Fans of avant-garde music have had much to celebrate recently in Detroit, with the continued success of collectives like New Music Detroit and their annual Strange Beautiful Music marathon, MOCAD’s and Trinosophes’ diverse sonic programming, and the announcement of the first Trip Metal Fest, which will offer a left-field alternative to Memorial Day weekend’s Movement Festival. To this list can be added the Detroit Free Arts Music Festival, which celebrates its first annual edition this weekend at Detroit Contemporary.
The two-day event will feature more than 20 local, regional, and national acts performing experimental and improvised works spanning the diverse territory of creative music. The festival is sponsored by Spread Art, an artist-run creative incubator designed to foster new interdisciplinary projects. Two of its members, James Cornish and Michael Malis, created and curated the event and are also scheduled to perform.
Among the acts on the lineup are Spread Art’s artist-in-residence, Vancouver harpist Elisa Thorn, who will perform with the trio Jazz Bras Dot Com. Detroit acts include drummers Djallo Djakate and Matthew Daher, saxophonists Mike Monford, woodwind specialist Marcus Elliot, and many more.
Admission to the first annual Detroit Free Arts Music Festival is on a sliding scale, between $5 and $10. The event takes place at Detroit Contemporary on 5141 Rosa Parks Blvd, Detroit. Doors open on Friday, April 15 at 5 p.m. and on Saturday, April 16 at 1 p.m. Check out the schedule below:
Friday
6:00–6:30 Maatchoo Blessyou Daher
6:45–7:15 Augusta Rose
7:30–8:00 Djallo Djakate
8:15–8:45 James Cornish/John Olson/Eric Schweizer/Lisa LaMarre
9:00–9:30 Rent Romus/Joel Peterson
9:45–10:15 Jazz Bras Dot Com (Elisa Thorn/Jessica Ackerley Guitar/Laura Swankey)
10:30–11:00 Derek Worthington/Mark Kirschenmann
11:15–11:45 Ben Willis/BC Grimm Duo
Saturday
1:30–2:00 Nicholas Arthur Tallidis/Jordon Schranz
2:15–2:45 Abby Alwin
3:00–3:30 Rafael Statin
3:45–4:15 Thomas Bell
4:30–4:45 Marcus Elliot
5:00–5:30 Rent Romus/James Cornish/ Elisa Thorn
5:45–6:15 Jake Shadik
6:30–7:00 Shelby Murphy/Skeeter Shelton
7:15–7:45 Witchpucker (Dan Clark/Sara Grosky)
8:00–8:30 Flandrew Fleisenberg/Jim Strong
8:45–9:15 Mike Monford/Mixxael Mxlis
9:30–10:00 Alex Koi
10:15–10:45 Maatchoo Blessyou Daher/Mixxael Mxlis/Rachael Ahn Harbert/Simon Alexander-Adams
11:00–CLOSE All In