SANTA CRUZ JUG BAND FESTIVAL 2025
The Santa Cruz Jug Band Festival will be Sunday, August 17, 2025, 11 AM to 5 PM. It will be held in Abbott Square, 118 Cooper Street, Santa Cruz.
Headlining the Festival are the following bands: The Rivertown Skifflers, The Trolley Drops Brass Jug Band, Quake City Jug Band, and Washboard Rhythm Co. There will be opportunities for musicians to join acoustic jams between sets, so bring your own instruments.
Santa Cruz’ own Trolley Drops Jug Band is sponsoring the event, which is open and free to the public.
More information can be found at http://trolleydrops.com/festival/ or on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/thetrolleydrops
Contact: Peter Thomas thetrolleydrops@gmail.com
What's Jug Band Music?
It’s bluesy, jazzy, and fun! With roots from Appalachia, New Orleans, and Africa, jug band music started in the south (notably Louisville, Kentucky and Memphis, Tennessee) in the 1920’s and 30’s. Highly popular "back in the day", jug bands such as Gus Cannon’s Jug Stompers and the Memphis Jug Band incorporated a variety of conventional and home-made instruments (such as spoons, kazoos, harmonicas, washtub bass, and washboard), and, of course, featured jug-blowing as a rhythmic backbone. Jug band music could have quietly slid into obscurity if not for a revival in the 1960’s by notable musicians such as John Sebastian, Jerry Garcia, Jim Kweskin, and Maria Muldaur. Today, with or without jug and home-made instruments, the genre is alive and well as you’ll get to hear and see when you come to the festival.