Beale Street Music Festival gives proper kickoff to Memphis in May

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (WMC) - Sunday was curtain call for Beale Street Music Festival, but just the beginning for Memphis in May 2022.

The final acts took the stage to cap off an exciting weekend for music in the Bluff City.

Sunday was certainly a much different sight from the night before, when severe weather caused a brief delay and evacuation of the festival before burning the midnight oil to watch headliner Megan Thee Stallion.

For the final day, it was blue skies and sunshine, with festival goers closing out their weekend with good food, good people and, above all, good music.

“We’re having a good time out here. It’s nice weather,” said Mercades Jones from Chicago.

“It’s a good time,” echoed David Jamieson from Trenton, TN.

“It’s a great vibe out here. It feels good,” said Memphian Brody Wamble.

For the tens of thousands in attendance, the festival provided a musical escape after two years of COVID-19 restrictions.

“It’s refreshing to be back and be around people and kind of get that sense of normalcy with no masks, being around people, socializing again,” said Memphis resident Amanda Hamilton. “This is our first festival since COVID and everything, same for a ton of people.”

“It’s the first time in forever, it feel like, but we’re doing good,” Jamieson said. “I think everybody is keeping themselves safe, doing what they’ve got to do to stay clean. I think we’re doing good.”

“People are always super friendly here, and I really love that,” said Shaggy, one of Sunday’s artists to take the stage.

For artists like Shaggy, Beale Street Music Festival was a way to shake off the rust for live performances.

Shaggy, like many artists, hasn’t toured since the beginning pandemic.

“You’re eager to get to it, but you really have to prepare yourself and rehearse and get back into the groove of things because it’s not second nature as it used to be,” Shaggy said. “We just can’t wait to really get in front of an audience and kind of catch the vibe in the energy from it.”

“I’m loving it,” Mickey Griffin, a Memphis resident, said. “I think it’s great for Memphis to have this again, and I’m just enjoying it. I think it’s good.”

Many festival goers we spoke with enjoyed the temporary layout at Liberty Park while Tom Lee Park undergoes construction on the River.

Whatever the layout is in the future, music fans hope the festival goes without another two-year hiatus and keeps the good music rolling in.

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