'Providence is reborn': PVDFest hiatus ends with dancing in the streets
Artists painting murals in real-time, lines snaking up to food trucks and trumpet sounds blaring from the City Hall stage as crowds dance and sway to tunes straight from New Orleans — this is PVDFest.
The three-day fête returned to downtown after a quiet two years during which the pandemic kept the party away. From Friday to Sunday, nothing could rain on the revelry.
Rows of merchants and outposts filling plastic drink cups to the brim took over Providence’s streets where visitors roamed between musical acts.
For some, it was a step back into the way things used to be.
“It’s nice because this is the first time I think we’ve been out in a crowd like this and not felt a lot of anxiety about it,” said Mike Ferguson, who came from the city’s West End with partner Jennifer Leslie.
“I have a lot of social anxiety that was made worse by being in quarantine,” Leslie said, reflecting. “But at the same time it is really refreshing to get out and be a part of the community which we haven’t been able to do obviously.”
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Among the crowd was Mayor Jorge Elorza, who began the festival in 2015. On Saturday, he meandered through the festival with son Omar, who had taken a dip in a massive bubble pit stationed outside The Dark Lady.
“It’s great to be out here again,” Elorza said. “It’s especially nice to be out here with Omar. He’s about to be 4 years old, so it’s the first time he can enjoy the festival.”
Both were headed in the direction of a performance by instrumental group Squonk, whose performances feature massive art installations — this time a pair of larger-than-life purple hands.
Bandmates remarked on their love of Providence, drummer Jeremy Papay in particular.
“This is always a town where the crowd energy is just so infectious,” he said. “We get so much from everybody here, and that turns us all up to 11, and we give it back.”
Among the audience, listeners from young to old crowded together to watch artists move the inflated hands to the eclectic sounds of an electric guitar, bagpipes and a keyboard.
“That’s the beauty of the show,” Papay said. “You can be into metal, you can be into pop, you can be 5 years old, you can be 50 years old, you’re going to find something in the show to latch onto – the big props, the interaction – it kind of spans all generations when you get to pull on giant purple fingers.”
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Nearby, members of Greater Boston’s Natyamani School of Dance huddled as they awaited their performance slot on another stage where they would showcase Bharathanatyam, a classical dance from South India.
For dancers emerging from a pandemic, this was a rare chance.
“I feel like a lot of us haven’t got a lot of opportunities to perform the past few years,” said Shanthni Ravindrababu. “So it’s really exciting to be able to sort of get back to performing in front of people.”
Among the sprawling tents of merchants on Washington Street, Alex Maddalena, owner of ice cream and sorbet company Big Feeling, was relieved to find some sense of normalcy after the pandemic’s toll.
“Honestly, it’s like overwhelming positivity,” Maddalena said. “It’s great to just see people out and about again and to interact with customers after interacting with them digitally, basically, for two years.”
Under a tent up the street, local organizer Liza Burkin was spotted volunteering for Real Access Motivates Progress, a nonprofit loaning out wheelchairs and ensuring the festivities were accessible not just to those on foot. With a big grin, she suggested that the city should make this a weekly event.
“It’s like Providence is reborn and coming back into itself and everything is correct.”
This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: PVDFest COVID hiatus ends with dancing in the streets
