The Asbury Underground Downtown Art and Music Crawl Returns in June

The Asbury Underground Downtown Art and Music Crawl, a much-loved city tradition that fills the streets of downtown Asbury Park with FREE concerts, comedy shows, workshops, poetry readings, art exhibitions and more, will return this June.

The event will take place June 21, from 12 - 7 PM. This year’s crawl, once again presented in partnership with the festival, will be held on Prudential North to Shore Festival.The annual event, on hiatus from 2020 through 2023, resumed in 2024 as an element of the

 
The Prudential North to Shore Festival, New Jersey’s multi-city celebration of the arts and entertainment, is produced by the New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC). This year, the festival will offer concerts and events at major venues, plus community arts events in parks, galleries and more, in Newark and Asbury Park from June 14 through June 29, 2025. The festival will also present community arts events in Atlantic City throughout the coming year.
 
This year’s Asbury Underground art crawl will include approximately 80 performances and events — highlighting the work of hundreds of area musicians, visual artists, poets and comedians at more than 30 different venues, including stages dedicated to jazz, spoken word poetry and comedy. Stores, galleries, restaurants and salons along the city’s Cookman Avenue retail corridor will host events throughout the afternoon.
 
Visitors can follow a map to all of the event’s stages and venues. Each stop offers a new display or performance by an area artist.

“When Asbury Underground returned last year, you could feel the excitement all over the city’s downtown. Walking down Cookman Avenue, you could hear music coming from restaurants and storefronts, and see crowds gathered around doorways. It was wonderful,” says the founder and producer of Asbury Underground, Patrick Schiavino. Schiavino, a local artist, is also the owner of the art629 Gallery.
“We can’t wait to once again bring that kind of energy to downtown, and spotlight Asbury Park’s incredible artistic community.”

“Prudential North to Shore isn’t just about bringing global headliners to New Jersey — it’s also about giving local artists a platform to shine,” said John Schreiber, President and CEO of NJPAC. “Today and every day, we celebrate New Jersey’s homegrown talent and the vibrant artistic communities that help define life in the Garden State. Their creativity and passion are an essential part of who we are as New Jerseyans.”
The crawl begins simultaneously at multiple venues at noon; performances are scheduled to begin at locations along the crawl’s path every 15 minutes. All Asbury Underground events are free.
This year’s crawl features several special events, including:
 
 

• The Joe Harvard Stage — a tribute to the local artist, author and Asbury Underground crew member — which will feature new musical sets every 45 minutes, at Parlor Gallery, 717 Cookman Avenue, from 12:30 to 5 PM. Xylophone of Wrench will perform between sets. Harvard established The gARTen, a community black-light art garden and gallery, in a vacant lot on the Cookman Avenue corridor. It served as an Asbury Underground performance space for many years.
• An afternoon of spoken word poetry, hosted by Chris Rockwell and featuring poets including Chelsea Palermo, Munsif Husami, Tamara Zbrizher and more, will be performed in the atrium of the Luxe & Shadow vintage clothing boutique, at 658 Cookman Avenue, from 1 to 3 PM.
• At the Jazz Stage at the Homesick restaurant, 522 Cookman Ave, jazz musicians Calvin Johnson & Native Son will perform from 3 to 5 PM.
• The return of The Literally Underground Comedy Show, curated and hosted by comedian Jess Alaimo, will be held in the basement-level Laylow Cocktail Lounge, at 603 Mattison Avenue, from 3 to 5 PM.

The Asbury Underground website, asburyunderground.com, has a schedule and a map of the crawl route for visitors to follow.

New Jersey Awards - Live Stats

Best Musical - Top 3

1. THE LITTLE MERMAID (HOWELL PAL THEATRE COMPANY)

3.1% of votes

2. HAIR (Vanguard Theater Company)

3% of votes

3. GREASE (Plays-in-the-Park)

2.8% of votes

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