Friday Night on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents Andy Montañez at East River Park

(Videos courtesy Raul Marquez)


(More videos here)

Thursday Night on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents Tony Vega at the East River Park Bandshell

(Video courtesy BoricuaRick)

(More videos here)

Tuesday Night on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents Neon Indian at the East River Park Amphitheater

(Video courtesy Mtech77)

Wednesday Night on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents Ratking at the East River Park Amphitheater

(Video courtesy Fella Rodriguez)

Tuesday Night on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents Tito Nieves at East River Park Amphitheater

(Video courtesy BoricuaRick)
(Video courtesy Angel Melendez Sr.)

Late Saturday Afternoon on the Lower East Side: Thrill The World NYC 2013 Event at the East River Park Bandshell

(Video courtesy thrilltheworldnyc)

Thursday Night on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents Larry Harlow and The Latin Legends Band with DJ set by DJ Lucho at East River Park

(Video courtesy Larry Velez) (Video courtesy QVLM) (Video courtesy Vico El Conde) (Video courtesy Ken Bravo) (Videos courtesy Luisito Rosario)

Tuesday Night on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents Pete Rock vs. DJ Premier hosted by Lyricist Lounge at East River Park

(Video courtesy Gandi Ganda)

(Video courtesy Sidney Corniff) (Video courtesy titoarembi) (Video courtesy Amora Corvo) (Video courtesy Sidney Corniff) (Videos courtesy TJ Davis)

Monday Night on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents The Faux-Real Theatre Company's "Jason and the Argonauts" at East River Park

Tonight at East River Park we saw another great SummerStage presentation by the Faux-Real Theatre Company, Jason and the Argonauts, a wildly innovative and dramatically compelling adaptation of Apollonius Rhodius's epic The Argonautica as translated by Aaron Poochigian.

Directed by Mark Greenfield, the narrative of the digressive and oddly postmodern poem, with a seemingly endless number of characters and adventures, works spectacularly well in making this semi-obscure work of the third century B.C.E. comprehensible and truly exciting for a contemporary audience.

As the retelling of the legend of Jason and the Golden Fleece, a kid's story it's not. (But it also is.)

Wednesday Evening on the Lower East Side: SummerStage presents Lyricist Lounge 20th Anniversary Show with DJ Premier vs. Pete Rock at East River Park

(Photo courtesy of James Early)

We were at the East River Park amphitheater tonight for SummerStage's continuing celebration of SummerStage's 20th anniversary celebration of the acclaimed hip-hop brand, Lyricist Lounge. Tonight's show, better attended than any of the many events we've seen here, featured an old-school face-off, Pete Rock vs. DJ Premier. The very large crowd loved it, as it brought back many memories yet seemed fresh.

As we were reminded from the stage at the beginning of tonight's show, thirty years ago, this amphitheater served as the setting for climactic and thrilling last scene of the seminal hip-hop film, Wild Style, which we saw at the Brooklyn Public Library as part of the Brooklyn Hip-Hop Festival on July 10.

As William Faulkner would say, hip-hop has not only endured, it has prevailed.

The SummerStage promo stuff said:

A respected part of hip-hop music and culture, Lyricist Lounge has hosted hundreds of live showcases featuring the best up and coming talent while acting as a career platform for many of today’s superstars. Lyricist Lounge hosts a night featuring two legendary DJs battling it out for turntable supremacy.

Pete Rock, also known as Soul Brother #1 and The Chocolate Boy Wunda, is a producer, DJ and rapper and is one half of the critically acclaimed group, Pete Rock & CL Smooth. He has arguably pioneered the fusing of jazz, funk and soul into hip-hop as well as laid down the blueprint for beautiful soulful productions in hip-hop. About.com ranked him #3 on their “Top 50 Hip-Hop Producers” list. Pete Rock’s production has appeared on many of hip-hop’s most important records: Heavy D’s Peaceful Journey, Nas’ Illmatic, and Kanye West/Jay-Z’s Watch The Throne to name a few.

Christopher Edward Martin, better known by his stage name DJ Premier (also known as Preem, Premo, or Primo for short) is a producer and DJ and is the instrumental half of hip-hop duo Gang Starr, together with emcee Guru. DJ Premier recognized as one of hip-hop’s most important track masters his style is aggressive and raw. About.com ranked him #1 on their “Top 50 Hip-Hop Producers” list and Rolling Stone identified DJ Premier as arguably “hip-hop’s greatest producer of all time.” DJ Premier’s production has appeared on many of hip-hop’s most important records: Nas’ Illmatic, the Notorious B.I.G’s Ready to Die, Jay-Z’s Reasonable Doubt and numerous others.

Here's a video of the opening, courtesy of luvjonezmusic, who has four more from the show:

The show came to an abrupt halt when the power went out. We waited a while, then along with a bunch of people, went over the Grand Avenue overpass over the FDR Drive, grateful we got to hear and see as much as we did tonight.