Flaming Lips and more: Word of South announces lineup of artists for 2024 festival
As the band The Flaming Lips might say, do you realize we are floating in space … and the Word of South festival is turning 10 this year?
The Flaming Lips will return to Tallahassee to kick off the annual three-day Word of South music and literature celebration in Adderley Amphitheater in the heart of Cascades Park on April 26.
“We’ve been talking about The Flaming Lips for several years, as I think it’s a great fit for us and one of the best live shows in the country,” WOS founder Mark Mustian said. “They’ll be playing, I think in its entirety, the legendary ‘Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots’ LP, which should be very cool.”
The official announcement of all the writers, singers and artists coming to this landmark year’s WOS spring fling running April 26-28 was made Feb. 22 at the Ology Brewing Co. on Kerry Forest Parkway. The Nygel Anderson Jazz Quartet provided the tunes.
The live concert by The Flaming Lips, a group that has not performed in Tallahassee since the late ‘80s, is the only WOS show that costs money. Tickets range from $40 to $75. Visit theadderleyamphitheater.com
“Yes, there are a few tickets left, but they’re going fast,” Mustian said.
Everything else is free in and around the park for the rest of the weekend. For a complete list, please visit wordofsouthfestival.com.
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Here are some highlights for 2024:
Scotty Barnhart and all that jazz
Recent Grammy Award-winner Scotty Barnhart, who teaches horn at Florida State University and is director of The Count Basie Orchestra, once again put together the jazz program on Sunday, April 28.
This year, it’s a tribute to Cuban and Latin jazz with flute player Roger Glenn, multi-instrumentalist Bobby Ramirez and more. To boot, it’s held in a climate-controlled ballroom in the AC Hotel by Marriott overlooking Cascades. The jazz afternoons have caught on with WOS audiences so arriving early is a good idea.
Authorized P-Funk with George Clinton
P-Funk mastermind George Clinton, who has made his home in Tallahassee since the 199Os, will tells stories from his lengthy career and be on hand when composer-keyboardist Danny Bedrosian unveils his book “The Authorized P-Funk Song Reference: Official Canon of Parliament-Funkadelic 1956-2023.”
The talk is slated for late afternoon on April 27, Saturday. In January, Clinton, the driving force behind such songs as “Flashlight” and “Give Up the Funk (Tear the Roof Off the Sucker),” had his name placed on a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles.
Jonah Goldberg and musical guest
Hey, it’s a presidential election year and Tallahassee is home to the state Capitol, so WOS is getting political in 2024. Conservative commentator Jonah Goldberg is appearing in a taping of the podcast “The Road to Now” on Saturday afternoon, April 27. Goldberg will be helped by podcast host and Middle Tennessee State University history professor Ben Sawyer and Bob Crawford of the musical act The Avett Brothers.
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Blind Boys of Alabama and a new book
The legendary Blind Boys of Alabama, who’ve recorded everything from spirituals to tunes written by Tom Waits, will perform on Sunday, April 28, and then discuss a new book about the singers after the concert.
Folk singer Jim White returns
Eccentric Southern folk singer Jim White (“Handcuffed to a Fence in Mississippi”) will join fellow songwriter Abe Partridge and writer Tad Bartlett for, well, something truly offbeat on Saturday. On Sunday, White will discuss his new literary memoir, “Incidental Contact,” which concerns his surreal days driving a cab in New York City before David Byrne’s label released his first album. This is a return visit to WOS for White.
Honoring historian Ed Gray
Ed Gray, a historian and writer who taught at FSU, was slated to appear at the 2024 WOS. In late December, Gray, 59, had a fatal heart attack while mountain biking. A tribute to Gray, as well as a discussion of his latest book “Mason-Dixon: Crucible of the Nation,” will be held Saturday, April 27, with award-winning journalist and friend Jennifer Portman moderating a panel of history authors.
Load up on local talent and more
Local talent abounds with appearances by musician Bill “Sauce Boss” Wharton, singer-songwriter Pat Puckett, novelist Trish MacEnulty leading a panel, DJ Demp collaborating with Tokyo Extraordinaire, columnist Diane Roberts interviewing Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist-memoirist Anne Hull, the music duo Robocromp and more.
The North Florida family act The Currys, from down the road in Port St. Joe, are back for more. The band is practically a regular at WOS. The Currys will join with all-female singing band The Krickets to warm up the amphitheater stage for headliners Rising Appalachia on Saturday evening, April 28.
Tananarive Due delves into Dozier School
American Book Award-winning horror writer and film historian Tananarive Due, whose parents were active in the Civil Rights Movement around Tallahassee, will read from her latest book, “The Reformatory: A Novel.” The story was inspired by the racially driven and brutal mistreatment of young males at the state-run Dozier School for Boys during the 20th century in nearby Marianna. Due will read Sunday, April 28.
“In 2013, I learned that I had a great-uncle Robert Stephens who died at the Dozier School in 1937,” Due said in an email. “I decided I wanted to write about the school – but there were so many memoirs by survivors that I realized the best way for me to approach the story would be as a horror novel. … The most gentle way to write this story was as a ghost story, where I could pay homage to the past murders … without writing a novel that would be nothing but killing and whipping children. … I wanted to create a sense of hope within the horror.”
How it all began
Word of South was started by attorney Mustian, who is also a novelist (“The Gendarme”) and former city commissioner. He was the lone vote against the controversial “deferred compensation” payout to sitting commissioners. Instead, Mustian took $100,000 he was handed and used it as startup money for the fest.
“It all been a great big blur,” Mustian said. “The things that I’m proudest of are that we’ve been able to do some truly unique things – the tribute to Nat and Cannonball Adderley, the Muscles Shoals tribute a few years back, the Jon Meacham and Yasim Williams pairing from last year. That you just can’t see anywhere else. … The great thing about Word of South is that there’s really nothing like it.”
Past visitors to WOS include piano pounder Ben Folds with the Tallahassee Symphony Orchestra, Oscar-winner J.K. Simmons (“Whiplash”) with the TSO, Grammy-winning bluesman Bobby Rush, columnist Leonard Pitts, singer Jason Isbell, the Tedeschi Trucks Band, bestselling author Jeff VanderMeer, jazz group The Marcus Roberts Trio, songstress Ricki Lee Jones, famed attorney Benjamin Crump, drummer Sheila E., novelist Padgett Powell, gritty author Donald Ray Pollock, country singer Jamey Johnson, songwriter Steve Forbert, “Oppenheimer” book (the basis for the Oscar-nominated film) co-author Kai Bird, singer Lisa Loeb, gospel belters The Como Mamas, hitmaker Rita Coolidge and many more.
WOS will proceed rain or shine.Mark Hinson is a former senior reporter at The Tallahassee Democrat. He can be reached at [email protected].
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Tallahassee's Word of South announces artists for 2024 festival
