City Stages 2007: Why I’m staying away

I’ve been a faithful City Stages fan for years, at least 15 or so. Most of the last 10 years, I’ve paid for my tickets and happily headed downtown for three days of music and fellowship.

I dare say I’ve spent more supporting the festival than most people I know. I consider that a point of pride, almost to the point of foolishness.

After all, even if the lineup was weak — and many a year, the lineup was weak — I could count on seeing old friends and discovering worthy up-and-coming acts.

Not this year. Not with my money.

Updated with Preserve Jazz Festival attendance, plus additional links.

I’ve agonized over the decision. That probably seems pretty silly to many of you, especially those who haven’t been in years.

It even seems silly to announce that the 19th edition of the festival will take place on Friday through Sunday in and around Linn Park. But thousands who used to attend know little about the festival’s current status.

Or care.

Talent shortage

This year’s lineup is downright awful. The festival cut its talent budget by 20 percent, from $1.25 million to $1 million. It’s difficult to get excited over recent returnees Ludacris and Puddle of Mudd, or old standbys like Earth, Wind and Fire and Marcia Ball.

Some will point the finger at Bonnaroo, hogging all the good acts for its spectacular four-day festival in Manchester, Tenn. Before Bonnaroo, the festival competed directly or indirectly with Music Midtown in Atlanta, the New Orleans Jazz Festival, the KROQ Wienie Roast in Los Angeles and Memphis in May.

The world simply doesn’t stop because Birmingham holds a music festival.

Asking $50 for three days or even $28 for one day is too much for me. That three-day ticket price is up 25 percent from $40 in 2006, while one-day passes remain the same.

(A friend offered me the chance to buy a three-day pass for $30. And I bet if I asked around, I could swing a freebie ticket. Maybe you could, too. It’s that easy.)

I don’t know why lineup has become a factor for me this year. I paid for three-day passes before and suffered through the crowds and heat and cold and chair people and bad sound and lousy stage management, but it was OK.

I don’t want to spend a dime with the festival this year. I would feel like a hypocrite supporting the organization, given its ongoing indifference to public feedback and its utter inability to sustain itself.

I’ve never been a cheerleader for the event, nor have I been an outspoken critic. I’ve asked the same questions year in and year out, honest questions shared by many attendees. I wanted the festival to succeed so badly that I was willing to spend money rather than take the easy free tickets.

Those questions still deserve answers, as long as the festival seeks my support, your support and taxpayer support via the city, county and state.

Just because I don’t attend this year doesn’t mean I want the festival to fail. But I’m not going to support a train wreck.

If you go, you should go because you want to spend money to see these acts, not out of some sense of civic duty. But before you decide, let me tell you about a different festival experience.

Suburban oasis

Event co-founder Eric Essix plays onstage
at the Preserve Jazz Festival in Hoover.
Photo by Kevin Walker, Imaginary Existence.

Last week, I drove out to Hoover for Eric Essix’s startup event, the Preserve Jazz Festival. I love jazz, but I couldn’t picture a jazz festival with enough fans gathered in the middle of Hoover to pull it off.

How wrong I was.

I parked with everyone else at Regions Park (better known as the Hoover Met), where shuttle buses ran nonstop to take attendees to Moss Rock Preserve five minutes away. People brought chairs, towels, blankets and, get this, small coolers with food and drink — all allowed by the festival.

Near the dropoff point, I bought a ticket, but not for $24.50 as billed. Just $20. I had arrived to see Essix and headliner Kirk Whalum, the last two acts of the one-day event, and they were charging less than advertised. Wow.

The small stage looked out over several thousand people seated along this beautiful expansive lawn. I noticed two things right away. The sound was damn near perfect even walking in from the back. And I could sit just about anywhere, stretch out and see the performers.

Those who didn’t bring their own supplies had plenty of options to buy from vendors on site. No radio stations used oversize speakers to drown out the acts. No claustrophobic street setting forced all of us to crowd together just to enjoy the jazz.

And for three-plus hours, I just sat there and breathed in the music on this Sunday evening, surrounded by families and couples and kids and old folks and believers and nonbelievers, black and white.

Hoover, where I grew up, has a music festival, one likely to return and grow. Essix estimated the audience at more than 3,000, though he had expected only 1,500, and says, “We didn’t lose any money.”

And I remembered: This is what a festival is supposed to be like. This is why I love music.

I don’t know why City Stages organizers insist that their lineup is as good as other festivals. Or why they cast blame elsewhere, whether it’s a competing festival or the weather or poor ticket sales. Or why anyone should continue to reward their lack of responsibility or sustainability or simple transparency.

And I don’t know why Chuck Geiss at Black and White and Mary Colurso at the Birmingham News have pushed harder this year than in previous years.

The folks at City Stages don’t care that I’m not going this year. Or that I think they’re doing a poor job.

It saddens me that the festival struggles along, dying slowly year by year. Be merciful, pull the plug.

And let’s leave City Stages with a little dignity.

• • •

Also:

• Geiss, Black and White: “I can’t remember a year when I have heard less buzz about this event; the festival’s response.
• Colurso, The Birmingham News: “It’s impossible for me to talk about the festival without picking apart its financial woes and wondering about the debilitating impact of Bonnaroo.”
• Colurso, part 2: “Modest remedies be darned; we’re suggesting stuff that would be radical and sweeping.”
• Birmingham News: Festival reduces debt by $800,000
• Prayze Report: “Do some homework on the bigger gospel festivals that take place across the country.”
• The many lingering questions about the festival’s past and future
• Chip Frazier: “I am reluctantly doing a City Stages preview. The lineup admittedly is a disappointment this year for City Stages, but there are enough notables to mention.”
• André Natta, My Birmingham: “I go because, as much as I’ve always had the inner battle about whether or not to go, I enjoy the new sounds that reveal themselves to me each year.”
• The Terminal’s festival guide
• Who’s the pair writing the festival blog? An intern and a singer/guitarist.
• Need to make a quick buck? Sell your VIP passes on Craigslist.
• Nicki, The Birthplace of the Process of Illogical Logic: “One thing that ‘the Stages’ used to do well, but hasn’t done as much in recent years, is support local musicians.”
• Stanley Holditch, Fleabomb.com: “This is not to just say how laughably lame the festival has become, how it yearly manages to ignore the best bands in this town and never passes up an opportunity to appeal to the lowest common denominator.”
• Matt Cuthbert, Get On With Your Nightlife: “The problem with this year’s City Stages lineup is that almost all the headliners either feel out of date or they’ve already recently played in Birmingham.”

What do you think? Are you going to City Stages this weekend?

• • •

Complete City Stages 2007 coverage.

Posted: Tuesday, June 12, 2007, 9:01 am, in B'ham, Bama, Commerce, Culture, Hoover.
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