There’ll be dancing … dancing in the streets … a guaranteed ingredient at HONK!, this year to include a total of 27 bands, all with social and/or political activism as part of their charters, as well as individual local players who are inevitably inspired to run home, grab their respective unplugged sound makers, and dive right under the HONK! community umbrella.
The “official” participants for this year’s HONK! will be travelling from as far as Moscow, Paris, New Orleans, and Los Alamos, to as near as Somerville and Boston. The Second Line Social Aid and Pleasure Society Brass Band , the band who got this world-wide phenomenon rolling in the first place, will once again serve as the hometown HONK! host band.
The overall HONK! schedule is available for perusal at www.honkfest.org/2014-festival/schedule-2014 (http://honkfest.org/2014-festival/schedule-2014/), with many familiar aspects, including the whimsical Lantern Parades and the spectacular “Reclaim the Streets for Horns, Bikes, and Feet” Parade, by now well loved by the many true-blue HONK! fans!
But there is also a new development this year that is important to note. HONK! 2014 will be hosting a “Day of Action” to be held specifically on Friday October 10th. The goal is to set the stage for a targeted weekend long partnership between HONK! bands and local community organizations. More info. on this new HONK! initiative can be found with updates available as HONK! gets closer to the day.
Specific HONK! Festival performance schedules will be made available after October 3, 2014. For more background information on HONK!’s origins and purpose, visit www.honkfest.org/about/. HONK! is a rousing spectacle featuring social activist street bands from all over who come together to share their different approaches to merry making while also instigating positive change in their communities. Born in Somerville in 2006, similar HONK!s have since spread to Austin, Seattle, Detroit, Providence, and New York City, with the first ever HONK! OZ to take place in Australia in January 2015.
For almost a decade now, the original Somerville/Cambridge HONK! just keeps on rolling and expanding! HONK! ON!
LINKS:
http://honkfest.org
http://www.secondlinebrassband.org
http://honkfest.org/2014-festival/friday-day-of-action-2014/
