Review & Photos: Opening Day Of The Inaugural Okeechobee Music & Arts Festival
By L. Paul Mann Mar 4, 2016 • 9:02 am PST
Words & Images by: L. Paul Mann
Okeechobee Music & Arts Festival Day One :: 3.3.16 :: Lake Okeechobee, Florida
View L. Paul’s Day One photo gallery below his review.
The Okeechobee Music & Arts Festival, the newest Florida mega music festival, had its inaugural opening day Thursday, March 3. The festival located in south central Florida – near Florida’s biggest lake, Lake Okeechobee – may become one of the premiere destination festivals in the way Coachella and Bonnaroo have. Okeechobee, which today organizers announced has officially sold out, began with a soft opening under balmy overcast skies, with pleasantly cool temperatures as evening settled in.
The four day event has a similar format to the premiere American festival Bonnaroo, but with its own unique elements. Like Bonnaroo, only a portion of the festival was open the first day and only to VIP and special ticket holders. The music is roughly divided into three main genres, rock/jam bands, hip-hop and EDM. There should be enough bands in each of these categories to keep any music purist happy in their own niche. But the beauty of festivals like this one is for attendees to explore and experience new musical horizons outside of their usual scope of interest. This may also be one of the first truly 24/7 musical festivals, with live music and performance art scheduled from noon Thursday until the early hours of Monday morning.
Jan Blomqvist played a pleasant sunset set on the Aquachobee stage, ground zero for the first live music of the festival. The English singer and EDM artist mixed some eloquent tunes just as people began to arrive at the stage, which is adjacent to a genuine beach with its own swimming pond. A few brave souls waded into the water, while many more worked on their vacation sun tans. A crowd began to gather around the stage as the next act began to play upbeat dance music. Miami’s own Spam Allstars featured an infectious mixture of Latin jazz, funk, rock, and EDM music that had the early bird crowd gyrating to the beat. This band is pure musical fun.
Like Bonnaroo, one of the most unique features of the festival will be jam sessions mashing up musicians from different genres. There will be at least three main jam sessions during the four day event. The first of these took place Thursday, just after the Spam Allstars ended their set. The jam was lead by pedal steel guitar master Roosevelt Collier, Jeremy Salken the drummer extraordinaire from the EDM duo Big Gigantic, keyboardist Nigel Hall and Leo Brooks from Pitbull on bass, along with members of the Spam Allstars joining in. The crowd swelled for their explosive jamming during the blues-drenched set, and the audience let out a deep moan when the band had to end.
The Aquachobee stage ended the evening with a set by young charismatic EDM musician Big Wild. By this time a large crowd had gathered and the EDM theme for the rest of the night had been set. Three separate other villages had EDM DJs playing non-stop music in at least one of the spots throughout the night. A troupe of performance artists danced from village to village enticing the young crowd to follow along in a dance craze. By midnight the EDM stages were swarmed with fanatically dancing music fans.
Today, the main village featuring three main stages opened at 11 a.m. with a world class line up in store. Located deep in rural south central Florida, the festival grounds are a remnant of old Florida, with its swampy bayous and beautiful tropical forest groves. It seems to be a perfect site for this new 24/7 music festival.
