A new St. Louis music festival is set to take over St. Louis’ Grand Center neighborhood this weekend, bringing 100 local acts to six venues. The inaugural Free 4 All showcase kicks off on Saturday and will include hip-hop, rock, R&B and more.
Organizing 100 performances is quite a feat. Free 4 All co-founder Joe Hess told St. Louis on the Air that the showcase’s open submission process garnered a lot of attention in a short amount of time.
“We opened submissions on June 26 and closed them on July 10. In just two weeks we had 300 submissions and nearly 200 nominations, which is just the general public filling out the form and recommending who they would like to see at [Free 4 All],” Hess said.
Hess, a longtime music journalist and musician, said the process introduced him to a wave of new talent.
“At least 30% were names that I had never seen before, maybe even a little bit more,” he said. “Space Quaker left quite an impression. Sprite was a band that I had seen live before, but had kind of passed out of my mind until I saw their application again. I became more familiar and excited by a number of different artists.”
For veteran St. Louis musician Tamara Dodd, who performs as Bates, Free 4 All was immediately appealing because it provides an opportunity to collaborate across genres.
“You kind of get exhausted doing the same thing over and over again. When you have reached certain amounts of success, in St. Louis specifically, it can be polarizing,” Bates said. “You’re kind of stuck in this one bubble and it feels good to be welcomed back into community as a musician [and] we can all have fun [performing] again.”
Bates said the showcase also creates space for more than just performances.
“These are places where I met KVtheWriter and Katarra for the first time,” she said. “These festivals mean [more than] just the showcase part of it, but also the networking part of it.”
Hess added, “This event is meant to bring everyone together under the umbrella of just being a musician. The names on our poster are in alphabetical order. No names are in a bigger font than any others. [Free 4 All] is tailored toward discovery.”
For more about what’s in store at Free 4 All this weekend, including what Bates is planning to do during her set at the Dark Room, listen to St. Louis on the Air on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or click the play button below.
Related Event
What: Free 4 All music showcase
When: September 6 - 7, 2025
Where: Various locations in Grand Center
“St. Louis on the Air” brings you the stories of St. Louis and the people who live, work and create in our region. The show is produced by Miya Norfleet, Emily Woodbury, Danny Wicentowski, Elaine Cha and Alex Heuer. Darrious Varner is our production assistant. The audio engineer is Aaron Doerr.
