Event Spotlight: Bitter Jester Music Festival

June was a weird month for me. DIY music made it weirder (in a good way).

The crowd for Exit 122 on night 1 of Bitter Jester

It’s rare that you end up going to a concert out of absolute necessity, but that’s what attending the 20th annual Bitter Jester Music Festival felt like. Let me explain.

This is my first summer after graduating from college. Although I should be celebrating this massive accomplishment, the dread of my uncertain future has been looming over me like the thick, humid June air. Oh, Illinois summer. I needed something fun to distract from the post-grad horrors, and something creative to write about for my next WholesomeZine article. Luckily for me, Bitter Jester was just a train ride away at Port Clinton Square in Highland Park, Illinois. 

Cara and her camera on Bitter Jester Day 1

I’d been aware of Bitter Jester since last year, when my wonderful friend Cara Goldstone, who lives in the area, attended. Cara stumbled across the festival one summer day when she was in a spot similar to mine: needing a pick-me-up to get her out of the house. She found Bitter Jester because Port Clinton Square regularly hosts community events in their outdoor space, surrounded by local businesses. Cara adored the experience, raving to me about a local DJ she’d seen there, the fiery Silver October.

Flash forward to this summer—Cara is even more excited because she’s been hired as one of the photographers for the festival, so I figured what better excuse did I have to see some free concerts and upcoming artists?

That wasn’t even the half of it. There are so many fascinating things that make Bitter Jester distinct that I wasn’t aware of before deciding to write about it.

A Big Deal

First, Bitter Jester operates on a much larger scale than I thought. According to their website, bitterjesterfoundation.org, it is “…the nation’s oldest and largest professional multi-state music competition for emerging bands and solo artists…”. Every year, 24 applicants from across the United States and Canada (and even sometimes other countries; there was a band from the UK one year that I wish I got to see) are accepted to perform in a battle-of-the-bands competition, along with 20 other entries selected as non-competing Showcase and Guest acts. 

The whole festival spans several weeks, usually across the month of June, with a team of judges choosing one artist from each night to move on to the final round. On this last night, musicians will compete in their final performances on a mobile stage for various prizes, including the grand prize money given to the first place winner, generously donated by the First Bank of Highland Park. 

The Application Process

The crowd kneels for Holden Garcia: established acoustic indie artist at age 11

For applications, there’s no limitation on genre; Bitter Jester has showcased everything from folk singer-songwriters to industrial metal bands (occasionally, on the same day). Because requires so much commitment just to get into this festival, all of the acts are immensely talented, each bringing their own creative flare to the concrete stage. I was blown away on the first day I attended.

There’s one more requirement that they don’t always advertise, though (I’ll get into why that is later). You might notice that everyone performing at this festival looks kinda… young. That’s because if an act is just one musician, they must be under 21, and for bands, each member must not be older than 24. This age cap was one of the most intriguing things I learned about Bitter Jester after I started attending and asking Cara more questions about her work there, since most of the team members fit the same criteria; it really impacted my experience there. So many of these artists were younger than me–and they were real good. 

Community First

Another thing I didn’t know was how community-oriented Bitter Jester is. I got this vibe seeing the all-ages audience on the first day, and the accessible location, but this festival isn’t grassroots in aesthetics alone. For the past twenty years, the nonprofit 501c3 Bitter Jester Foundation for the Arts (BJFA) has held city-sponsored concerts with a focus on uplifting emerging artists. Almost all the festival staff are volunteers, and the City of Highland Park and many other local businesses sponsor the event. Some of this year’s supporters included Harmony Coffee Bar, Secret World Books, and Judy’s Pizza. This made me much less intimidated to write about the event–it felt like it was run by real people I could talk to.

I mentioned earlier that most artists who perform at Bitter Jester are under 21, but you won’t see that detail on most ads for the event. On the first day of BJMF, Nicolas DeGrazia, the founder who started the whole thing back in 2006, gave their reasoning for this: Although the goal of the festival is to uplift young, emerging artists, they don’t explicitly advertise Bitter Jester as such because of the preconceived notion of what that might look like. Just because the musicians are young does not mean they are any less talented than their adult counterparts (quite the contrary). To infantilize them would be doing everyone, performers and audiences, a great disservice.

Billy Schaumann performing on Bitter Jester day 3

The initial surprise I felt when learning the ages of the acts was intentional, and at first, it made me feel a little self-pitying. 22 is a weird age to be at a festival where most of the musicians are under 21–it makes you think “Oh no. What have I done with my life?”. I was already feeling insecure before I went there. Then I remembered where I was just a few years ago.

As happy as I am now to go see a band in a bar with no teenagers in sight, I was reminded of how important all ages shows were to me in high school and early college. They were one of the few spaces where I had access to DIY music as a young person, and where I could see people my age performing their own art. I strongly believe that everyone should be able to have that opportunity in a safe environment. Watching Nic and the rest of the Bitter Jester team provide that for young people meant so much to me; it didn’t matter that I had “aged out” of the audition demographic.

And so...

I have so many tender memories from the four dates I attended that it would be impossible to fit everything into one post without cutting out some magic. So, as an end-of-summer special, here is the first installment of The Bitter Jester Diaries, a series where I recap all the acts I had the pleasure of seeing at BJMF: what it all meant to me, and what I think WholesomeZine readers would get out of it.

Stick around for each upcoming issue!