Photo credit: Toby Tenenbaum
The Magic of Celebrate!
For almost 50 years, BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! has been synonymous with one place: the Lena Horne Bandshell in Prospect Park. That’s still our home, and we’ve helped transform it into a space for families, music fans, and art lovers of all types to enjoy amazing performances under the stars. Prospect Park Alliance is our first strategic partner, and we’re proud of the legacy we’ve built.
This July, for the third year running, BRIC Arts Media also brought Celebrate Brooklyn! to another part of the borough, beautiful Brower Park in Crown Heights, with an event that epitomized our message of radical joy.
In a city of constant change, Celebrate Brooklyn! is New York City’s longest running music and performing arts festival. We are also among the most daring and diverse, where powerhouses like Patti LaBelle, Liz Phair & Sleater-Kinney, Royel Otis, and Common share the stage with rising stars and artists from around the world for unforgettable nights.
Celebrate Broookyn! was launched five decades ago to help revive Prospect Park after years of neglect, and accelerate the borough’s revitalization through the arts. But the festival was also conceived as what today might be called a violence interruption program – an intentional way to make the park safer, more inclusive, and inviting to those in its surrounding neighborhoods and the people of Brooklyn. That kind of investment in arts and culture and community-building remains at the core of what BRIC does.
“What struck me most was the crowd: intergenerational, multiracial, multicultural, people of diverse sexual identities and people of different faiths all in one place, together.”
Soon after starting here in 2022, I considered a question: Could we bring that BRIC magic to other neighborhoods? I thought so, and the team agreed. That same year, Council Member Chi Ossé proposed a collaboration with us in Crown Heights, and a new tradition was born. Today, BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! at Brower Park has become an extension of the energy we bring to the Lena Horne Bandshell. It also shows up at BRIC House, our headquarters in Fort Greene. Frankly, it’s the ethos behind everything we do.
Photo credit: Toby Tenenbaum
This July, we returned to Brower Park even bigger than before. The event – an ecstatic celebration of house music featuring Black House Radio, Chicago house legend Terry Hunter, and Brooklyn’s own Dub-Stuy Soundsystems – was one of my favorite BRIC shows as a civilian and a BRIC employee. What struck me most was the crowd: intergenerational, multiracial, multicultural, people of diverse sexual identities, and people of different faiths all in one place, together.
That’s the real magic and our value proposition: leveraging arts and culture to create a sanctuary of community, safety, and belonging wherever we go. In a time of division and violence, being positive and leading with love is a revolutionary act.
Crown Heights, like neighborhoods all across Brooklyn, is filled with its own brand of amazing people and cultural greatness. At BRIC we celebrate those forces year-round. We’re proud to work with partners like Council Member Ossé, Con Ed, Rooftop Films, and others who support that vision.
Thanks to everyone who got down with us this summer. Let us know if you’d like to see BRIC’s brand of radical joy in your neighborhood. Brower Park is just the beginning.