EDITOR'S NOTE: Multimedia journalist Taylor Torregano spoke with the founder of Taste of Soul about the evolution of the festival. Click the arrow above to watch the video.
SOUTH LOS ANGELES — The biggest free street festival in California will return as a live event Saturday after two years of being virtual. Whether it’s soul food or soul music, the 17th annual Taste of Soul Family Festival is back in person and expected to be bigger than ever when it closes a two-mile stretch of Crenshaw Blvd. to cars and opens it up to pedestrians.
“Given the fact that we’re coming out of COVID, everybody is really, really excited to be coming back to Taste, and we’re excited to have them,” Danny Bakewell Jr. told Spectrum News 1. His father, Los Angeles Sentinel publisher Danny Bakewell Sr., started the event in 2005 and has grown it into a community party for “350,000 of his closest friends,” Bakewell Jr. said.
Just like before the pandemic, the Taste of Soul family festival will have five stages for performers playing everything from gospel to jazz to R&B, but it will have more of just about everything else: 150 food vendors serving up dishes from soul food and snow cones to fried fish and barbecue; 200 merchandise vendors selling everything from board games and clothing to jewelry and art; as well as social services.
About 20 vendors will be part of the LA County Pavilion. Some of them will connect festival-goers with medical services, including on-site blood-pressure, heart and cholesterol checks — even mammograms. Others will help with job placement, voter registration and Metro passes.
“There’s a huge social services component for people who either didn’t know they existed or didn’t have the time and couldn’t take off work,” Bakewell said. “We’re trying to bring all of these components right here to the community.”
Metro, which recently opened its new K Line light rail servicing the Crenshaw district, is one of several event sponsors that will also have a display. Microsoft will have a technology tent. Chevrolet will display various cars, including some of its new electric vehicles. And Bank of America will be on hand providing financial education, including information about its new program waiving the 20% down payment requirement for African American and Latino first-time home buyers.
All the event’s amenities are spread along a two-mile stretch of Crenshaw Blvd. from Obama Blvd. to Stocker St., including its five themed stages. Besides stages for blues, jazz and children’s performances, the Bakewell Media stage will feature shows by the funk band Lakeside, R&B act Troop and the synth-funk group Midnight Star, as well as several local performers. Local radio station KJLH will also have a stage, where Grammy-winning soul singer Kenny Lattimore and contemporary gospel act the Campbell Sisters are slated to perform.
Station owner Stevie Wonder also “might just show up and entertain the crowd,” as he’s done in previous years, Bakewell said. Taste of Soul often hosts unannounced-until-the-last-minute celebrity guests. Previous years have seen sets by comedian Cedric the Entertainer. This year, “In Living Color” actress and comedian Kim Coles will perform.
“You never really know who’s going to show up, but we try to make way for all of these celebrities,” Bakewell said. “It’s a chance to perform in front of their home crowd.”
KVLX, owned by talk show host Tavis Smiley, will be set up in the Taste’s beer garden, hosting jazz and blues bands.
“When you stop at all these vendors and get full, you just need a place to sit down and say, ‘Woo, let me rest. You know I’m going to sit here and praise God and listen to some gospel music or some good old school R&B and just kind of catch my breath.’”
Taste of Soul draws visitors from around the city and other parts of the state, but it’s a community event first and foremost. Many of the attendees live close enough to walk and host their own parties in conjunction with the fest.
“Beyond what we have going on at Crenshaw, families are having reunions and barbecues on their front porch, and then they make their way to listen to the music,” Bakewell said.
Since 2005, the annual Taste of Soul has been held as a live event every third Saturday of October. During COVID, however, it was a virtual event experienced as a drive-by food and gift card giveaway. This Saturday’s fest runs from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m.
“This is an opportunity for us in the Crenshaw community here in South Los Angeles to come together in a day of unity, in a day of celebration, a day of embracing our culture,” Bakewell said. “This is our home where everybody’s welcome, so we encourage everybody from every community to come and celebrate everything that is good and honorable and wholesome here in South Los Angeles.”