Musikfest

Musikfest is an American music festival that has been held annually since 1984 in Bethlehem in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. It is the nation's largest non-gated free music festival. The festival begins on the first Friday in August, though it has been preceded since 2015 with a Thursday preview night involving the premium stage and adjacent areas. The festival ends the second Sunday thereafter. Musikfest draws thousands of visitors to Bethlehem from around the nation and world in a celebration that weaves through a Moravian community that dates back to 1741. Festival visitors are treated to hundreds of free shows with great genre variety over the course of the event. Each night, the festival's premium stage, Steel Stage, formerly known as RiverPlace and Kunstplatz, hosts a nationally known recording artist. These premium concerts, along with select shows at other stages, require paid tickets to gain admission. Musikfest is rooted in the Bethlehem area's German roots, and most of the festival's venues use Platz, the German word for place or square, at the end of their names. A popular place for eating and listening to music, for example, is the large "Festplatz", which includes 300 dining tables, and usually features a polka band each night. Beyond that, however, Musikfest's music, food, and other attractions represent a broad range of cultures. Musikfest is presented by ArtsQuest, a nonprofit arts organization founded to celebrate arts and culture in the Lehigh Valley and beyond. Proceeds from the event benefit ArtsQuest ventures such as the Banana Factory community arts center in South Bethlehem, and other nonprofit groups throughout the region. Musikfest served as the inspiration for major plot elements of the music film Killian & the Comeback Kids.