Positively 4th Street: Village Trip festival to kick off with Music Inn block party

BY LIZ THOMSON | In just a few days’ time, The Village Trip 2024 will open on West Fourth Street. The kickoff will be a block party celebrating the fabled history of “New York’s Left Bank” and the unique and storied institution that is the Music Inn, a gathering place for more than half a century for the likes of Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, George Harrison and many others who are part of the history of our times.

David Amram, artist emeritus of The Village Trip whose own fabled history in the Village goes back to the 1950s, will lead the music-making at the block party, celebrating the city as a musical melting pot and playing, as he puts it, “sincere roots music built to last that has been embraced by all jazz artists.”

Indeed, our opening weekend and the early part of Week One celebrate a diverse range of music: from the sophisticated sounds of Cy Coleman’s Broadway with the Grammy-garlanded Janis Siegel and Yaron Gershovsky at the Blue Note, to the blues of Lead Belly, with the New York City premiere of the acclaimed documentary “Lead Belly: The Man Who Invented Rock ’n’ Roll.” There will be two screenings at the Loft at City Winery, each followed by a Q&A with Alvin Singh, Lead Belly’s great-nephew, and Anna Canoni, granddaughter of his great friend Woody Guthrie.

The imposing red-brick presence of the Public Theater on the border between Greenwich Village and the East Village is a daily reminder of the great legacy of Joe Papp. The Village Trip is proud to showcase selections from David Amram’s music for Shakespeare in the Park, the fruits of his 12-year relationship with Papp. Both men shared a staunch belief in the arts for public good. Our unique evening features baritone Michael Kelly and Joe’s widow and creative partner, Gail Merrifield Papp, who brought such pivotal shows as “A Chorus Line” and “The Normal Heart” to the Public Theater.

Amid the splendor of the Salmagundi Club, we present a musical celebration of three of the greatest 20th-century artists, all of whom lived and worked in the Village — Georgia O’Keeffe, Jackson Pollock and Edward Hopper. The concert, curated by Victoria Bond, launches The Village Trip’s thought-provoking classical and new music program, directed by guitarist William Anderson and Joan Forsyth, pianist and chairperson of the piano department at the Third Street Music School Settlement.

At La Lanterna di Vittorio on MacDougal Street, a historic Village coffeehouse that was once home to Eve’s Hangout, a lesbian nightclub, and later to Pete and Toshi Seeger, Rolling Stone senior writer David Brown takes us on a tour through “the foggy ruins of time” with a publication-day conversation about his latest book, “Talkin’ Greenwich Village: The Heady Rise and Slow Fall of America’s Bohemian Music Capital.”

The annual Village Trip Lecture, “Performing Politics in the Village: Black Women Entertainers and the Civil Rights Movement,” will be given by Professor Ruth Feldstein at the Jefferson Market Library. Prof. Feldstein will reflect on the ways in which 1950s Greenwich Village and Harlem provided artistic and political possibilities for so many women whose names are now writ large in the history of our times. Years before “intersectionality” became the buzzword that it is in social justice circles today, Black women entertainers lived and performed a politics of intersectionality — at Village hot spots and, subsequently, around the world.

And that’s just the first week! Our rainbow-colored, family-friendly program honors a truly unique community that has given the world so much, socially and culturally. Fifteen days and more than 40 events — there’s something for everyone. High jinks and high ideals — be there or be square! We look forward to welcoming you.

For more information, event dates, times and locations, check out www.TheVillageTrip.com. Or see the 20-page special supplement with a complete calendar of festival events in the September print issue of The Village Sun newspaper, distributed around Downtown, or read the e-edition here.

Thomson is founder and joint artistic director, The Village Trip.