Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, one of the largest, free, and beloved music festivals in the country celebrating American roots music, announces its first participants in this year’s Let The Music Play On, led by veterans Alison Brown and John Doe, returning artists Aaron Lee Tasjan, Yola, and first-time performer Sierra Ferrell.

The Bay Area’s beloved Hardly Strictly Bluegrass is launching its new global and community-driven initiative  Let the Music Play On to bring the spirit of Hardly Strictly Bluegrass to backyards and living rooms all over the world with a global broadcast taking place the weekend of October 2nd.  In compliance with safety concerns and California’s statewide mandate against large public gatherings, the festival will not be taking place in its traditional setting of Golden Gate Park.

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass will be presenting a live stream on July 25th at 4 pm PT with Los Lobos.  The Grammy award-winners have a rich history with Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, having played the festival in 2007, 2013, 2015 and 2018. “After months of lockdown, Los Lobos is honored and happy to report we will be doing our first show all together again for our friends at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass,” says Steve Berlin.

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, proud to be returning to San Francisco's Golden Gate Park on October 4-6 for its 19th year, has just released its much-anticipated daily lineup.

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, which takes place October 4-6, is proud to be returning to San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park for its 19th year, and is asking fans to help spread the word about the new regulations in place.

For the fourth straight week, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass has announced ten more artists for their 2019 festival which takes place in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park on October 4-6. As with past lineup reveals, fans were treated to a sneak-peek audio clip of the soon-to-be-announced artists on HSB’s social media accounts earlier this week. Upon hearing what HSB calls the weekly “artist medley,” fans hypothesized in the comment section about who might be added to the lineup.

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass keeps the lineup announcements rolling this week. Through their traditional “artist medley” teases, fans were treated to a sneak-peek audio clip of unannounced artists on HSB’s social media accounts earlier in the week. Today, HSB revealed ten new artists who will join the twenty previously announced artists for the festival in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park this October 4-6.

Celebrating its 19th year in 2019, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass will return to Golden Gate Park in San Francisco on October 4-6. The festival, founded by Warren Hellman in 2001 as a musical gift to the people of San Francisco and the world, celebrates American “roots” music and its many outgrowths. Each year, hundreds of thousands of music fans from around the globe flock to Hardly Strictly Bluegrass to do exactly that—celebrate.

For the past 18 years, Hardly Strictly Bluegrass has brought hundreds of thousands of die-hard live music fans from around the world to San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park each October.

This weekend, I was one of the luckiest people in the world. San Francisco had a banner weekend full of events, from Fleet Week to the World Cup to the Castro Street Fair to Litquake to Hardly Strictly Bluegrass—and that’s not to mention the athletic events that took place in the Bay Area. Such a full calendar guarantees that all modes of transportation will be a nightmare, if not deadlocked.