Event promises over 200 bands, 150 artists at Outer Harbor

By Patrick Sawers

For the second year running, Buffalo’s Outer Harbor will play host to Music Is Art, the annual homegrown arts festival celebrating artistic expression in just about every imaginable form.

The all-day event, set for Saturday (Sept. 20), will feature a packed lineup of live musical performances, and the entire extravaganza will be rife with opportunities to watch artists of all varieties as they engage in their creative process.

“It’s my favorite day of the year,” said Robby Takac, the festival’s founder, speaking by telephone from Albuquerque, New Mexico.

Takac is more widely known as the bassist for local rock legends the Goo Goo Dolls, who are currently touring the country alongside Dashboard Confessional, and despite a string of “really exciting dates” on the horizon, he said, he’s especially excited about breaking away for a quick jaunt back to Buffalo.

Takac started Music Is Art over two decades ago, and what began as a modest gathering outside his band’s Franklin Street recording studios has since blossomed into an all-out staple of the summertime festival season. Having long outgrown its original grounds, the festival last year settled into the recently-developed Outer Harbor area, where it seems to have put down some roots.

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“We learned a lot last year, as far as getting people in and getting people out and all that kind of stuff,” Takac explained. “It’s always a learning experience when you’re in a place for the first time, so I think we had an opportunity to find out what it’s like to pull off an event like this.”

With over 200 bands performing on nearly 20 different stages, a handful of adjustments have been made to better utilize the available land, and also to help expose festivalgoers to a truly stunning array of musical genres.

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“We’re using the main stage for bands this year,” Takac said. “Last year we had a silent disco up there, but (this year) we’ll be using the main stage for bands. We’ll have Shonen Knife from Japan; they’ve played Music Is Art a few times and they’ll be here to perform again this year, which is pretty exciting, and a whole host of some of the premier Buffalo acts on that main stage. I know Green Jelly’s coming back again this year, they’ll be here again doing their thing.”

And while live music will be the backbone of the event, Takac also noted that festivalgoers will hardly be able to turn around without encountering a cornucopia of other artistic endeavors. These, he indicated, will range from the live creation of traditional works of art – paintings, murals and interactive pieces – to skilled activities like dance, skateboarding and even wrestling.

“It’s all part of the insanity that comes with MIA,” Takac said. “We’ve got the dance community tapped in, the art community, I think we have about 150 displaying artists this year. We have the wrestling guys coming back this year, the Nickel City Wrestling guys, which is great. The Sideshow stage is coming back again this year; we’ve got a proper stage set up over at the skate park this year, which is pretty exciting. We’re doing a little more work over in the DIY skate park, we’re making that a little bit more accessible and exciting for the kids to use throughout the year.”

Underscoring the festival’s emphasis on inclusiveness and interactivity, Takac added, one of this year’s debuting features will encourage attendees to jump right in and join in the performance.

“We’re going to have a Buskers’ Row this year, which we didn’t have last year,” he said, “so people are welcome to come down and busk. We also have a program of scheduled buskers as well throughout the day.”

The festival runs from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m., and Takac noted that Music Is Art maintains a family-friendly atmosphere, with attractions and entertainment geared toward younger attendees throughout the earliest hours of the event.

“There’s going to be a kids’ area, we’ll have ‘MIA Idol,’ which goes on every year,” he said. “There’s a kids’ stage, a dance stage up there that features a lot of the younger peoples’ dancing groups, a lot of activities for the kids and such up front, and then as the sun goes down it transitions into something that’s a little bit more uniform with the rest of the festival.”

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Music Is Art is completely free to attend, and Takac is quick to emphasize that its organizers work tirelessly throughout the year to make the festival happen at no cost to the people of Buffalo.

That being said, a $100 VIP option is available that will allow ticketholders access to the green room behind the main stage. Private performances will be held there by Takac, as well as Shonen Knife, members of the band Aqueous and more.

“The most important thing to me, period, from the beginning, is that this is a free event,” he said. “We do things like hold various fundraisers throughout the year, whatever it takes, really. We’re just trying to do what we can to pay for this thing. One way or the other, we figure out how to make this happen every year.”