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| Snarky Puppy @ Stern Grove (Photo: Sean Reiter) |
It may have been Father’s Day as the 86th season of the Stern Grove Festival opened on Sunday, but Mother Nature took center stage as she brought mid-70 degrees sunshine to an estimated 8,000 music fans for sets from DJ Lady Ryan, blues guitarist Isaiah Sharkey and Texas jazz fusion masters Snarky Puppy.
After recovering from the severe damage of late 2021’s water main break and the widespread downing of trees in the preceding winter, the Stern Grove team perhaps deserved the biggest round of applause for perseverance. This year will bring nine more events every summer Sunday now through The Big Picnic on August 20th with The Flaming Lips. There’s something for everyone’s musical tastes including Indigo Girls & Neko Case on June 25, Lyle Lovett and his Large Band on July 9, SF Symphony with Lettuce on July 23 and Buddy Guy on his final tour on August 6. This year, the concerts are also being webcast live on KPIX.com and (for the first time) being broadcast directly on KBCW 44 Cable 12.
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| DJ Lady Ryan @ Stern Grove (Photo: Sean Reiter) |
Sunday began with DJ Lady Ryan setting the tone for the early arriving crowd, where “Can you believe this weather” was a common conversation starter. Fans filled the close in areas early and began to fill the hillside terrace levels (the stage is actually 14 stories below 19th Avenue entrance). It truly felt like summer as blankets and picnic meals filled the venue.
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| Stern Grove (Photo: Sean Reiter) |
Grammy Award-winning Chicago blues guitar prodigy Isaiah Sharkey and his band wowed the crowd with their opening set. The 24-year-old Sharkey, who began playing acoustic at 4 and went electric at 7, has played and toured with Paul Simon, Patti Labelle, Keith Urban and Chris Martin. He went from a childhood at Chicago’s infamous Cabrini Green to touring the world with fellow guitar legend John Mayer.
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| Isaiah Sharkey @ Stern Grove (Photo: Sean Reiter) |
Sunday, he teased the crowd with a traditional version of The Spinners’ “It’s a Shame” before announcing “We’re not going to play that one tonight. Well, at least not that way. Here’s our version” – launching the band into the swinging version from his 2017 album “Love. Life. Live.” He was also joined by the horn section from Snarky Puppy and joked that the audience was getting a rare chance to see “Sharkey Puppy!”
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| Isaiah Sharkey @ Stern Grove (Photo: Sean Reiter) |
Sharkey’s performance was very well-received and he delivered a final exclamation point to his status in an elite club of blues guitarists by delivering a powerful cover of Prince’s “The Beautiful Ones” where he blended in nods to Hendrix’ version of “Star Spangled Banner” and finished with a screaming solo that would have fit nicely in “Purple Rain.”
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| Snarky Puppy's Michael League @ Stern Grove (Photo: Sean Reiter) |
Snarky Puppy’s name has always sounded more like a punk band than the Texas-born 10-piece jazz fusion ensemble but is probably befitting of the group that bends their sound and cycles through more than 25 members regularly coming and going. Winners of multiple Grammys – including for their last two albums 2021’s “Live at the Royal Albert Hall” and this year’s “Empire Central”, their upbeat solos-forward style had frequent cheers cascading down the hillside. They began their set with “Keep It on Your Mind” - the first song off their newest release and “East Bay” before Puppy founder Michael League made a touching dedication to jazz mentor and “Empire Central” contributor Bernard Wright before going into the soaring ballad “Belmont” that spotlighted the tender keys of Justin Stanton. Their set focused mostly on the new album with three older songs thrown in.
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| Snarky Puppy's Justin Stanton @ Stern Grove (Photo: Sean Reiter) |
Sunday was the first date of the Puppy’s 2023 North American tour that finds them spending two weeks on the continent (culminating with a sold-out gig at the Montreal Jazz Festival) before heading to a month’s tour of Europe. After their European run, they will start back up in America with an extended Fall tour that will see them returning to Northern California in September with dates in Grass Valley, Davis, Oakland’s Fox Theater and the Monterey Jazz Festival.
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| Stern Grove fans (Photo: Sean Reiter) |
They finished out Stern Grove’s opening Sunday with an encore by bringing up Sharkey for a different version of Sharkey Puppy sending the huge crowd up and out with a sun-soaked smiles. While there can certainly be no guarantee of Sunday’s weather repeating every Sunday at 2 pm out in the Sunset District, there will for sure be many great shows of the 2023 Stern Grove Festival still to come. Free tickets for each event can be reserved one month ahead of each show date at 2 pm by visiting www.sterngrove.org.
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