Stanwix Triangle Stage

June 1 - June 17

Daytime concerts start at 12pm every day of the Festival. The following evening concerts start at 7:30pm Monday-Saturday, 6:00pm on Sundays, except where noted. All shows are free and open to the public.

Nightly Shows at Stanwix Triangle Stage

Click on any show to jump to more information or to sample the sounds.

Fri, June 1

Robert Randolph & the Family Band

Sat, June 2

Martin Sexton
with special guest Jon Check at 6pm

Sun, June 3

Ozomatli

Mon, June 4

Black Moth Super Rainbow at 8:30pm
Race the Ghost at 7:30pm
Jack Wilson and Dums at 6:30pm

Tues, June 5

Grace Potter and the Nocturnals

Weds, June 6

Lotus

Thurs, June 7

Roomful of Blues

Fri, June 8

Cowboy Junkies
sponsored by Point Park University

Sat, June 9

Koko Taylor
with special guest Willi Tri Blues Band at 6pm sponsored by Point Park University

Sun, June 10

Los Lonely Boys
sponsored by Point Park University

Mon, June 11

Stephen Pellegrino

Tues, June 12

Ike Reilly Assassination at 8pm
with special guest Earl Greyhound at 7pm

Weds, June 13

The Avett Brothers

Thurs, June 14

Joe Bonamassa

Fri, June 15

Jackie Greene

Sat, June 16

Rickie Lee Jones
with special guest Lohio at 6pm

Sun, June 17

Spyro Gyra, corrected time 7pm
with special guest Rodney McCoy at correected time 5:30pm sponsored by Mellon Financial Corporation

Friday, June 1

Robert Randolph & The Family Band

7:30pm

Legendary live performers Robert Randolph & The Family Band bring their soulful, funk-laden jam rock to Pittsburgh for a show at the Festival.

Acknowledged as one of the virtuosos of the pedal steel guitar, Robert Randolph learned how to play at the House of God Church in Orange, New Jersey, where he was steeped in the Pentecostal "sacred steel" tradition. Since emerging from the church, Robert Randolph & The Family Band have established themselves on the jam band circuit as a multicultural funk, rock and soul band. With diverse influences such as Sly and the Family Stone, Stevie Wonder, Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin, Robert Randolph & The Family Band has created an interesting hybrid of sounds over the course of their recording career.

Listen to a sample of Ain't Nothin' Wrong With That by Robert Randolph and the Family Band.

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Saturday, June 2

Martin Sexton

7:30pm

Acclaimed guitarist/singer/songwriter Martin Sexton comes to the Festival in support of Seeds, his latest release on his own imprint, Kitchen Table Records.

Sexton's music is a classic fusion of folk, country blues, soul, country and gospel - he lets the great American forms run through his filter and emerge as timeless rock 'n roll. Although long known as a fine guitarist, Sexton's engaging live performance continues to win him new fans. His daring, soulful vocals get a lot of attention, too. The Boston Globe raves, " Martin Sexton is ripe with raw, expansive talent. His voice comes in a hundred impossible shades. His songs are sweet and spirited and soulful. His repertoire is like a cross-country tour of the American musical vernacular."

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Sunday, June 3

Ozomatli

6pm

Multicultural, political activist group Ozomatli brings rebellious politi-pop to the Festival.

Los Angeles's Ozomatli is an unusual act in today's music industry. They've won Grammy's, appeared on TV and in movies, but for over a decade, their multi-cultural, multi-genre music has confounded music critics and radio programmers with their infectious, yet hard to define sound. Their Spanish-English mash-ups of hip-hop, salsa, cumbia, dub, and Middle Eastern funk have their origins in political activism, and themes of human rights and anti-war activism remain in their music today.

Find out more about Ozomatli at www.ozomatli.com.

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Monday, June 4

Jack Wilson and Dums

6:30pm

Jack Wilson and Dums perform a unique brand of insightful lyrical indie hip-hop.

Race The Ghost

7:15pm

Race the Ghost's music is an exciting mixture of pop craft and technical finesse, infused with jazzy guitar and rhythm changes, and featuring unique vocals that sound like a mixture of Morrissey and The Silver Jews' David Berman.

Listen to Race The Ghost, Then We Just Stopped

Black Moth Super Rainbow

8:30pm

The psychedelic, electronic pop of Black Moth Super Rainbow lands at the Festival on Monday, June 4th.

In an age where laptops and digital sequencers are the vanguard of electronic music, Black Moth Super Rainbow utilizes analog synthesizers and other equipment from the '60s and '70s to achieve their sounds. Their vocalist sings through a vocoder for a genuine vintage robotic tone. Although they refer to themselves as an electronic psych pop band, the Krautrock of Kraftwerk and Can also inform their sound.

Coming to the Festival on the heels of their third release, Dandelion Gum, a loosely based concept album described as being "about witches who make candy in the forest", Black Moth Super Rainbow is poised for big things. An appearance at this year's SXSW was hailed as "one of the best shows" of the event by David Fricke in Rolling Stone.

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Tuesday, June 5

Grace Potter and the Nocturnals

7:30pm

The music of Grace Potter and the Nocturnals combines reverence for the rich heritage of rock music with a strong sense of adventure and expression; a fusion of rock, blues and Americana. The 24-year-old Grace Potter, who has found her voice both as a singer and as an instrumentalist, leads the quartet. Her vocals bring comparisons to Aretha Franklin, Bonnie Raitt and Janis Joplin.

Grace Potter and the Nocturnal are quite a DIY success story. Rather than trying to get signed to a major label, the band chose the touring route to build their audience. Along the way, they've released three CDs (along with a live CD available as download only) that have sold in impressive numbers. They've toured with the likes of Taj Mahal, Mavis Staples, Derek Trucks, Robert Cray, and Trey Anastasio, played the Bonnaroo Music Festival, and jam band fans across the nation have adopted Grace Potter and the Nocturnals as one of their own.

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Wednesday, June 6

Lotus

7:30pm

Lotus has rock, funk and soul elements mixed in with electronica's deep house and drum and bass grooves. Their all instrumental shows features tightly composed tunes with jam band-style improvisation. Lotus has been touring non-stop since they formed in 1999, garnering a large devoted fan base. Their debut release in 2002, Vibes, was a live, in concert recording. They followed the success of Vibes with Nomad, their second album, in 2004.

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Thursday, June 7

Roomful of Blues

7:30pm

Formed 40 years ago in Rhode Island, Roomful of Blues is a blues institution. Their horn driven, joyous fusion of the blues styles of the 1940s and '50s (like swing, jump and Chicago blues) has earned them five Grammy nominations and devoted fans around the world. Roomful of Blues is known for its exceptional musicianship. They've twice been voted "Best Blues Band" in Downbeat, and the W.C. Handy Blues Awards feted Roomful of Blues with their "Best Blues Band" award.

Roomful of Blues has long been known for their ability to bring the most sedate audience to its feet. After they backed Count Basie, he raved, "they're the hottest blues band I've ever seen." Coming to the Festival on their latest release, Standing Room Only, expect punchy horns and dynamic guitars singing the blues with passion and style.

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Friday, June 8

Cowboy Junkies

7:30pm
sponsored by Point Park University

Canadian acoustic rock legends Cowboy Junkies bring their atmospheric and richly textured music to the Festival for a concert sponsored by Point Park University.

Best known for their 1985 debut album, The Trinity Session, which was recorded in a church in Toronto on a single microphone in a single day, the Cowboy Junkies have followed an independent path through out their career. They have created a consistently satisfying body of work and their live shows continue to attract a devoted following of fans.

Coming to the Festival in support of their new release At The End of Paths Taken, the Cowboy Junkies have created an album that reflects the stage of life they've reached. Song themes deal with family and the struggle to maintain personal connections. In essence, At The End of Paths Taken tells the story of the band. "To me, this a lbum is looking at who we are right at this second, right now," Margo Timmins says. "At our ages, with our work, as parents of young children. It's all the paths I've taken to this point - to who I am."

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Saturday, June 9

Koko Taylor

7:30pm
sponsored by Point Park University

Grammy Award winning blues vocalist Koko Taylor brings her band to the Festival for an evening of soul-stirring Chicago blues for a concert sponsored by Point Park University.

Rolling Stone has called her "the great female blues singer of her generation, and she's the world's undisputed Queen of the Blues. During the course of her 50-year career she's sung with the likes of Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Willie Dixon, B.B. King, Buddy Guy and Robert Plant.

Taylor started her life on a sharecropper's farm near Memphis, Tennessee. She loved the gospel she heard in church, and the blues she heard on the radio. In her 20s, she moved with her husband to the southside of Chicago. Soon Taylor was sitting in and singing with Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Magic Sam, Little Walter and Junior Wells. In 1963, blues bassist/songwriter/producer Willie Dixon took her under his wing. In 1966, Taylor scored her biggest hit on the R&B charts, "Wang Dang Doodle".

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Sunday, June 10

Los Lonely Boys

6pm
sponsored by Point Park University

Texas's Los Lonely Boys bring their "Texican" blues for a concert sponsored by Point Park University.

Los Lonely Boys sound like they ve been a band all their life - because they have. The group learned music from their father who once played music with his seven brothers. By 1991, the three brothers - Henry Garza on guitar and vocals, Jo Jo Garza on bass and Ringo Garza on drums - were backing their father in Texas roadhouses and on trips to Nashville. Soon the boys developed their own musical voice and formed Los Lonely Boys. Often described as "Texican" music, Los Lonely Boys is a fusion of diverse elements of rock, blues and Latin roots music. "It's just a mixture of everything we've learned: conjunto music from our father, Richie Valens, Stevie Ray, Willie. All the music that we've gathered - Fats Domino, Santana, Skynyrd," says Henry.

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Monday, June 11

Stephen Pellegrino

7:30pm

Surrealistic performance artist Stephen Pellegrino brings songs and stories about Pittsburgh's rich cultural history as told by his high-energy group, LOSER's Dragging the Stone and Ensemble, a brass and accordion band for the new millennium, which includes the treated ukulele and laptop by Maurice Rickard and costume/percussion pieces by Frank Ferraro.

Stephen Pellegrino, a founding member of LOSER, has been creating, performing and producing inter-disciplinary music/theatre works for over thirty years. Since the early 80's he has been engaged in an ongoing multi-sectional work called Drywall, which uses said construction process to create an aboriginal culture and society - the latest being an inter-dimensional planet called 'Nyayzar. Pellegrino is committed to destroying the notion that regional artists and their art is somehow less worthy in the over all scheme of the universe.

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Tuesday, June 12

Earl Greyhound

7:00pm

SPIN raves about Earl Greyhound, "This band can crush your favorite band." The band formed in 2002 in New York City by songwriter Matt Whyte and Kamara Thomas as a guitar /piano duo. Soon after forming, pianist Thomas was moved to bass as drums were added to form the heavier Earl Greyhound sound. They refer to classic heavy bands like Led Zeppelin and Queen, with the pop of T.Rex or Ziggy-era David Bowie on top.

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Ike Reilly Assassination

8:00pm

In the music of alt-rockers Ike Reilly Assassination are the influences of Bob Dylan, Buddy Holly, the Rolling Stones and punk all at once. Considered one of the best up and coming songwriters in contemporary music, songwriter/guitarist/vocalist Ike Reilly combines rock, punk, folk and blues into a gripping package.

"These songs were easy to write," says Reilly. "Most of them were written quickly, maybe a session a song. On the bus, in hotels, in the back of clubs and some at home and in the recording session itself."

The New York Times recently described the band as "incendiary," and continued: "The Ike Reilly Assassination appeared both to terrorize and to amaze their audience, playing post-punk jams that careened from gut-bucket blues to white boy raps."

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Wednesday, June 13

The Avett Brothers

7:30pm

The sound of the Avett Brothers is a foot stomping mixture of old time, bluegrass, country and rock, with a distinct and driving punk influence. They've become fan favorites by delivering intense, rollicking performances that recall everyone from Hank Williams Sr. to the Clash while captivating the audiences with their sense of musical purpose.

Formed by bothers and North Carolina natives, Seth and Scott Avett in 2000, The Avett Brothers started as a side project, loosely playing acoustic bluegrass and country tunes. Following a release of their first album, Country Was, the 'side project' became a full time band as their former main projects dissolved. Over the course of the next seven years, The Avett Brothers released eight more releases, while touring relentlessly. They are coming to the Festival in support of their latest release, Emotionalism.

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Thursday, June 14

Joe Bonamassa

7:30pm

Up-and-coming blues guitarist Joe Bonamassa performs at the Festival with his band. Bonamassa is appearing at the Festival in support of his 2006 release You and Me, a record that equally highlights the diversity of his rock and blues influences, and his increasingly electrifying vocals.

The son of a guitar dealer and player, Bonamassa began playing guitar at age four. By age seven he was deftly playing Stevie Ray Vaughn licks. By ten, he was performing at local venues in upstate New York. And at 12, Bonamassa opened a show for blues legend B.B. King, resulting in an invitation to tour as B.B. King's opening act. While still in his teens, Bonamassa formed Bloodline with musician Berry Oakley Jr. Their self-titled debut was a fusion of boogie, funk and roadhouse blues that produced two chart hits. For his first two solo albums, Bonamassa created a solid fusion of classic blues and pop production that expanded his fan base, but has since returned solidly to his blues roots.

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Friday, June 15

Jackie Greene

7:30pm

WYEP artist of the year Jackie Greene brings his band to the Festival for a night of soulful, roots music.

Jackie Greene's story is an interesting mix of talent, desire and hustle. He began writing and performing, and by age 16 he had saved enough of the profits from DIY released discs to record Rusty Nails, generating a significant buzz. Once Greene graduated from high school he moved to Sacramento and began playing every gig he could get. Soon his hard work paid off with a deal with a local label, Dig, and Gone Wanderin', his second disc.

The success of Gone Wanderin' led to tours with B.B. King, Susan Tedeschi, Taj Mahal and Buddy Guy. The follow-up album Somewhere Sweet Bound, on which Greene played every instrument, led to Greene signing with Verve Records. His forth and latest album American Myth is full of the heartfelt performances that define the Jackie Greene sound. It was produced by Steve Berlin of Los Lobos and included musicians like drummer Pete Thomas and Davey Faragher of Elvis Costello's band, the Imposters, and multi-instrumentalist Greg Leisz.

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Saturday, June 16

Rickie Lee Jones

7:30pm

Two-time Grammy Award winning vocalist/musician/songwriter Rickie Lee Jones brings her soulful songwriting to the Festival.

A force in jazz and popular music since the late '70s, Rickie Lee Jones is known to most by her first, and biggest hit, 'Chuck E's in Love'. Over the past three decades, Jones has followed her artist muse and created a varied catalog of recordings. She's sung jazz, pop, R&B, blues and standards. She has recorded with diverse musicians Dr. John, Walter Becker, Leo Kottke and Lyle Lovette, among others. Jones was ranked 30th on VH1's 100 Greatest Women of Rock and Roll and has been nominated for a total of eight Grammy awards during her career.

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Sunday, June 17

Spyro Gyra

corrected time 7pm

Smooth jazz pioneers Spyro Gyra will close out the Festival with their melodic instrumentals on Sunday, June 17 in a concert sponsored by Mellon Financial Corporation. The lineup features Spyro Gyra co-founder Jay Beckenstein on saxophone, Tom Schuman on keyboards, Julio Fernandaz on guitar, Scott Ambush on bass and Bonny B. on drums and percussion.

After three decades, 5,000 concerts, nine Grammy nominations, and with over 11 million records sold with one platinum and two gold records, you'd think Spyro Gyra would rest on its laurels. Not so. Since their beginnings in Buffalo, New York nearly 30 years ago, Spyro Gyra has been about moving forward. And on June 12, 2007 Spyro Gyra will release twenty-sixth album, Good To Go-Go on Heads Up International, just in time for their Festival show.

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