode with light, color, and sound during this screening and live orchestral score of Brimstone and Glory, a documentary by the creators of Beasts of the Southern Wild about the National Pyrotechnic Festival in Tultepec, Mexico, that captures the ritual, danger, and absolute beauty of fireworks. “Mixing sheer spectacle with human-interest threads, [the film is] a poetical, entrancing documentary,” writes Variety. Wordless Music Orchestra provides the percussive accompaniment, and Sonido Gallo Negro, a stunning theremin-driven nine-piece instrumental combo from Mexico City that channels both the mystique and mysticism of 1960s Peruvian cumbia, opens.

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    Wednesday, July 25, 7:00 pm
    COURTNEY BARNETT | JULIEN BAKER | VAGABON
    Ticketed BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Benefit Concert
    $39.50 advance / $45 day of show (General Admission – Standing)

    Tickets can be purchased by visiting BRICArtsMedia.org or Ticketfly.com.

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    Thursday, July 26, 7:30 pm
    Eventbrite Music Series
    BRANDI CARLILE | RUTHIE FOSTER
    Free

    Brandi Carlile’s 2018 record, By the Way, I Forgive You, is a career-defining tour de force that “expertly skirts the fine line between rootsiness and pure, pre-‘Americana’ singer/songwriter finesse.” (Variety) With a voice that easily slides from whispered raw emotion to rafter-shaking power, she makes the intimate feel anthemic and the anthemic transcendent. Texan blueswoman Ruthie Foster’s trio showcases her soulful, gospel-infused vocals and luminous guitar, which Rolling Stone calls “pure magic to watch and hear.”

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    Friday, July 27, 7:30 pm
    TINARIWEN |
     CHEICK HAMALA DIABATE
    Free

    The GRAMMY Award-winning, guitar shredding desert blues group Tinariwen originally formed while living in exile. Called “music’s true rebels” by NPR, these Tuareg musicians from northern Mali bonded over revolutionary politics and a shared love of the radical chaabi protest music of Morocco, Algerian pop rai, and western artists like Led Zeppelin and Carlos Santana. The night begins with the Malian griot and ngoni master Cheick Hamala Diabate.

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    Saturday, July 28, 7:30 pm
    Music & Movies

    NAUSICAÄ OF THE VALLEY OF THE WIND | KAKI KING
    Free

    Roger Ebert once called Hayao Miyazaki and his Studio Ghibli collaborator Isao Takahata, of Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke fame, “arguably the greatest directors of animation in the world.” Considered by some their finest film, Nausicaä, the 1984 masterpiece that launched the studio, is a visually dazzling post-apocalyptic epic about a warrior princess and her fight to save a toxic jungle and its giant mutant insects from an ancient weapon of unimaginable power. Think Star Wars meets Avatar, but smarter and more fun than both. The otherworldly Brooklyn-based guitarist Kaki King sets the stage for the fantasy.

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    Thursday, August 2, 7:30 pm
    Eventbrite Music Series
    BADBADNOTGOOD |
     CHARLOTTE DAY WILSON
    Free

    Mixing instrumental hip hop with free improvisation and spacey electronica, the virtuosic Toronto quartet BADBADNOTGOOD lets “the jazz philosophy of music bending to individual musicians’ styles shape their genre-hopping evolution.” (The Seattle Times) Wildly innovative covers and collaborations with the likes of Kendrick Lamar and Tyler The Creator have catapulted the group to stardom. The singer-songwriter and guitarist Charlotte Day Wilson, another BBNG collaborator, possesses a “wide, bright, humid voice” (NPR) that packs a heavy emotional wallop.

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    Friday, August 3, 7:30 pm
    Eventbrite Music Series
    NONAME | TOPAZ JONES | JAZZE BELLE
    Free

    The outspoken Chicago MC and poet Noname’s acclaimed 2016 solo debut, Telefone, showcased “a potency and urgency in her complicated, spoken word-esque cadences” (Stereogum) that captivated the hip hop world and set her miles apart from this generation of rising talent. The night begins with sets from the electrifying Brooklyn rapper and singer Topaz Jones, who “proved his scholarship by weaving West Coast G-funk with Southern rap flows,”

    (Pitchfork) and Jazze Belle, a Harlem outfit with “a sound that’s both unique and intimate, carving out its own space in the NYC expanding alt soul scene.” (The Deli)

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    Saturday, August 4, 7:30 pm
    TARRUS RILEY WITH DEAN FRASER AND THE BLAK SOIL BAND
     | MWENSO & THE SHAKES
    Free

    Tarrus Riley, the son of the late, beloved ska and rocksteady star Jimmy Riley and “one of the most accomplished of the second generation of Jamaica roots reggae singers,” (Jamaica Gleaner) belts out love songs and black history lessons with equal passion. Mwenso & the Shakes’ members hail from across the globe but all call Harlem home; they put on an electrifying show The New York Times calls “intense, prowling, and ebullient.”

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    Tuesday, August 7, 7:30 pm
    GOOD VIBES WITH JASON MRAZ & BRETT DENNEN
    Ticketed BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Benefit Concert
    $55 advance / $60 day of show (General Admission – Standing)

    Tickets can be purchased by visiting BRICArtsMedia.org or Ticketfly.com.

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    Thursday, August 9, 7:30 pm
    Bud Light Music Series
    GARY CLARK JR.
     | FIONA SILVER
    Free

    Once a blues rock phenom and collector of Hendrix comparisons by the truckload, Gary Clark Jr. has developed into a genre-warping guitarist and singer defiant of categorization. Is it psychedelia? Soul? Hip hop? Yes. Whatever you want to call it, his “fiery technique is a thrill to witness.” (The New York Times) The “brash and beguiling” (Paste) chanteuse Fiona Silver kicks things off.

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    Friday, August 10, 7:30 pm
    GODSPEED YOU! BLACK EMPEROR
     | EMEL MATHLOUTHI
    Free

    The legendary Montréal experimental collective Godspeed You! Black Emperor drives music writers to abandon caution with its “swelling, torrential compositions that also gracefully loom, like a dewed spiderweb, squaring the circle of neo-classical and punk rock.” (NPR) In Emel Mathlouthi, whose electronica-infused songs were the soundtrack of the Tunisian revolution, “you hear a person refusing to compromise, a searing vision founded on real risks and the necessity of truth.” (Pitchfork)

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    Saturday, August 11, 7:30 pm
    Bud Light Music Series
    THE BREEDERS
     | SPEEDY ORTIZ
    Free

    Anchored by the deadpan vocals and vicious guitars of Kim and Kelley Deal, The Breeders came storming back this year with All Nerve, featuring the lineup from 1992’s iconic Last Splash. The new record has “many moments of bliss, even as the lyrics evoke isolation, frustration, and scuzz” (Pitchfork) as only this band can. Speedy Ortiz, which “once invited abundant comparisons to ’90s alternative rock bands like Pavement and Helium,” has continued to evolve, as frontwoman Sadie Dupuis “tackles the heavy task of killing her idols.” (Pitchfork)

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    About BRIC and the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival

    BRIC is the leading presenter of free cultural programming in Brooklyn, and one of the largest in New York City. The organization presents and incubates work by artists and media-makers that reflects the diversity of New York. BRIC programs reach hundreds of thousands of people each year.

    BRIC’s main venue, BRIC House, offers a public media center, a major contemporary art exhibition space, two performance spaces, a glass-walled TV studio and artist work spaces.

    Some of BRIC’s most acclaimed programs include the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival in Prospect Park; groundbreaking media initiatives, including BRIC TV, BRIC Radio, and Brooklyn Free Speech; and renowned contemporary art exhibitions. BRIC also offers education and community-building programs at BRIC House and throughout Brooklyn.

    In addition to making cultural programming genuinely accessible, BRIC is dedicated to providing substantial support to artists and media makers in their efforts to develop work and reach new audiences. BRIC is unusual in both presenting exceptional cultural experiences and nurturing individual expression. This dual commitment enables BRIC to most effectively reflect New York City’s innate cultural richness and diversity.

    The BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival is BRIC’s flagship performing arts program: a free, summer-long experience allowing New Yorkers to come back again and again with their friends and family to appreciate or discover a new genre, acclaimed artist, or world culture each night of the Festival. Entering its 40th season, the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival has presented celebrated global music icons, legendary jazz artists, chart-topping indie bands, gravity-defying dance troupes, large-scale film projects and even a virtual reality performance, becoming one of the city’s foremost cultural attractions and a beloved summer tradition. The festival’s Executive Producer is Jack Walsh. Its Artistic Director is Rachel Chanoff. Leslie Schultz is the President of BRIC