There’s a reason they call South Australia (SA) the Festival State – the city truly is a mecca for new experiences. This weekend you can head on down to the Winter Beer Fest in Port Adelaide or plan ahead for Wildlands Festival later in the year. But as for the month of July, Umbrella Festival has got you well and truly covered for your entertainment needs in the world of music.
Since its inception in 2016, Umbrella Festival has become one of South Australia’s largest winter festivals. Their 2022 program boasts more than 175 events across Adelaide’s CBD, metropolitan suburbs and regional areas of South Australia between 1 and 31 July. Spanning over 90 venues, there will be something to feast your ears on throughout the entirety of the month.
This year’s program aims to reignite the recovery of the South Australian live music sector and is packed with a variety of performances that cater to everyone’s musical requisites. You’ll find genres with the likes of trad-folk, punk-rock, experimental jazz and acoustic covers – and absolutely everything in between.
After a lengthy browse through this year’s bursting program – one productions that caught our eye is the LGBTQIA+ inclusive event Queer Club, presented by Pretty Good Thanks and hosted by the fabulous drag queen, Ophelia Butt. The Queer Club nights feature lip-sync battles, dance-offs, confetti canons and crazy theatrics at the Adelaide UniBar.
As for the opening night, Friday 1 July is the date to mark in your calendar. There will be four free gigs across the city hosting the celebratory evening, these venues include; popular New Orleans inspired bar NOLA that’ll be hosting an acoustic folk and alley-jazz fuelled night. Along with iconic live music venue The Crown and Anchor that will turn into a raucous affair of psych-rock and delicious riffs. Next up is the Grace Emily Hotel that will be offering pub rock and country belters. And finally, SAM Awards 2021 Best Venue winner, JIVE will be singing songs of indie-rock. And that’s just the start of it all – buckle up for a wild July!
Chair of Music SA, John Glenn states, “Umbrella Festival warms our hearts and souls in the winter months through live music. It is a great analogy for the Live Music Industry in SA as we start to recover from the darkness of the pandemic.”
“Our wonderful team at Music SA has developed a program that celebrates diversity, inclusiveness, fun and excitement but, most importantly, pathways this State’s incredibly talented musicians to perform, for audiences to celebrate and diverse live venues to thrive again.”
South Australian Minister for Arts, Andrea Michaels supports this with, “Now in its seventh year, the festival has gone from strength to strength, despite the challenges the pandemic has thrown in its way.”
“The South Australian Government is committed to supporting our state’s music industry to get back on its feet and we’re proud to continue to support the Umbrella Festival,” Andrea Michaels tells us.
Now, we’ve only listed, to say the least, a few productions that are on the menu for this year’s Umbrella Festival – so check out the full program here!