Residents of Binghamton’s West Side neighborhood are mowing their lawns and moistening their reeds in anticipation of Binghamton Porchfest 2023, back for an eighth year next Sunday, August 27, from noon to 7 p.m.
Porchfest invites thousands of community members each summer for a free afternoon of live music performed from the residential porches, stoops, and yards of the Abel Bennett Historic Tract. The 2023 festival features 162 local and regional bands performing at 63 host locations, showcasing folk music alongside hip-hop, worship music next door to heavy metal, high schoolers covering Lou Reed, retirees singing Beyonce, classical, jazz, opera, country, and punk.
Food vendors and restroom locations dot the neighborhood and a free shuttle traverses the perimeter of the roughly quarter square mile festival footprint, defined by the rough borders of Riverside Drive, Chestnut Street, Recreation Park, and Beethoven Street. Most roads will be closed to traffic, with free golf cart shuttles offering rides where traffic is prohibited. Lourdes Hospital is offering free parking in their back lot at the end of Lourdes Road. Cans collected during the festival will benefit fundraising efforts for the Danielle House.
Like the many other Porchfests operating independently throughout the country, Binghamton Porchfest is modeled after a DIY community festival hosted by the residents of Ithaca since 2007.
Binghamton Porchfest 2023 comes to life with the support of the City of Binghamton and Mayor Jared Kraham, Cavanaugh’s Grocery, Visions FederalCredit Union, and the generosity of many community sponsors and donors. This event is made possible with public funds from the Statewide Community Regrants Program, a regrant program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature, and administered by The Earlville Opera House. Additional support for the Broome SCR Program graciously provided by the Stewart W. and Willma C. Hoyt Foundation, Inc.
More information – including band bios, and map – is available at binghamtonporchfest.com.
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