Rochester’s Summer Soul Fest returns for its 29th year

ROCHESTER, N.Y. (WROC) — Rochester’s Summer Soul Music Fest is coming back Saturday for a night of food, drinks and of course, music. This year marks it’s 29th anniversary.

“29 years of good times, good music, good people coming together,” said Dante Jordan with Ruff Endz , one of the groups performing this weekend. “So, for us to be here on the 29th year is important especially for us because he’s adding us to a legacy that he’s building.”

Jordan said it won’t be the first time he’s performed in Rochester with his partner, David Chance, but it has been a few years, so he said it’s an exciting time for the nationally recognized R&B duo.

“It’s not a main market in our business but they call it, I guess a B-market,” he said. “But those B or C markets sometimes be the best markets because they don’t always get the love.”

The main headliner of the event is Dru Hill , another nationally recognized R&B group. Members told News 8; this is the first time they’ve been able to perform at the Summer Soul Music Festival.

“The biggest thing that we’re excited about is just performing for the people because all of us have, like, a history here,” said Nokio with Dru Hill. “In the 90s we recorded part of our first album here so, you know, we spent a lot of time here.”

“We concentrate on bringing in music groups that Rochester hasn’t seen in years, so we definitely want to showcase those groups when we come in from year to year,” said the CEO of Xperience Live Varick Baiyina.

The festival runs from 3 p.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday at Innovative Field. You can buy tickets here .

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