City Parks Foundation’s SummerStage Returns To NYC For Jazzy 2024 Season

City Parks Foundation’s SummerStage is returning to New York for the 2024 season, and this year, the female-led organization will be leaning into jazz. The focus on the genre follows last year’s celebration of 50 years of hip-hop, which saw the free outdoor performing art festival — which takes place across all five New York City boroughs from June through August (and at their SummerStage venue in Central Park from June through October) — bringing Grandmaster Flash back to the Bronx.

Erika Elliott, executive artistic director at SummerStage and Charlie Parker Jazz Festival, promises that jazz will be popping up a lot more frequently this upcoming summer season and adds that she hopes to celebrate the diversity of the genre. The lineup includes Kim Gordon, Sun Ra Arkestra, Arooj Aftab, Corinne Bailey Rae, Ezra Collective, The Yussef Dayes Experience, Ghostface Killah, Snail Mail and more. Other artists performing benefit concerts throughout the summer season include T-Paine, Ethel Cain, Counting Crows and more.

The Charlie Parker Jazz Festival running from Aug. 23-25 will feature a lineup that includes Christian McBride Big Band, Carmen Lundy, Louis Hayes, Wallace Roney Jr., Helen Sung and more. Overall, the season will feature 85 shows in 13 neighborhood parks across all five boroughs. The season kicks off on June 1 in Central Park with a free performance from Andra Day in association with Blue Note Jazz Festival.

“We have a legacy of supporting jazz music,” Elliott says. “We present the Charlie Parker Jazz Festival, which is an important institution for the genre. Normally we present straight-ahead jazz artists, but what I’m excited about this summer is being able to see the full range of jazz music that’s out there. We’ve had people like Kamasi Washington in the past and other things, but we’re going to have a lot of jazz-forward artists this season.”

This year will feature the return of the Palmwine Music Festival, which was founded by Nigerian rap combo Show Dem Camp. The event made its North American debut last year at SummerStage — also on Aug. 27 — with performances from Show Dem Camp, LADIPOE, BOJ and more. The event’s success made City Parks Foundation want to bring it back, especially following the growth in the Afrobeats music scene over the last few years. The crew from Palmwine Music Festival plans to curate a lineup predominantly consisting of Nigerian acts, as well as a mix of contemporary African music.

For a free festival in the biggest market in North America, City Parks Foundation has a slew of competition. Elliott admits they can sometimes struggle with getting artists on board for their program.

“Being in a market like New York City, it’s tremendously competitive,” Elliott says. “Not so much radius, but price point. This is a top market where artists can make a lot of money. And so artists are having to make a decision often to play for less money, but to do something that they believe is meaningful. Which is to play for free in Central Park or one of the locations we present. I think the competitive nature of this stuff, because ticket prices are so expensive and artist fees are more every year, it’s hard for a festival like ours to be competitive on pricing because we’re community-based and a free non-profit.”
Despite the competition, Elliott shares that City Parks Foundation SummerStage has its own way of making things work. The event isn’t trying to be a major commercial festival, allowing them to tap artists from all sorts of genres and backgrounds.

“If an artist isn’t able to do it, there’s a whole long list of other people that will,” she says. “The strongest thing over time has just been the relationships with the agents and a reputation of being an important venue to play in New York and that people understand that the opportunity to play in New York City for free often outweighs the other options. When it doesn’t, it doesn’t. But, when it does, people are often coming to us first.”
Elliott and SummerStage also pride themselves on ensuring their lineups are diverse, with a minimum of 50% women or groups that include non-male identifying members. While this is nothing new for the foundation, Elliott says that this year in particular it will be noticeable.