Second Day of the World Course

Today, Big Ears released its eagerly anticipated lineup for the March 2025 festival in Knoxville, Tennessee. 

Each year before, there had been at least one bucket-list performer on the schedule that I simply had to see. Laurie Anderson. Harold Budd. John Zorn. Patti Smith. This year, there were no "OMG, I have to see them" shows in the announcement, although it's still a strong overall lineup.

The headliner acts this year include the Philip Glass Ensemble performing Music in 12 Parts, although the announcement makes it clear that composer Glass himself will not be in attendance. German electronic musician Michael Rother will perform the music of his seminal bands Neu! and Harmonia. Johnny Greenwood of Radiohead will do something called 133 Years of Reverb, which seems to an eight-hour sound installation in an old church. Jazz trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith will lead a program that will include his RedKoral Quartet, the Wadada Leo Smith Quartet, Orange Wave Electric, Revolutionary Love, and more. There's also the premier of a composition by Tyshawn Sorey and something called Ipsa Dixit by soprano Kate Soper and the Wet Ink Ensemble. I've never heard of Soper, but the festival describes Ipsa Dixit as "an evening-length work of chamber music theater for voice, flute, violin, and percussion that explores music, language, and meaning through blistering ensemble virtuosity and extended vocal technique."

But it's after all that, that things get interesting for me. Ukraine's DakhaBrakha is performing. I saw them at Seattle's Bumbershoot Festival in 2013 having no idea who they were at the time - I was walking by their stage as they started and decided to stick around and check them out and they blew my mind. I haven't seen them in the 10 years since, so that's one set I'm certainly looking forward to.

There's also Nels Cline, possibly the most innovative living guitarist IMHO, Mike Reed’s Separatist Party, who released my personal AOTY last year, and the Sun Ra Arkestra playing with indie rockers Yo La Tengo. Then we have jazz guitarist Jeff Parker, both solo and with his post-rock band, Tortoise. Speaking of post-rock, Icelandic band múm is also on the schedule, as well as Austin's Explosions In the Sky.

Two years ago, I saw the indie slowcore band Low at Big Ears and shortly afterwards drummer and singer Mimi Parker of Low sadly passed away. Her husband, Low's guitarist and singer Alan Sparhawk, has now gone solo and will be performing at Big Ears this year. 

The experimental rock band Beak> will be performing, as will ambient-country bands SUSS and Cowboy Sadness. More conventional ambient music will be provided by William Basinski (The Disintegration Loops), Steve Roach, and harpist Mary Lattimore. There's also Yuka C. Honda, formerly of the unforgettable Cibo Matto, and Helado Negro and Julia Holter. Jazz musicians include Bill Frisell, Susan Alcorn, Sylvie Courvoisier, Kahil El’Zabar, Vijay Iyer, Joe Lovano, and others.

Overall, there's over 150 performances by over 50 artists, and still more artists to be added later. 

So is it all worth over $3,000 though ($1,150 for VIP pass and over $2,000 for a centrally located hotel)?

Fuck, yeah. Sign me up!