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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Long’s Park Amphitheater Foundation Kicking Off Its 47th Season of Free, Award-winning Music June 7, 2009 with Booty-Shaking Band.

LANCASTER, PA -- The Long’s Park Amphitheater Foundation will open another free summer of music in the park on Sunday, June 7, 2009 at 7:30 pm. The 47th annual Long’s Park Summer Music Series will showcase Papa Grows Funk, a quintet whose tight grooves and booty-shaking sets have redefined funk-jam.

With four CDs under their belts, over 25,000 albums sold and coast-to-coast and international tours on their passports, Papa Grows Funk has a devoted fan base around the world. Influenced by the legendary founding fathers of funk, The Meters, as well as Dr. John and The Neville Brothers, the quintet dishes it out New Orleans-style. In fact, they trace their roots to a Meters after party in 2000.

Time Out promises audiences “a guaranteed good time.” The Onion says concertgoers can “bank on big grooves and ... dancing.”

Tethered by the slinky Hammond B3 and gravel pit vocals of bandleader John “Papa” Gros, the five-piece band is a “who’s who” of New Orleans’ best musicians. Blazing Wild Magnolias guitarist June Yamagishi was an original member of Japan’s first blue combo, The West Road Blues Band, and has inspired two documentaries from his native Japan. Former Galactic saxophonist Jason “Big Wind” Mingledorff cleanly articulates the knee-dropping funk sustained by bassist Marc Pero and drummer Jeffrey “Jellybean” Alexander.

The Long’s Park Summer Music Series is produced and underwritten by the Long’s Park Amphitheater Foundation. Thanks to generous sponsors, private donors and proceeds of the Labor Day weekend Long’s Park Art & Craft Festival, admission and parking are free. Sponsors of the 2009 season are Lancaster General and Susquehanna Bank. Season media sponsors are WARM 103 and 96.1 WSOX. Weather sponsor of the Series is WGAL-TV.

Stevens & Lee and Griffin Financial Group are sponsoring the 2009 Long’s Park Art & Craft Festival.

Partial funding has been provided through a grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts (PCA), a state agency funded by an annual state appropriation and the National Endowment for the Arts, a federal agency. PCA supplies funding to nonprofit, tax-exempt corporations, a unit of government or a school district with arts programming or services in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.

Long’s Park concertgoers are invited to bring picnics, blankets and lawn chairs to the park. A selection of food purveyors will also be in the park, offering a complete meal’s worth of family foods and desserts. Long’s Park is an alcohol-free park.

Long’s Park is conveniently located at 1441 Harrisburg Pike in Lancaster, just off Route 30 across from Park City Center. All performances are held rain or shine, except in the case of dangerously inclement weather.

Additional information and links to musical previews of Long’s Park’s performers can be found at www.longspark.org or on Facebook. For details on corporate sponsorships of the Long’s Park Summer Music Series and to learn how to make individual and corporate contributions, contact the Long’s Park Amphitheater Foundation at www.longspark.org.