The Vision Festival is the premier event featuring experimental music of various genres, art, film, and dance. Held every summer in various venues throughout Brooklyn, the festival showcases avant-garde jazz and its extensions into other spheres. At the same time, this free New York City festival allows the public to see jazz legends, closer to the mainstream. The vision is the largest festival of its kind in the US and the only free large-scale jazz festival in the Big Apple.
Founded in 1978, the Vision Festival was first held in Manhattan, but later has moved to downtown Brooklyn. It has been recently held at Roulette Intermedium, the performing arts and new music venue. Previous lineups of the festival included David S. Ware, Sam Rivers, Frank Lowe, Cooper-Moore, Abbey Rader, Daniel Carter, Roy Campbell, Jr., Hamid Drake, William Parker, Nicole Mitchell, Rob Brown, Kidd Jordan, Henry Grimes, Marc Ribot, Chad Taylor, Joe McPhee, Jayne Cortez, Fred Anderson, Matthew Shipp, Billy Bang, Eddie Gale, Amiri Baraka, Roscoe Mitchell, Steve Lacy, DJ Spooky, Whit Dickey, Peter Kowald, Peter Brötzmann, and Cat Power.
Overall, every edition of the Vision Festival brings together over one hundred top musicians, poets, artists, and dancers for an unfettered celebration of creativity and innovation. The showcase of FreeJazz and improvisation, Vision Festival often features special events and ceremonies, like the Lifetime Achievement Award, which is presented annually to artists who have attained preeminent status in the world of FreeJazz.
