Stone Arch Bridge Festival, Minneapolis (June 14, 2025)
Stone Arch Bridge Festival (June 14-15, 2025)
Saturday, June 14
Sunday, June 15
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Since we were going to be in downtown Minneapolis to see Sleigh Bells at the Fine Line, we came a few hours early to stroll through the Stone Arch Bridge Festival, a festival that is in its 31st year, a festival ranked #16 in Sunshine Artist Best of 2024. (The Minnehaha Falls Art Fair ranked #5).
I can understand the high ranking for both art festivals due to the location of the events. The Stone Arch Bridge Festival starts from one end at Gold Medal Park and meanders along West River Parkway past the Guthrie Theater, Mill City Museum, the Stone Arch Bridge, then the imposing buildings of the United States Postal Service and Federal Reserve, and finally a quiet stretch along the Mississippi River crossing under the Nicollet Island Silver Railroad Bridge and ending at 4th Avenue.
Cactus Blossoms at Grand Old Day (June 1, 2025)
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The festival route isn’t nearly as long as Grand Old Day in St. Paul, but by its location offers unique places along the river to drink a cold beer from Pyres Brewing Company or better, a hot coffee due to the cooler, damp weather that settled in for the weekend. (The saddest person I saw at the festival was the food vendor trying to sell sno-cones.)
Like Grand Old Day, there were music acts. But unlike Grand Old Day, the two music venues were almost on opposite ends of the Festival, which made for long strolls through the pockets of vendor booths selling everything from oil paintings, woodworking and landscape photography to other curios like a booth solely dedicated to taxidermized insects.
There were plenty of steps. So it was nice to sit among the ruins at the entrance of the Stone Arch Bridge at the Star Tribune Stage or at a mini amphitheater along the Mississippi River at the Cities 97 Stage. The bands I briefly caught along the way:
The Right Here, a young group of musicians, describing themselves as a “jang-a-lang-a-lang band from Minneapolis” Their rockabilly meets punk sound echoed through the surrounding ruins of the mills.
Danger Pins, also from Minneapolis, looking like a rock band, playing like a rock band. Their sound a perfect mix of laid-back psychedelic rock drifting along while the Mississippi flowed behind them.
The Walker Brothers minus one brother, so Joseph picked up another guitarist while Jay attended another gig. Still a nice, easy sound of R&B and soul swimming with the world beat of Joseph’s South American upbringing.
Leslie Rich and the Rocket Soul Choir, a Belfast singer/songwriter residing in Minneapolis. Due to the distance between venues, I only caught the last two songs and wished I caught more as the summer sun began to fade behind the looming clouds and oncoming drizzle, a setting usually found in Rich’s costal hometown.
