CINCINNATI — Cincinnati City Council's budget and finance committee heard a presentation Monday from the organizers of a new festival planned for the banks of the Ohio River that will remind many of the former Tall Stacks festival.
America's River Roots will take place on the Ohio River from October 9 through 12 in 2025, officials announced in the spring.
The festival will be "centered on the Ohio River." The festival is intended to kick off the 250th birthday of the United States, which happens in 2026.
New details about the festival presented
The presentation to council committee members on Monday included a few new details, including how many music stages are planned and some plans for the boats involved in the festival.
The presentation also disclosed an estimated price tag for the event: $16,450,000. Organizers anticipate the bulk of that cost will be spent on entertainment and production, and logistics associated with the riverboats — like supplies, lodging and travel fees. The majority of the funding will come from sponsors and state, county and local governments, according to the presentation.
"The goal of America's River Roots is to invite all locally, regionally, nationally and actually internationally," Susan Fisher, executive director of the festival, said. "We span from the Bengals stadium [to] beyond Sawyer Point."
Missing were details on whether the federal government would provide any funding for the festival, which is intended to be a part of the nation's 250th birthday party.
The presentation breaks out three major themes of the festival: Cuisine, culture and music.
The cuisine section of the presentation highlights:
- Multicultural food and products
- Regional food truck and Restaurant Row
- Celebrity chef presentations
- Bourbon tasting sessions
- Craft beer tasting sessions
- Themed riverboat offerings
As for music, the presentation says the festival hopes to have:
- Nationally recognized and emerging artists on eight different stages along the Ohio River
- River Roots gospel revival
- Cincinnati Black Music Walk of Fame recognition
- Unplugged performances
The cultural events attendees can look forward to at the festival were listed as:
- Tall Stacks riverboat cruises
- River Cities Expo
- Sounds of the River education program
- Steamboat age and river industry exhibits
- Freedom Center speaker series
- Regional cultural tours intended to last beyond the festival, which include:
- Freedom Journey digital platform
- Riverwalk Heritage Tour
- Bourbon Trail
- UNESCO Earthworks
The presentation includes a map of the riverfront, highlighting where many of the festival's attractions will be located.
"It is a five-day festival, and people will come and go as they please, but we will have activities morning, noon and night for all to enjoy," Fisher said. "There will be something for all people of all ages, generations."
The map breaks the whole festival down into eight different zones, each of which will have its own stage. The zones are spaced out along the Ohio River to stretch the festival from the Andrew J Brady Music Center to past the Daniel Carter Beard Bridge on the Cincinnati side.
In Northern Kentucky, the festival spans from a "yacht village" planned to the west of the Roebling Bridge near Covington to Newport on the Levee, where the bourbon-tasting events are slated to be held.
The aforementioned "yacht village" is also listed as a sponsorship opportunity; the presentation from organizers highlights "docking for yachts at Covington Landing during the four-day event with VIP river taxi service" as a possible funding source for the event. In addition, there will be opportunities for corporate or club reservations for riverboat cruises or tasting events.
Also highlighted on the map is a designated area for riverboats along Yeatman's Cove at the Serpentine Wall — and two river taxis that will ferry people back and forth between the Cincinnati side of the river and the Northern Kentucky side.
The presentation also includes a timeline that more specifically outlines the festival's path to fruition before its launch date in October 2025. For now, organizers are focusing on the finer details, but the presentation says they plan to announce headliner artists in the first quarter of 2025. From there, the full festival lineup should be announced in the second quarter of 2025.
"We are excited and proud to be one of the first in the country to kick off the nation's 250th [birthday]," Fisher said. "We are going to open up our incredible mile and a half Cincinnati–Northern Kentucky waterfront, and it's just going to be a don't-miss event."
Here's what we already knew was coming
The festival will have plenty of live music, with Bryce Dessner of rock band The National curating performers. The National, which is made up of Cincinnati natives, is set to perform.
The lineup also features Kathy Wade, an award-winning jazz singer, officials announced in the spring.
The Purple People Bridge will also be transformed into a food market for the festival.
Similar to the blast-from-the-past festival Tall Stacks Music, Arts, and Heritage Festival, America's River Roots will have 12 steamboats take part in the festival to celebrate Cincinnati, which at one point was the steamboat capital of the world.
Captain Alan Bernstein, who owns BB Riverboats, recruited the 12 boats taking part in next year's event. The dozen boats also include the only three operating commercial steamboats in the country.
"Recently, it's never been done, and they'll be racing on Sunday," Bernstein said. "It's the big featured event, the three steamboats, and it's going to be a very neat race."
Bernstein said each of the boats will be themed, incorporating music, food and culture into their river tours.
Overall, the event will have a similar feel to Tall Stacks. Tall Stacks was first held in 1988 to celebrate Cincinnati's bicentennial, where Greiwe served as executive director of the celebrations. That festival drew national attention, and more than 700,000 people crowded into the riverfront during the three-day event, which featured historic riverboats and a late-18th-century feel.
Held in October that year, the first Tall Stacks was so successful — with a Xavier University study at the time claiming it created an economic impact of $30 million — it was brought back, and subsequent festivals were held in 1992, 1995, 1999, 2003 and 2006.
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