New Music Festival Set to Make LGBTQ+ History

Jupiter Fest, a 4-day festival celebrating diversity in music and theater, is coming to the Shenandoah Valley next fall, and what happens next has never happened before.

The fest will gather more than a hundred artists, mostly queer/trans and heavily racially diverse, to present a program that represents the best new voices and stories in staged music, from opera and Broadway to drag and burlesque.

“Artists like us rarely get such a wide-open chance to tell our own stories in our own voices,” said Jude O'Dell, professional show-writer and Jupiter Fest producer. “For one weekend, there will be more of us doing that work together than ever before.”

Shows presented will include 22 new and adapted works, including Carmen by Georges Bizet, Norma by Giuseppe Verdi, and the ever-thrilling Broadway classic, Cabaret. New works include commissions from trans and queer composers, fresh premieres from leading contemporary composers, and several concept-album-style song cycles.

Jupiter Fest takes place October 10-13, 2024, at MidMountain in Natural Bridge. Tickets are priced from $0 to $1,200 and are available via the Fest online store.

DETAILS ABOUT JUPITER FEST

• 3 Full Days of Music… and One Magical Night!

Shows range from 20 minutes to 2 hours. Comedy, romance, drama, and even a little spookiness: there's storytelling for every vibe. On the MidMountain "front porch" stage, we love all kinds of music. We're showing off our Appalachian banjo skills, and our singer friends from the Metropolitan Opera will wow you. But you'll be surprised to find pop, gospel, and blues on the menu, too!

• Making Music History

Trans singers have a rough time in professional music. On our festival stage, they all get opportunity. Currently, our roster includes more than 50% gender-diverse artists. They're writing the music and words; they're taking onstage lead roles; they're producing and designing and directing. They're finally, end-to-end, having the chance to be heard.

• DIY-ing Our Way to $320,000

What do a few former “girls in tech”, a gang of punk-as-heck mountain queers, and a gaggle of opera-industry outsiders have in common? Can-do-it-iveness, resourcefulness, grit, skills? Yeah. Self-funding a music festival is as simple as stone soup when your first ingredients are business acumen, top-shelf artistry, and total commitment. And when your second ingredients are a linocut studio, a rack of thrifted tees, and a bunch of professionally crafty punks... well, that's what we around here call merch. Check out the Fest Shop now and later for rolling limited-edition releases that 100% support artists only, and watch us eat an elephant... one bite at a time.

• A Historical Venue

Our Fest takes place among the rolling meadows, free-food forest, and 18th-century brick mansion of MidMountain, a queer/BIPOC-centered home for the arts in Natural Bridge, Virginia. In the fields next to the free-food forest, attendees will get to learn about, appreciate, and help reclaim this beautiful place through cultural workshops and activities.

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