This year’s Concord Pacific Dragon Boat Festival will present free musical performances over two days on the TD Main Stage in Creekside Park. Saturday’s (June 22) lineup includes singer and actor Kristina Lao, the noir pop band Vox Rea, and the indie duo Post-Modern Connection.
Also performing that day will be Blonde Diamond, Eagle Song Dancers, the Cindy Yang Dance Academy, and the headliner, Juno-nominated Hey Ocean! The veteran indie-alternative rock trio will play a reunion set at 8 p.m.
Ashleigh Ball, David Beckingham, and David Vertesi formed Hey Ocean! in 2004. Since then, the band has released four full-length albums, starting with Stop Looking Like Music (2006) and ending with The Hurt of Happiness (2018), as well as four EPs.
Kristina Lao co-wrote “What This Was” with Cody Taylor.
On Sunday (June 23), the headliner will be the Filipino Canadian R&B hip-hop duo Manila Grey, which recently rocked the Lapu-Lapu Cultural Block Party in East Vancouver. Manila Grey’s Soliven and GhostrideNeeko have released two full-length discs: No Saints Loading and No Saints on Knight Street.
In 2021, the duo received a Juno nomination for Breakthrough Group of the Year.
Watch Manila Grey’s video for “Silver Skies”.
Diverse musical lineup along with dragon boats
Preceding Manila Grey will be a remarkably diverse lineup that includes DiRTY RADiO, Coastal Wolf Pack (Tsatsu Stalqayu), Queer as Funk, Haleluya Hailu, Jia, and Ricecake: Drag’n’Dim Sum.
Hailu has family roots in Ethiopia; Jia immigrated to Canada from Taiwan; and Ricecake CEO Van Dang is of Vietnamese ancestry. Coastal Wolf Pack is an Indigenous group and Ricecake and Queer as Funk celebrate the LGBTQ+ community.
Meanwhile, the festival will include 6,000 dragon boat racers from across Canada, the United States, and Australia. The organizer, Dragon Boat BC, is anticipating that 125,000 visitors will be at the event.
In addition to the boat racing and free music, the festival will offer Vancouver’s first public drone show. It will take place at 9:30 p.m. on Saturday.
There will also be Chinatown, Indigenous, and Pride pavilions. The Concord Pacific Dragon Boat Festival grounds extend from Creekside Park to Concord Pacific Place on the shore of False Creek.
For more information on the Concord Pacific Dragon Boat Festival, visit the website. Follow Pancouver on X (formerly Twitter) @PancouverMedia and on Instagram @PancouverMedia.
