WHRO/NPR
Organizers of the country’s largest ska music festival hope their biggest show to date will continue to connect generations, spread cultural awareness and build community in their Hampton homebase.
“We live here, we want our community to be enriched by this,” said April Receveur.
She and husband Tim are the progenitors of Supernova International Ska Festival, which has grown from what was supposed to be a one-off house show in 2013 to this year’s multi-day concert at Fort Monroe’s Patton Street Park from September 15 to 17.
“I think we overdid it this time,” Tim said of the nearly 40-act lineup. “I hope people enjoy it because there’s some bands that you’ll probably never see again on the East Coast like the Untouchables - they haven’t been here since UB40 in the mid 80s.”
After forming Supernova around Fredericksburg, it moved with the Receveurs to Hampton in 2018 with plans to re-debut the event in 2020. It was delayed to 2021 because of the pandemic, so 2023 will mark the second year the festival has been held at its new Fort Monroe abode.
