Mum has been the word recently on the upcoming music festival that the Independent Weekly has been planning for 2010. The local independent paper which covers events and culture throughout the Triangle has decided to focus their attention in Downtown Raleigh for a large scale, multiple day, multiple venue music festival.
The event will be called Hopscotch and will occur from September 9th-11th in multiple indoor music venues in Downtown Raleigh as well as a big “main stage” presence in City Plaza on Fayetteville Street. Lots of local acts are being courted as well as some VERY big names in the national music industry. If the Indy comes through with some of the names that have been flirted with, and I’m a very confident they will, Hopscotch could become one of the South’s premier music festivals this year and in future years.
Over the past 5-10 years music festivals have become very widespread throughout the country, most of which are outside on some large vacant land. Hopscotch will be different. It will be urban and celebrate Raleigh as an emerging metropolis and a center of musical buzz. The shift towards Raleigh as the center of this buzz seems to be solidified by the Indy’s choice to hold the fest in downtown. That or the fact that Raleigh as a metropolis will bring in more attendants.
Both SPARKcon and Cherry Bounce (both of which we are huge fans of) are versions of this urban music festival. Cherry Bounce expanded to multiple venues and multiple days this year and MusicSPARK is only one arm of the cultural octopus that is SPARKcon. Hopscotch has a few things on both of these in that it will focus solely on music but has the backing of the Independent and sponsors. All three will assumingly happen in September/October this year and hopefully Raleigh can handle all three or all three can merge in some way to create a massive “South by Southeast”, with a much better name I’m sure. We look forward to the first year and hope that it exceeds every expectation that has been whispered our way. The Triangle has been waiting for something like this for a long time.
A preview of performers will be announced and tickets (which will be tiered from single passes to full festival passes) will go on sale in mid February early March.
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