VersoFest, The Westport Library’s annual music and media conference and festival where knowledge is shared and inspiration is discovered took place last Thursday through Sunday. VersoFest, named after the Library's state of the art recording studio Verso Studios is a forum for media creators, artists, and fans to converge. VersoFest includes panels where experts share their perspective and vision. Intimate workshops provide creators the opportunity to deconstruct, improve, and hone their craft. Performances entertain and inspire. Verso produced, recorded and release the first vinyl album ever created by a public library.

Photos and Story By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com  Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery

VersoFest 2023 was held over four days – a Thursday night kickoff concert featuring Sunflower Bean and DJ Hysterica that drew more than 300 people; the Friday night headlining show with the Smithereens featuring Marshall Crenshaw, Amilia K Spicer, and Miriam Linna that brought out a crowd of nearly 500; and a series of panels, workshops, and more on Saturday and Sunday, drawing hundreds more. Among the highlights was the Saturday keynote conversation between legendary producer Steve Lillywhite (U2, Talking Heads, Dave Matthews Band, and many more) and Talking Heads and Tom Tom Club drummer Chris Frantz, and the Saturday evening Malloy Lecture in the Arts with acclaimed painter and Psychedelic Furs frontman Richard Butler. On Saturday and Sunday record dealers brought their inventories of vinyl LP’s including some rare and hard to find titles.

Weekend workshops included ones on songwriting, screenwriting, photography, TV and media production, and a TeachRock workshop utilizing Anthony Coscia's Wall of Sound which is a 1:4, 10' x 14' scale model replica of the Grateful Dead’s legendary “Wall of Sound” which the band employed throughout much of  1974 and which was on display and cranking tunes intermittently throughout the entire course of VersoFest 2023.

Weekend workshops included ones on songwriting, screenwriting, photography, TV and media production, and a TeachRock workshop utilizing Anthony Coscia's Wall of Sound which is a 1:4, 10' x 14' scale model replica of the Grateful Dead’s legendary “Wall of Sound” (first row, above right) which the band employed throughout much of  1974 and which was on display and cranking tunes intermittently throughout the entire course of VersoFest 2023.

Beginning in 2020, Coscia began his “Le Petit Mur De Son” project to rebuild the Grateful Dead's legendary Wall of Sound. The intent of the project is to preserve The Wall's place in history and allow people to hear, see, and feel what so few were able to experience. Scaled walls have been constructed in lead-up and in fundraising for a full-scale replication, to which Coscia is currently seeking funds.

Coscia's half-scale Wall of Sound is currently housed in a space donated by SpreadMusicNow at Granite Church in Redding, CT, which Coscia says is far too small a room for the system. “For perspective, the half scale wall in its current location is like putting a full scale wall in a small theatre,” he wrote in a Facebook post following one of the first tests of the system, “so needless to say it was loud but surprisingly clear and clean.”

Photos By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com  Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery

Hundreds of guests enjoyed panel discussions over the weekend about topics including rock fashion, rock photography, vinyl record collecting, and the business of music, as well as a panel discussion on podcasting, streaming, and more. In addition, there was a celebration of the 50th anniversary of hip hop in Connecticut, an all-day Sunday record fair, a working replica of the Grateful Dead’s “Wall of Sound” PA system, a museum of Alice Cooper Group artifacts, and a screening of the Alice Cooper reunion documentary “Live From The Astroturf”  featuring a Q&A with Alice Cooper Group bassist and founding member Dennis Dunaway.

Dunaway and his wife Cindy Smith Dunaway set up one of the library's meeting rooms with a massive memorabilia collection from his more than forty years with Alice Cooper, whose real name is Vincent Furnier. Among the Dunaway's collection were several of the many costumes Cindy created as the original costume designer for the ban and is credited with ushering in the "Shock Rock" fashion style popular in the 70's with edgy bands like Alice Cooper. Cindy is the sister of Alice Cooper's drummer Neal Smith. The couple married in August of 1974 at the Greenwich CT town hall. Dunaway, who was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame in 2011 along with two other surviving band members, signed a variety of memorabilia brought by the band's devoted fans. Alice Cooper is perhaps best known for his smash hit "School's Out", which was released 51 years ago this month on the band's fifth studio album which climbed to number two on the Billboard Top 200, and the single reached number seven on Billboard's Top 100.

Legends, Beats, and Grooves curated a hip-hop 50th anniversary panel featuring DJ Grand Wizzard Theodore who has been credited with inventing the ubiquitous "scratch" found in many Hip Hop tracks since the inception of the genre in the Bronx in August of 1973. Along with DJ Theodore on the panel discussing all things Hip Hop were Tony Tone (Cold Crush Brothers), DJ Grand Master Supreme (Lauryn Hill), DJ Ragoza, DJ Billy Busch (HOT 93.7), The panel discussion and Q & Q session was hosted by Terrible Tee and there was a demonstration of the dual turn table DJ mixing which is the core of much of genre.

Photos and Story By J.C. Martin For WestportLocalPress.com  Click on an image to enlarge and open gallery.