40th Street Summer Series

The an­nu­al sum­mer mu­sic and per­form­ance series kicks off this week, bring­ing a sea­son of fun to Uni­versity City’s green space be­hind the Wal­nut West Free Lib­rary. Con­certs are a joint ef­fort among the Uni­versity of Pennsylvania, Uni­versity City Dis­trict and The Ro­tunda. A vari­ety of mu­si­cians and per­formers have already been an­nounced for the free events hap­pen­ing through Septem­ber.

Sat., June 18 will fea­ture a head­lining per­form­ance by the Young Phil­adelphi­ans, a four per­son band headed by Marc Ri­bot that com­bines punk mu­sic with funk, soul and noise. The Young Phil­adelphi­ans pay trib­ute to the pre-di­git­al era of dance mu­sic. They cov­er not­able songs like “Love Roller­coast­er” by Ohio Play­ers and “The Hustle” by Van Mc­Coy and the Soul City Sym­phony. The night will also fea­ture a per­form­ance by gender non-con­form­ing cel­list, vo­cal­ist, lyr­i­cist, Reiki prac­ti­tion­er, and visu­al artist Mon­ica McIntyre.

Sat., Ju­ly 23 fea­tures Dendê & Band, com­bin­ing Afro-Brazili­an mu­sic and tra­di­tion with that of world mu­sic. Open­ing the show is PaPa Ed Stokes and Kunu Bi, a multi-in­stru­ment­al­ist who plays dozens of in­stru­ments, in­clud­ing some that are homemade.

Sat., Au­gust 20 will fea­ture the Liberi­an Wo­men’s Chor­us for Change, a group us­ing tra­di­tion­al Liberi­an song to place em­phas­is on strong and safe com­munit­ies. The Chor­us uses mu­sic to en­cour­age wo­men to make their voices heard. The Mo­dero Dance Com­pany will also per­form a mix of mod­ern and tra­di­tion­al In­done­sian dance.

Sat., Septem­ber 17 will be head­lined by Ren­nie Har­ris’ RHAW, a youth dance group that will per­form a vari­ety of hip-hop dance styles. The Kala­man­dir Dance Com­pany will join them, per­form­ing clas­sic­al In­di­an dances.

June 18, Ju­ly 23, Aug. 20, Sept. 17. 6pm. Free. 201 S. 40th St. uni­versity­city.org