2022 Craft Beer & Music Festival

Charlie Brown Superstar (Brett Fuller) is a DJ, producer, remixer, and artist from Huntington, WV. Fuller concentrates on what he calls Mountain Funk, an eclectic blend of jam, funk, and electronic, with elements of local flavor, that he has showcased at festivals such as Mountain Music Fest, Brew Skies, and Kickin’ It On the Creek, and, more locally, Huntington Music and Arts Fest and Funktafest.

New Orleans style brass band Crush Funk is a group of passionate young musicians that enjoy performing and playing a little bit of a lot of the music you like through-out the DMV.

Coming all the way from New Orleans “Papa” Gros is a bedrock New Orleans artist, a keyboardist, singer and songwriter who draws on funk, rhythm & blues and Americana song craft.

For over three decades, Gros has brought his city’s celebratory culture to listeners around the globe. Gros mixes all the sounds of New Orleans – funk, trad jazz, brass band, blues – and makes it his own signature gumbo. His new solo album Central City, shows Gros capturing New Orleans’ distinct feel-good charm with help from some of its’ most renowned players.

Gros began playing gigs when he was just fifteen years old but didn’t truly kick off his career until after graduating from Loyola in 1989 with a degree in French Horn performance. During the seminal years that  followed, the young man cut his teeth as a solo performer on Bourbon Street while also developing a reputation as a formidable sideman. He backed up some of the biggest names in the Crescent City,: such as Meters bassist George Porter Jr. and guitarist Snooks Eaglin. Between 2000 and 2013, Gros began his transition into the spotlight by leading Papa Grows Funk, a highly revered group that mixed hard-hitting funk grooves with often unpredictable jazz spontaneity. The band released six critically-acclaimed studio albums while touring the U.S. and far off countries like Japan and Brazil.

This year, John “Papa” Gros released Central City, his third solo album. The album is a collection of classic New Orleans songs, both new and old, filtered through his decades of dedication to his craft. The album features Gros’ feel good originals alongside his takes on beloved songs by Allen Toussaint, Lloyd Price, and John Prine. Joining Gros on the album are a who’s who in the keepers of the New Orleans tradition, who perfectly exploit the similarities between New Orleans jazz and early rock ‘n’ roll on songs such as “Yeah Yeah Yeah” and “Personality.”

Gros absorbed a lifetime of lessons and became part of the direct lineage of New Orleans music. “I’m walking in the same path as Dr. John, Allen Toussaint, and Art Neville,” explains Gros. “I’ve been following them my whole life. Now, they’re no longer in front of me. They’ve gotten off the path but the path is still very clear.”

Read more