WXPN offers live and prerecorded Philly concerts online after cancellation of XPoNential Music Festival
From a press release:
Philadelphia public radio station WXPN 88.5 FM is producing a summer-long slate of special music programming, with some replacing the WXPN live music events that its members and listeners typically enjoy each summer but have been cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.
In place of its now-cancelled, annual three-day XPoNential Music Festival taking place on the Delaware Riverfront in late July, fans can revisit past years’ performances online when WXPN presents “XPNFest Fridays.” Two complete back-to-back concerts from the festival archives will be available every Friday night at 7 p.m. during June and July, with full sets by Courtney Barnett (2015) and Low Cut Connie (2019) kicking the series off on Friday, June 5.
More festival celebrating will take place with the “XPNFest Weekend” from Friday, July 24 through Sunday, July 26, featuring archived XPoNential Music Festival performances as well as new and exclusive performances by selected artists who were scheduled to perform at this year’s event. Archived festival performances will be available online on July 24 and July 25, and exclusive new concerts recorded and provided by artists will be online and on-air Sunday, July 26. Fans can talk about the event and share using the #XPNFest hashtag.
“We’re excited that some of the artists who were to have performed at this year’s XPoNential Music Festival are providing these exclusive concerts just for WXPN members and listeners,” said WXPN General Manager Roger LaMay.
“It speaks to the strong connection that artists have with WXPN audiences, even during this extraordinarily challenging time.”
In addition to events celebrating WXPN’s summer XPoNential Music Festival:
- More artists will perform exclusively for WXPN and its nationally-syndicated daily music program “World Cafe” in the “World Cafe Instagram Live Happy Hour” every Tuesday and Thursday during June, from 5 p.m.-5:30 p.m. Amos Lee and Jaime Wyatt will be the first artists to perform in this new online series when it starts on June 2, with future performances coming from The Lone Bellow, The War and Treaty, Lo Moon, Shakey Graves, Katie Pruitt, Mondo Cozmo, Marcus King, Squirrel Flower, Dizzy, and more.
- Some of Philly’s hottest new talent will be showcased in a “Live and Local” concert on WXPN’s Instagram at 6 p.m. every Thursday in June, which will launch June 4 with performances by American Trappist, Lizdelise, Getem, and Lily McKown.
- “Throwback Thursday,” a favorite WXPN summertime music feature, returns with a different music theme each week from 6 a.m.-7 p.m. during June, July, and August. The first “Throwback Thursday” theme of the summer will be the year 1970 when the feature relaunches June 4.
- In an echo of last summer’s wildly popular, as-it-happened replay of the original four-day Woodstock music festival, broadcast during the festival’s 50th anniversary, Woodstock’s 51st anniversary will be celebrated Aug. 10-16 by WXPN when it broadcasts the festival’s music sets and stage announcements throughout the week and weekend.
WXPN, the nationally recognized leader in Triple A radio and the premier guide for discovering new and significant artists in rock, blues, roots and folk, is the noncommercial, member-supported public radio service of the University of Pennsylvania. WXPN produces “World Cafe,” public radio’s most popular program of popular music that is distributed by NPR to more than 200 U.S. radio stations, and the Peabody Award-winning “Kids Corner.” WXPN serves the greater Philadelphia area at 88.5 FM, the Lehigh Valley at 104.9 FM, Worton/Baltimore at 90.5 FM, Lancaster/York at 88.7 FM, Harrisburg at 99.7 FM, North Jersey/Poconos at 91.9 FM, and the world via online streaming at xpn.org. The WXPN app brings all of WXPN to any mobile device. WXPN produces XPoNential Radio on XPN2 as its secondary radio channel in HD, also available online.
See NEPA Scene’s photos of Low Cut Connie performing at the 2016 XPoNential Music Festival here and at the Bowery Ballroom in New York later that year here. See photos from Day 1 of the 2017 XPoNential Music Festival here, Day 2 here, and Day 3 here.
Photo by Keith Perks/1120 Studios/NEPA Scene
