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Spring Weekend
DatesWeekend in April or May (historically)
Location(s)Brown University, Providence, RI
Years active1950–2019, 2021–present
Organized byBrown Concert Agency
Websitehttps://brownconcertagency.com

Spring Weekend is a student-organized music festival hosted annually in April at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. Spring Weekend was officially founded in 1950, though is rooted in a late 19th century spring festival tradition known as Junior Promenade.[1][2] Celebrity artists were first brought to campus starting in the 1960s.

The festival is organized by the Brown Concert Agency, a student group overseen by Brown's Student Activities Office and funded by the university's Undergraduate Finance Board.[3] Historical Spring Weekend acts include Bob Dylan (1964 and 1997), Ella Fitzgerald (1965), Ray Charles (1967), James Brown (1968), Bruce Springsteen (1974), U2 (1983), R.E.M. (1985), and Sonic Youth (1998). More recent headliners include Snoop Dogg (2010), Childish Gambino (2012), Kendrick Lamar (2013), Young Thug (2017), Daniel Caesar (2019), and Mitski (2019).[4][1][5] Noted non-musical Spring Weekend guests include Martin Luther King Jr. (1967) and Allen Ginsberg (1968).[3]

In 2020, the festival was cancelled for the first time since 1950 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.[3]

History

Junior Promenade

Spring Weekend is rooted in a late 19th century spring tradition at Brown known as Junior Promenade. In 1897, the university's Junior Class Committee met to discuss the possibility of a spring celebration; while originally dismissed, the idea resurfaced the following year and gained approval; the inaugural Junior Promenade was held in 1898. In 1901, the tradition was restructured as Junior Week, adopting a longer and more diverse program of events and student performances.[1]

250 couples attended the 1935 Junior Promenade, which was hosted at the Providence Biltmore[6]

Early iterations

Junior Week and Promenade lapsed during World War II and in 1948 were replaced with All-Campus Weekend. Spring Weekend, in turn, succeeded All-Campus Weekend in 1950.[1] The inaugural Spring Weekend featured club events, student performances, athletic contests, a buffet, and dances held in Faunce House and fraternity houses.[2] In the 1960s, concerts and shows featuring celebrity artists replaced student performances and dances.[1] In 1960, students formed the Brown Concert Agency to plan and organize the event. Headliners of the festival in its early years included Bob Dylan (1964) and Ella Fitzgerald (1965). In 1967, the festival featured Peter, Paul and Mary, Ray Charles, and Jefferson Airplane; Martin Luther King Jr., in Providence on other business, preached at the Sunday morning Protestant service held in Sayles Hall.[2]

The 1968 festival was larger than its predecessors and marked Spring Weekend's transition from a "drunken brawl" into a "classier affair."[7] Ira Magaziner, an organizer of the event wrote of the festival "We had James Brown, Dionne Warwick, Procol Harum, the Yardbirds and Dizzy Gillespie; for the poetry crowd we had Allen Ginsberg and Lawrence Ferlinghett... To launch the event, we chartered a small airplane to fly over the college green and dump thousands of colored ping pong balls stamped with WELCOME SPRING WEEKEND."[8]

1970–1999

Noted Spring Weekend acts in the 1970s included Tina Turner (1972) Bruce Springsteen (1974). Guests in the 1980s include U2 (1983), R.E.M. (1985), and Elvis Costello (1987). In 1984, following the passage of the National Minimum Drinking Age Act and Rhode Island's subsequent raising of the legal drinking age, the university brought off-duty state troopers to campus to perform optional breathalyzer tests.[3] In 1991, Spring Weekend ended a longstanding practice of serving alcohol, apparently motivated by cost and potential liability issues.[1] Artists featured in the 1990s include A Tribe Called Quest (1992), Indigo Girls (1995), Bob Dylan (1997), Sonic Youth (1998), Busta Rhymes and Common (1999).

2000–present

Spring Weekend 2007

Noted guests in the 2000s include Wyclef Jean (2000), Ben Folds (2005), M.I.A. (2008), Vampire Weekend (2008), and Nas (2009).[9][10] Headliners in the 2010s included Snoop Dogg (2010), Childish Gambino (2012), Kendrick Lamar (2013), Chance the Rapper (2014), Mac DeMarco (2016), Young Thug (2017), and Mitski (2019).[11][5][12] In 2013, The Brown Daily Herald and other campus press outlets received an email from a user impersonating the Brown Concert Agency that included a fake lineup of artists including "The Sounds of Capitalism," Toro Y Moi, The Postal Service, and Grouper.[13]

COVID-19 pandemic

In 2020, the festival was cancelled for the first time since 1950 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Brown Concert Agency did not publicly announce which artists were scheduled to perform at the 2020 festival, although an unsubstantiated rumor purported the lineup to include Doja Cat.[3] The 2021 festival featuring Phoebe Bridgers and KAYTRANADA was held online.[14][15]

Lineups

1970–1989
Year Dates Headliners
1970 April 24–26
1971 April 30–May 2
1972 April 28–30
1973 May 4–6
1974 April 26–28
1975 April 25–27
1976 April 30–May 20
1977
1978 April 28–30
1979 April 27–29
1980
1981
1982 April 30–May 2
1983 April 29–May 1
1984 April 27–29
1985 April 26–28
1986 April 18–20
1987 April 24–26
1988 April 15–17
1989 April 28–30
Flaming Lips play at Spring Weekend 2007
1990–2009
Year Dates Headliners
1990 April 27–29
1991 April 26–28
1992 April 17–19
1993 April 9–11
1994 April 22–24
1995 April 20–23
1996 April 11–14
1997 April 17–20
1998 April 16–19
1999 April 22–25[16]
2000 April 13–16
2001 April 19–22
2002 April 19–21
2003 April 10–13
2004 April 22–25
2005 April 21–24
2006 April 20–23
2007 April 19–22
2008 April 10–13
2009 April 17–19
2010–
Year Dates Headliners
2010 April 22–25
2011 April 15–17
2012[17] April 20–22
2013[4] April 18–21
2014[18] April 11–13
2015[19] April 17–19
2016[12] April 14–17
2017[11] April 27–30
2018[20] April 26–29
2019[5] April 26–28
2020[3]
Cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic
2021[14][a] April 10
2022[21] April 29–30
2023[22] April 29–30

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f "Spring Weekend celebrates 67 years of star-studded legacy". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  2. ^ a b c "Encyclopedia Brunoniana | Spring Weekend". www.brown.edu. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  3. ^ a b c d e f "The ghosts of Spring Weekends past". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  4. ^ a b "Spring Weekend delivers engaging lineup". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  5. ^ a b c "Brown Concert Agency announces 2019 Spring Weekend lineup". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  6. ^ "JUNIORS AT BROWN HAVE YEARLY PROM; Setting of Tropical Garden Is Provided by Dance -- 250 Couples Are Present". The New York Times. 1935-05-12. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2022-04-29.
  7. ^ "Spirit of the University". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  8. ^ Eugenides, Jeffrey; Moody, Rick; Lowry, Lois; Robinson, Marilynne; Cheever, Susan (2014-05-20). The Brown Reader: 50 Writers Remember College Hill. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-4767-6520-4.
  9. ^ "Sunny, warm Spring Weekend delights". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  10. ^ "Nas, Of Montreal to headline Spring Weekend". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  11. ^ a b "Spring Weekend to feature Erykah Badu, AlunaGeorge, Young Thug". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  12. ^ a b "Fetty Wap, Mac DeMarco to headline Spring Weekend". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  13. ^ "False Spring Weekend lineup sent to campus press outlets". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  14. ^ a b "Phoebe Bridgers, KAYTRANADA, KeiyaA to perform at Spring Weekend". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-22.
  15. ^ "Brown Concert Agency to release Spring Weekend lineup April 3". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  16. ^ "98-112 (Spring Weekend)". www.brown.edu. Retrieved 2022-04-29.
  17. ^ "BCA announces Spring Weekend lineup". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  18. ^ "Lauryn Hill, Chance the Rapper energize Spring Weekend". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  19. ^ "Modest Mouse, Hudson Mohawke to headline Spring Weekend". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  20. ^ "Anderson .Paak, NAO to headline Spring Weekend". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2022-01-23.
  21. ^ Jagwani, Aalia (March 25, 2022). "Flo Milli, Ari Lennox, Amaarae to take stage at first in-person Spring Weekend in three years". Brown Daily Herald.
  22. ^ "Remi Wolf, JID, Ethel Cain to perform at Spring Weekend 2023". The Brown Daily Herald. Retrieved 2023-04-09.

Notes

  1. ^ Held virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic
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