Finally: HampdenFest! With Fewer Links and More Tiny Pictures!

HampdenFest! I have put off re-capping it, because I barely know where to begin. HampdenFest, I loves ya, and Hawker is slow this week partly because she was recovering.

If you see Benn Ray or Rachel Whang (and the easy way to do this is to go visit Atomic Books or Atomic Pop,) THANK them for HampdenFest. They might play it off like it was no big deal, but it was. They made it happen, people. Praise them.

A Hampdenite (and cast member in this fall's Baltimore Shakespeare Festival production of Antigone) put it succinctly: "HonFest feels like it's about showing off for visitors, but HampdenFest feels like a party for ourselves." Hey, I'm the first to admit that showing off for visitors occasionally is a good thing, but it's nice to just celebrate being our own freaky selves once a year.

For me, Hampdenfest started off with Secret Crush Society (accompanied by an adorable yawning, but enthusiastic tambourine girl.) Then, as part of the SCS number "Reach into the Dolphin" (based on a true story,) this creature appeared:
Children rocked. Dolphins were empowered.

Punks gazed in mock disbelief!

The music at HampdenFest is becoming legendary. So many freaking bands! Three stages! What's a Hawker to do? I caught some of Double Dagger (We may indeed be building a ghost town, my friends) and some of The Jennifers. Impossible Hair somehow (impossibly?) played HampdenFest and then the Charm City Roller Girls bout the very next day, and I think a member of The Oranges Band was playing somewhere in Baltimore city 24/7 from Friday, September 14 through midnight on Sunday, September 16.

I gotta say that the kids rockin' it at HampdenFest are really the best entertainment, however. There was kid dancing and basketball shooting (thanks to the Hampden Family Center) and face painting and crazy hair galore. Here's a shot of my favorite kids:


Then, there was Hampden Idol. Hampden Idol makes you believe in the power of music again.

This year's winner was Hampdenite Lisa Harbin! (She is the lead singer of Secret Crush Society, FYI.) How'd she become our Hampden Idol? The girl rocked 99 Luftballons! AND she brought the freaking balloons! AND magically: as she hit the last notes of her song and let the last balloon go to find its way into the sky, a kid jumped up on stage and tried to grab it, but he missed and the kid--and the whole audience--just stared as that last balloon floated away into its destiny. It was beautiful!



Even Spiderman loved it!


Other Hampden Idol highlights included a musical goodbye from soon to the departing Hampdenite Hannah who's off to Portland to take her talents to their city monthly:


Then, there was Scott. His rendition of "Love Hurts" made girls cry:


God! There was a heavy metal Jules Burn from the Charm City Roller Girls rockin' it. There was teacher & milkmaid hj singin' truth to power. There was Johnny Zebra from CCRG judgin' it! There was New Ben, and if somebody doesn't start dating him like right this minute, Hampden is not the neighborhood I think she is. People, I give you New Ben:


Hawker could go on and on!

Then, Hampden drank Brewer's Art out of Ressurection.

Then, HampdenFest floated away like that single red balloon.



Then, it seemed like it was time to go home.