Courtesy: Sarafest.rocks
In the early 2000s, The Sarah Isom Center for Women and Gender Studies and students hosted a benefit concert, aptly named “Sarahfest,” at (the no longer extant) Two Stick.
Fast-forward to fall 2014, wherein interim director Jaime Harker and Isom Center staff began to consider methods of reintroducing the Isom Center to the community. After much deliberation, the idea of organizing a music festival stuck. They adopted the name of the small benefit concert held years ago and began the extensive planning process.
“The festival is reigniting the spark produced by UM faculty and gender studies students that was first lit over a decade ago under the stewardship of former Sarah Isom Center director Deborah Barker,” Theresa Starkey, Isom Center assistant director, said through email.
With the help of sponsors such as the Yoknapatawpha Arts Council and some sheer luck, the Isom Center staff organized the 10-day music and art festival, which begins today with a performance by Memphis musical act Marcella and her Lovers at Lamar Lounge.
The Sarah Isom Center’s mission, director Sue Grayzel said, is “to support women and their allies by being advocates for equity and justice. As educators, we want to help folks understand how gender shapes our world. We have always been interested in education and provoking thought through creative expression as well as intellectual contributions.”
Throughout the week, The Powerhouse will display art and photography and host two film screenings. Various venues around Oxford will host both local and remote musicians, including the Grammy-nominated and musically versatile Neko Case. On campus, there will be opportunities to learn about gender and counterculture through brown bag lectures.
At its core, Sarahfest is a festival celebrating women who do amazing things, and thus, the festival aims to empower women, as well as those who don’t identify with the “norm.”
“(Sarahfest) is trying to provide a wide range of cultural events and activities that make people who may feel like outsiders or otherwise not central to the group feel like there’s a place for them in Oxford, there’s a place for them at the university and at the Isom Center,” Harker said. “Anything from Blues to gospel to crazy punk to anything in between, there’s a space there. This idea of community building through the arts is a big part of what we do.”
Since the first of this month, art by revolutionary rocker and artist Jon Langford, along with photography by University assistant professor of Journalism Alysia Steele from her book “Delta Jewels” has been on display at the Powerhouse as part of the festival. The Powerhouse will hold an artist talk this Saturday, during which former John Grisham Writer-in-Residence Megan Abbot will interview Langford.
On Saturday, Thacker Mountain Radio will hold a special, star-studded pop-up show at Rowan Oak. Jon Langford will make another appearance, along with Atlanta, GA’s Kelli Hogan and Tenement Halls. For fans of the Indigo Girls, one-half of the folk singer-songwriter duo, Amy Ray, will join the bunch. Storyteller and singer Sarah Minton will be the night’s literary guest.
Last fall, while Isom Center staff began to put together this special edition of Thacker Mountain Radio, Starkey wrote to Neko Case about the possibility of a performance at Sarahfest. This contact, to everyone’s surprise, led to an exciting response from Case, who agreed to not only perform as a part of Sarahfest, but also allow ticket sales from her show to benefit the Sarah Isom Center.
These two events left a week in between for shows at local venues, like Lamar Lounge and Snackbar, and two Brown Bag lectures focused on gender and the 70s counterculture act The B-52s. Oxford Film Festival will show two documentaries centering around the importance of self-expression (“Girls Rock: The Movie”) and women’s liberation (“She’s Beautiful When She’s Angry”).
Lamar Lounge will hold a day of local music, beginning Sunday, Sep. 20 at noon. The Blues Doctors, a duo featuring the University’s own Adam Gussow, will kick off the performance. Next, Oxford-based musician Jimbo Mathus will play his well-known “catfish music,” followed by the Slow Rollers, a jazzy duo featuring Shaundi Wall and Wendy Jean Garrison.
For 10 days, Oxford will be chock-full of activities related to Sarahfest. These events are all unique both in style and subject. According to Harker, the festival’s atmosphere was an important goal during the planning process.
“We wanted to have a range of genres, a range of medium and styles, and not have it so big that it’s overwhelming,” Harker said.
Soon after the inception of the women’s liberation movements, music festivals for women began to pop up around the country. Sarahfest will bring this appreciation for women in the arts to Oxford, in a way that is both localized and open to everyone in the community.
“We want to raise awareness about women’s accomplishments, past and present, and show, literally – that women rock in really amazing ways – in the classroom on the stage – professionally, artistically, as leaders – and as figures of inspiration,” Starkey said. “To me, this is empowering and exciting. Do and be all that can be – this is for all our UM students.”
For a full schedule and details of Sarahfest events, visit Sarahfest.rocks.
