Drop Me Off in Overtown

Miami is a young buck as far as cities go. But while our years are few, our memories are many. Overtown is one such bastion of historical recollection. One of the city’s earliest black neighborhoods, it boasts a narrative that includes the voices of some of music’s greatest African-American musicians,...

By Hannah Sentenac

June 21, 2012

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Miami is a young buck as far as cities go. But while our years are few, our memories are many. Overtown is one such bastion of historical recollection. One of the city’s earliest black neighborhoods, it boasts a narrative that includes the voices of some of music’s greatest African-American musicians, including Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, and Billie Holiday. And these impressive musical roots are celebrated in song each year at the Overtown Rhythm & Arts Festival. For the second annual incarnation of this community fete, R&B crooner Freddie Jackson, singer-songwriter Jonathan Butler, the Booker T. Washington High School Marching Band, Ernest Walker Jr. and Company, the Larry Dogg Band, and Dei 7 Free Range Music join the lineup. And music ain’t all. Attendees can nosh on Southern, Caribbean, and barbecued fare as well as locally grown produce. The aesthetically inclined can peruse art vendors, explore local businesses, and park the kids at a designated village for face painting, balloon animals, and games galore.
Sat., June 23, 11 a.m.-8 p.m., 2012

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