This Saturday, Golden Gate Park will host a very unique event: the Bicycle Music Festival. The Richmond District has its fair share of music festivals but this one is different – everything about the show is powered by bicycles, whether it’s the 2000 watt pedal-powered PA system or the completely bike-haulable stage.
The festival starts out in Golden Gate Park at 9:30am and then moves onto other parts of the city, on bike of course. The event is packed up and deployed numerous times: staged sequentially at different public parks and also on a moving “Live On Bike†stage which rolls down city streets.
Even the performers pack all their gear onto bikes and move onto the next location. Dolores Park and Pier 7 are other stops on the BMF route.
The festival takes audience participation to a whole new level – it’s the pedaling of the crowd that literally keeps the music going. Talk about direct feedback from your audience! If you’re a boring performer, I guess the crowd could just stop pedaling and send you packing. Who needs Simon Cowell?
The schedule for the opening leg in Golden Gate Park is as follows:
Saturday, June 20 | Marx Meadow in GGP; walk in at 31st Avenue from Fulton
9:30am – 10:00am: TBA marching band
10:00 – 10:40am: Tin Cup Serenade
10:50 – 11:10am: MaMuse
11:20 – 11:45am: StitchCraft
12:00pm – 12:45pm: Spaceheater
1:00 – 1:30pm: Antioquia
1:30 – 2:00pm: TBA marching band
See the full festival schedule here
Below is a brief video from last year’s event which also shows you how they generate the electricity to keep the party movin’. And remember, whatever you do, don’t drive to the festival. 😉
Sarah B.