A Selective Guide to the Arts in Los Angeles

 

94TH ANNUAL AMERICAFEST CELEBRATION: ROSE BOWL AND MT. WILSON OBSERVATORY

The Rose Bowl Stadium will host its 94th Annual AmericaFest Celebration, recognized as one of the nation’s largest and longest-running shows to celebrate America’s birthday, virtually this year to ensure the tradition continues.

For the past 93 years, America’s Stadium has proudly provided the greater Pasadena area and beyond with a 4th of July celebration. This year it plans to transition to a virtual event on the afternoon of Saturday, July 4, from 2 to 3 p.m., so Pasadena locals and national fans alike can tune in to the 94th Virtual AmericaFest Celebration on Rose Bowl LIVE, located on the stadium’s social media platforms.

The virtual event, in collaboration with Mt. Wilson Observatory, will include music from cellist Cécilia Tsan who will be performing live two solos from the 100-inch telescope dome on top of Mt. Wilson in honor of our United States Fallen Heroes and the first responders and frontline workers for their admirable work and courage during COVID-19.

In addition, Mt. Wilson will activate its special art installation called Sunstar, created and owned by artist Liliane Lijn and astrophysicist John Vallerga. The prism will be moving throughout the day to shine a bit of pure color from the sun over Pasadena for residents to enjoy throughout the virtual 4th of July event.

The one-hour virtual event will feature celebrations of our United States veterans and military personnel, messages from our community thanking first responders, frontline workers and their personal heroes for their work during COVID-19, as well as a salute to America with a message aboutwhy we celebrate the 4th of July.

At the end, there will be a flyover of Pasadena and its most historic landmarks. The flyover will be viewable from many Pasadena residents’ homes, as well as streamed online.

To register for this free event and/or to submit your video thanking local heroes, please visit www.RoseBowlLive.tv. Videos must be no longer than 15 seconds and filmed in landscape mode (horizontal).

For more information on the 94th Virtual AmericaFest Celebration, visit https://www.rosebowlstadium.com or @RoseBowlStadium. To learn more about Mt. Wilson Observatory, please visit https://www.mtwilson.edu.

Mt. Wilson will activate its special art installation called Sunstar, created and owned by artist Liliane Lijn and astrophysicist John Vallerga, for the Fourth of July. / Photo by Ray Blumhorst

GRAND PARK + THE MUSIC CENTER’S 4TH OF JULY BLOCK PARTY: HOME EDITION

For the first time, the eighth annual Grand Park + The Music Center’s 4th of July Block Party: Home Edition has partnered with ABC7/KABC-TV Los Angeles, Southern California’s most-watched television station, to broadcast the first hour of the highly popular celebration on Saturday, July 4, (7:00 p.m.–8:00 p.m. PDT) on ABC7. Viewers can also stream the first hour live on abc7.com and ABC7’s Connected TV Apps. The special will simulcast on L.A. County’s public access Channel 36 and will continue with expanded programming streamed from 8:00 p.m.–10:00 p.m. PDT on Grand Park’s and The Music Center’s digital channels. The event is hosted by ABC7 Eyewitness News anchor Coleen Sullivan, who will be joined throughout the special by Eyewitness Newsmakers’ host Adrienne Alpert, and community journalists Sophie Flay, Ashley Mackey and Eric Resendiz.

Grand Park + The Music Center’s 4th of July Block Party: Home Edition

KABC-TV Broadcast Hosts 

  • Members of the Eyewitness News Team will host and introduce Grand Park’s performances and profiles featured during the 7:00 p.m. broadcast on ABC7. Eyewitness News Anchor Coleen Sullivan will host the event and will be joined by Eyewitness Newsmakers’ host Adrienne Alpert, and community journalists Sophie FlayAshley Mackey, and Eric Resendiz.

Music

  • Rapper and songwriter D Smoke (née Daniel Anthony Farris) headlines the eighth annual Grand Park + The Music Center’s 4th of July Block Party: Home Edition, performing songs from his debut album, Black Habits. The artist also chats about growing up in L.A. as well as how his education background and being a school teacher has influenced his career. (Headline Performance and Profile)
  • 21-year old singer artist Amindi, who takes pride in her Jamaican heritage and Inglewood neighborhood, made her mark with the 2017 release of “Pine & Ginger,” which garnered 25 million streams. While discussing her views on the 4th of July and her support of equality and justice efforts, Amindi also performs songs including her newest single, “Love Em Leave Em.” (Profile and Performance)
  • Editing films, videos and other multimedia by day, and making music under the name Ginger Root by night, Cameron Lew fronts a sound described as “Aggressive Elevator Soul”. Lew discusses his Chinese American heritage, growing up in Orange County and how everything from Philly sounds to Soul Stax helped influence his cool groovy music style. (Performance and Profile)
  • A five-resident artist collective, Cumbiatón was founded in Boyle Heights and focuses on creating a safe space for Women of Color and Queer and Trans People of Color DJ’s and community. Sizzle Fantastic talks how Cumbiatón welcomes and celebrates those who have been most marginalized. (July 1st Performance; July 4th Profile)
  • Founded in 2013 with DJs Partytime, siik, and SOSUPERSAM, 143 Worldwide’s parties have gone global, mixing love songs and R&B. The group takes their “1-4-3” name directly from the 90s pager code for “I love you;” Cody Debacker (aka Partytime) and Samantha Duenas (aka SOSUPERSAM) chat why they encourage everyone to join their music party. (July 1st Performance; July 4th Profile)
  • With a striking stage presence, Los Angeles’ singer-songwriter San Cha spans Cumbia, Punk Bolero, Electro and traditional Mexican Rancheras. A powerful voice for Queer Latinx identity, San Cha discusses familia, acceptance and inequality before performing her song, “Capricho Del Diablo” acapella. (Profile and Performance)
  • A fixture of the L.A. radio scene, Sérgio Mielniczenko has been the longtime host of two shows, the “Brazilian Hour” on KXLU and “Global Village Friday’s” on KPFK. Speaking about COVID-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement from a Brazilian viewpoint, Mielniczenko also muses on the healing powers of music and his 40-year career as a cultural contributor in Los Angeles. (Profile)
  • GRAMMY®-nominated Thalma de Frietas is a multidisciplinary artist, performer and composer from Rio de Janeiro, known for her genre-bending mix of Brazilian traditions, pop, jazz and Latin music. Now based locally, de Frietas talks about the intersections of Brazilian music, culture and current events in Los Angeles. (Profile)

Comedy Sketch

  • Comedy variety show Filipino AF entertains viewers with Improv, sketch and stand-up routines about Filipino American identity and life in Los Angeles. (Digital Performance only)

Food Personalities

  • Started by Lorenzo and Danny Cerda, Cerda Vega is known for its homemade Birria de Res and Mexican French Dip. The popular food truck chefs discuss how their mobile catering business has survived the COVID-19 pandemic while helping the community and feeding first responders. (Profile)
  • A cookbook author and restaurateur, Susan Feniger’s career spans decades in L.A. with the opening of her signature restaurant, Border Grill, and other ventures with business partner Mary Sue Milliken. On July 4, Feniger chats about the beautiful food evolution in Los Angeles. (Profile) 
  • Husband and wife, Johneric and Christine Concordia, talk about their restaurant, The Park’s Finest, based in Historic Filipinotown, and discuss their love for the community and support of frontliners during this time of COVID-19 through The Feed the Frontliners Project. (Profile)
  • Chef Jocelyn Ramirez founded Todo Verde in 2015 with a mission to create delicious and healthy plant-based food inspired by her Mexican and South American roots for the Eastside community. Chef Ramirez talks about Mexican Vegan food and the beauty of changing one’s lifestyle before demonstrating how to make Street Tacos & Three Sisters Salad (Las Tres Hermanas in Chipotle) from her cookbook La Vida Verde. (Cooking Demonstration)
  • Sarintip “Jazz” Singsanong immigrated to the United States in 1979 with only $200 in her pockets. Twenty-seven years later, she and her late brother, Suthiporn “Tui” Sungkamee, transformed Hollywood’s Jitlada into a cult following, specializing in spicy Southern Thai cooking. Jazz talks about living the American Dream and living her mantra: Since she is blessed, she needs to bless others with her gifts. (Profile)

Hollywood

  • Hailing from North Hollywood, film director and fashion designer Mikey Alfred speaks about his fashion line, which brings awareness to racism and a need for change and his hope for his fellow Millennials to lead the way. (Profile)
  • Known for his many roles in films, Danny Trejo is also a producer and entrepreneur as the owner of Trejo’s Tacos and Trejo’s Coffee & Donuts. The community leader chats about Los Angeles through his eyes, the strength and characteristics of Angelenos as well as what it was like for him growing up in LA. (Profile)

Literature

  • Fifteen-year-old Zoie Brogdon is a young equestrian champion and member of the Compton JR. Posse and aspiring poet. From her View Park home, Brogdon reflects on her generation’s fears and hopes for a new day with the recitation of her poem, “Melanin.” (Profile)
  • Luis J. Rodriguez was the official Poet Laureate of Los Angeles from 2014 to 2016 and is the founder of Tia Chucha’s Centro Cultural & Bookstore in the San Fernando Valley. An arts advocate and community healer, Rodriguez recites his poem, “Love Poem To L.A.,” which reflects on the city’s external and internal beauty and how to love the good, the bad and the ugly of Los Angeles. (Poetry Reading) 

Photography

  • B+ (née Brian Cross), a legendary Hip Hop photographer from Ireland, talks about the power of photos to tell a story and how they have the power to shape narratives, especially during the times of revolution. (Profile)
  • Estevan Oriol discusses Los Angeles through his eyes and how his work as a photographer and director have intertwined with L.A. identity, Hip Hop culture and familia. (Profile)

Visual Arts

  • TheChinese American Museum (CAM) is an L.A. landmark located in the El Pueblo de Los Angeles Historic Monument. As the first museum in Southern California dedicated to the Chinese American experience in this state, CAM Board members Gay Yuen and Paula Madison share the importance of recognizing how racism has impacted both Black Americans and Chinese/Asian Americans and the need for unity across communities to affect change and understanding. (Profile)
  • Shepard Fairey, best known for his famous rendition of Andre the Giant, is a muralist and graphic artist who constantly shifts between political art, street art, fine art and more. Fairey discusses how his 20-year career span living in L.A. and the abundance of different cultures that call L.A. home have influenced his art and informed his activism. (Profile)
  • Born in Pasadena with a Filipino, Mexican and Native American background, artist Patrick Martinez uses various mediums such as graffiti, painting, ceramic, sculpture and neon to interpret everyday realities. From his studio, Martinez talks about his inspiration through Tupac Shakur’s connection to L.A. and the strength of the arts to heal our communities while showing his recent art depicting inner city communities. The Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture recently acquired one of his pieces. (Profile and Artwork)
  • Based in Venice, graffiti artist Jules Muck discusses Los Angeles through her eyes, protests and how her work as a muralist has become synonymous with some of the most polarizing events in recent times. She’ll also display her most recent works focusing on the death of Lakers legend Kobe Bryant and Minneapolis resident George Floyd. (Profile and Artwork)

Perspectives

  • People on the street interviews feature different perspectives of everyday people, including a high school teacher from Venice High School and a protestor from Compton, among others, plus what it means to grow up as a Black child according to 13-year-old Aedan McDaniels. 

*Artists and performances are subject to change.

Where:

KABC-TV, Channel 7

LA36

Facebook Live (@GrandParkLosAngeles and @MusicCenterLA)

Grandparkla.org

Musiccenter.org 

When:

Saturday, July 4, 2020 

7:00 p.m.–8:00 p.m. (ABC7 and LA Channel 36 broadcast)

8:00 p.m.–10:00 p.m. (Grand Park and Music Center digital channels)

For updated information, visit grandparkla.org and july4.grandparkla.org. Follow Grand Park on Facebook (GrandParkLosAngeles), as well as Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat (@GrandPark_LA).