St. Paul’s popular (and still free!) Lowertown Sounds concert series announces 2024 lineup

With concert ticket prices rising along with the cost of just about everything — and some cities not even paying local bands anything to perform in their parks — organizers of St. Paul’s Lowertown Sounds music series are especially thrilled to unveil their lineup of free Twin Cities bands for 2024.

“The hill keeps getting steeper,” admitted Clint Roberts, founder and director of the annual series formerly known as Music in Mears.

Performers lined up for the Thursday night series in Mears Park include: regular favorites the New Standards, Flamin’ Oh’s and Salsa del Soul; rootsy Americana music mainstays Molly Maher, Erik Koskinen, Becky Kapell and the High 48s; and buzzing newcomers such as Laamar, Aby Wolf’s Champagne Confetti, Keep for Cheap, Favourite Girl and Colin Bracewell.

The latter two acts will share the stage on the June 6 kickoff night with Dan Israel, who’s one of several reputable singer/songwriters also on the 12-show schedule alongside Mary Bue, Chris Koza (playing with his band Rogue Valley), Dan Rodriguez and the Scarlet Goodbye’s Dan Murphy and Jeff Arundel.

Organizers promise the usual mix of food trucks and local beer and wine makers at the shows, which will again run from 6-9:30 p.m. nearly every week through Aug. 29.

As much as everything appears unchanged and rock-steady for this year’s series, Lowertown Sounds organizers faced steep increases behind the scenes in costs, including everything from insurance to signage and production. Meanwhile, sponsorship money has become more challenging to obtain.

Roberts praised Blaze Credit Union and other 2024 sponsors while noting he’s still looking for more support. The series also relies on grant money from the city.

Rising costs like those have forced other festival-style events around the Twin Cities to go on hiatus in recent years, such as Rock the Garden, Twin Cities Summer Jam and the Basilica Block Party — the latter of which is returning in August, but with higher ticket prices and one less stage. Similar financial challenges were cited by Minneapolis Parks & Recreation Board members after they received blowback this winter for not paying musicians to perform in their Music in the Parks series.

Roberts said he considered downscaling the amount and/or level of entertainment, but he said, “I didn’t want to cut back on the quality of music people have come to expect.” More than 25 acts received slots in this year’s series.

“That’s one of the problems: We’ve been around a while now and are known for putting on popular shows, so everyone thinks we’re doing great,” Roberts said. “There’s a risk of being taken for granted.”

Here’s the full 2024 schedule with the rich lineup local music lovers have come to expect every summer in St. Paul: