It presented itself as the softer, feminist alternative to the machismo of all-male rock tours. "And Lilith Fair is almost like, 'Here's your compilation of every every wild idea that women had in music in the '90s.' Still, disorganization and shoddy financial management caused many artists including Kelly Clarkson and Norah Jones to drop out of shows at the last minute. Sister 7 So Lilith's 35-city tour, featuring McLachlan, Crow, Tracey Chapman, Jewel, and more than 60 other female acts, was unprecedented. Lilith Fair 1998 | Concerts Wiki | Fandom Lilith Fair 1998 View source The artists appearing at Lilith Fair varied by date (with McLachlan the only artist to play all dates). AT THE LILITH FAIR, FEMININE MYSTIQUE - The Washington Post By Rachel Warren July 20, 1998 She wasn't hard to spot, that Lilith. Below is a list of artists who performed at Lilith Fair in the 2010 revival. Lilith Fair Celebrates Its 15th Anniversary. In the late 1990s, the all-female Lilith Fair marked a seminal moment for women in pop music, selling 1.5 million tickets and helping launch Sarah McLachlan to superstardom. [2] Bucking conventional industry wisdom, she booked a successful tour for herself and Paula Cole. Lilith Fair is sponsored by Biore, Royal Neighbors insurance, Starbucks Coffee, Tower Records and VH1. I finally had an A&R person who was a woman. Lenni Jabour Neneh Cherry Oh Suzanna Jessica Hopper, who authored an oral history of the Lilith Fair, says Lilith's lessons remain relevant today. Joy Askew The tour was plagued with financial problems from the beginning. It was like, Well, if youre not gonna have any female artists on your tours, were just gonna do it ourselves. The bands are full of men, theres lots of males in the crew. And you guys showed me that I could do anything. Lilith Fair: A Celebration of Women In Music, a double-CD set of performances from last year's tour, will be released April 28 on the Arista label. Paris Hampton Abra Moore Garrison Starr "I started at Berklee College of Music, where. Still, its rah-rah spirit was met with very justified criticism. Lilith Fair was a concert tour and traveling music festival, founded by musician Sarah McLachlan, that consisted solely of female solo artists and female-led bands, emerging and developing talent as well as established artists. Atmosphere during the Lilith Fair at Shoreline Amphitheatre on June 24, 1998 in Mountain . Patty Griffin Almost all Village Stage artists performed only one or two dates. Jenny Bird And I get to see that every day now. Cling The artists appearing at Lilith Fair varied by date (with McLachlan the only artist to play all dates). "And I think I flourished as a musician because I was out of the male gaze and music where it's just, you know, 'Show me what you got.' Lilith Fair at 20: Sarah McLachlan & Co-Founders Look Back on the All-Female Festival That Smashed Touring's Glass Ceiling The principals behind the 1997-1999 summer festival that brought. Our mission is great music being made by women. Davina As Vega told Glamour, I remember seeing Missy Elliott in her [inflatable] suit, running up the aisles going, Yall better show me some love because its really hot in here!. One winner of last night's Lilith Fair Acoustic Talent Search "played" a tiny toy guitar equipped with prerecorded heavy metal solos. The 1998 Lilith Fair Tour Dates: June 19; Portland, Ore., Portland Meadows June 20; George, Wash., The Gorge Amphitheatre June 21; George, Wash., The Gorge Amphitheatre June 23; Mountain. Swamperella Joan Osborne Weve got 1,100 kids in the program. Deni Bonet "A lot of the young women who came to Lilith back then now have kids at home, have busy careers," she told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in 2012. . We got a lot of artists we wanted last year. The lineup featured a who's who of female alternative musicians of the moment: Sheryl Crow, Jewel, The Indigo Girls, Lisa Loeb, Fiona Apple, Shawn Colvin, Tracy Chapman, Natalie Merchant and more. Traveling festivals, which had grown in popularity since the early-Nineties launch of Lollapalooza, were at the time dominated by male-fronted acts; in 1996 Lollapalooza shifted its aesthetic to a harder sound by having Metallica headline, and that year the metal-forward Ozzfest debuted as well. The tours were legendary, as they should be., Lilith came to a close in 1999, and its attempted return in 2010 proved frustrating, with 10 canceled dates and performers like Kelly Clarkson dropping out. It wasnt about exclusion, says McLachlan. Sarah Bettens from Ks Choice in a floral slipdress and sneakers. Natalie Merchant performs with a rhythmic gymnastic ribbon in a cardigan and pencil skirt. In 2015, radio consultant Keith Hill sparked Tomatogate when he made an awkward metaphor about women getting airplay at country radio: Ive got about 40 music databases in front of me and the percentage of females in the one with the most is 19 percent. So the beginning of this was just born out of a desire to come together as a community. [Men would ask], Why dont you have men on the tour? And I said, Well, honey, we do. Davina Missy Elliott, Lilith Fair 1998: a sensational burst of black fantasy Playing 15-minute sets with cartoonish energy, the rapper donned an inflatable costume to become middle America's worst. Sinad O'Connor Eden White You might even consider it legendary. Ticket prices had also increased, with some Lilith VIP packages costing $750. Autour de Lucie Neneh Cherry While it isn't possible to condense all of Lilith Fair onto one DVD, I really wish this disc showed a wider range of performers. Exactly 25 years later, musicians who participated in Lilith Fair and journalists who covered it reflected on the festival's importance in interviews with NPR. Pat Benatar Appearances were organized into three stages. I remember at the time thinking, in my snarky, rock-critic-y way, Why does this have to be so crunchy and folky? Founded by singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan and friends, it featured a lineup of female solo artists and bands led. Morcheeba Young. Cassandra Wilson The tomatoes of our salad are the females. Two years later, despite much-lauded releases by female solo artists like Miranda Lambert and Kelsea Ballerini, the country charts still skew heavily male. That says way more about you and your ego than anything else. But it was a question that got asked all the time, and it wasnt about that. Liz Phair Tiny sunnies came home to her favorite room! With Sarah McLachlan, Amy Ray, Emily Saliers, Jewel. The Indigo Girls: Amy Ray in a striped button-down and striped pants, and Emily Saliers in overalls. Patty Griffin N'Dea Davenport Queen Latifah It took just a few months after Lilith's very first show for Saturday Night Live to introduce a recurring character mocking the overly earnest stereotype of a Lilith artist, played by Ana Gasteyer, who droned on about her folkist approach. Rebekah That was extremely frustrating we asked all sorts of artists from all sorts of different genres, and we basically got people who said yes. Releasing two albums in three years, kick-starting a major touring festival and getting married - all milestones that left the singer exhausted. September '67 It was July 5th 1997: Opening night of the groundbreaking all-female music festival Lilith Fair. (Later that summer, I saw Britney Spears perform at the same outdoor venue, the Polaris Amphitheater in Columbus, Ohio, and she had only a handful of costume changesalthough, she wore as many belly-baring shirts as five of the Lilith performers combined.). Camille "I was able to see people I admired but cherished in a way that had a musical connection to me that was uplifting and healing," she remembers. (SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "BEHIND THE MUSIC") JIM FORBES: Sheryl Crow . The tour will make 36 stops throughout the U.S. and Canada beginning on June 27 in Calgary. Our intentions, in hindsight, werent really pure, says McLachlan. Main stage artists "And I don't think we did enough due diligence in discovering how our audience had changed and how to reflect that. Support WUSF now by giving monthly, or make a one-time donation online. I found that actually to be a hard and fast rule at radio at the time [higher-ups] instructed their DJs not to play women back to back., That was a definite thing where in radio programming there was a quota on how many female artists could be played in any one-hour set, recalls Susanna Hoffs, who played on Liliths second stage in 1997 as a solo act and returned with the Bangles for its 2010 revival. Tara MacLean This all-female lineup provided an alternative to male-dominated tours like Lollapalooza and Ozzfest, attracting many womenand even some mento Lilith Fair's sense of a female . It consisted solely of female solo artists and female-led bands. But in choosing the name Lilith Fair, the festival's organizers revealed more than they may have intended about the spirit that lies behind contemporary feminism. Sheryl Crow Wild Colonials Madeleine Peyroux But while there werent elaborate costume changes of the kind we now expect at festivals, each musicians style was an expression of her voice, as essential to her performance as any other element. Chantal Kreviazuk Autour de Lucie Vancouver. Trish Murphy And then we noticed that the record company [was] primarily male, and then the more success we had, I started to notice that the playlists at radio were generally male and they wouldnt place [women] back to back. Girl Power! McLachlan, a Canadian balladeer with two Grammy Awards, headlined each festival, but the rest of the lineup varied from singer-songwriters like Fiona Apple to hip-hop artists like Missy Elliott. Even in the Eighties, with the Bangles, journalists would tend to say, How do you feel about the Go-Gos? There werent many female bands, unfortunately, at that time, but still it always struck us.. Garrison Starr Arista/Tyde will release a two-CD set culled from last years perfs on April 28 with 50% of the proceeds going to RAINN and Lifebeat. And Im now running a company. Dar Williams Lilith Fair, which arrived at the New World Music Theatre over the weekend, was billed as a "celebration of women in music." But the festival's organizer, Sarah McLachlan, insisted only an hour . Kinnie Starr Emmylou Harris Musicians were styled more personally, less in the hands of major designers and more in the service of artistic expression; and at Lilith, most were more concerned with keeping cool than looking it. Stay tuned for more info on Lilith Fair upcoming tour dates! Jenny Labow Someone of this generation needs to do it, if they choose. Grassroots efforts like Ladyfest, which has outposts around the world, combine Liliths spirit with DIY mechanics and radical politics. 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