Three college friends who started running shows at UMass Amherst are taking their operation downtown with a full-day music festival at City Hall Plaza next Saturday. Founders Charley Blacker, Alex Parker and Emily Donovan are billing Mojo as a roughly 10-hour, two-stage marathon with food trucks, vendor stalls and bars. Organizers say the Boston date is their first major City Hall Plaza show after a string of smaller campus events, and that they expect roughly 8,000 people.
The group says the idea grew out of dorm-room promotions at UMass Amherst, when they began "promoting local musicians" and staging small shows to give bands a platform, according to CBS Boston. CBS Boston identifies Blacker as Mojo's CEO, Parker as COO and Donovan as director, and reports the trio launched the company while sophomores. The outlet also notes the founders raised production money through sponsorships and ticket sales for their first Boston festival.
The City Hall Plaza event is billed as a 10-hour day of music with two stages, a vendor village, food trucks and full-service bars, and local coverage indicates the event planners expect about 8,000 attendees. As reported by NBC Boston, Mojo's Boston edition is the latest in a run of festivals the team produced on college campuses this spring. Organizers say the event will use professional staging and staffing to handle a city-scale crowd.
From Dorm-Room Shows To A City Stage
Mojo cut its teeth with small campus festivals, Mojofest Amherst among them, and local coverage shows packed rooms and outdoor crowds at those warm-up dates. Photos from the Amherst Bulletin documented the team's Amherst events and bands that later appear on the Boston bill. Lineups posted on event sites include regional favorites and national DJs alike, with listings showing acts such as AC Slater and Morrissey Boulevard on the City Hall program, per Resident Advisor.
What This Means For Downtown
City efforts to make public spaces more active, from temporary art and "front-lawn" projects to pop-up programming, have been part of a broader push to bring more events into civic plazas, according to the city's outreach pages. The site also has festival pedigree: City Hall Plaza hosted the early Boston Calling installments before that event moved to a larger park site, a history traced in local coverage. For background on the city's public-space push and City Hall's festival past, see Boston.gov and Boston Magazine.
Tickets And Logistics
Mojo's festival page lists the show as running roughly 12 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. and points to ticketing on commercial event platforms. Organizers and listings indicate an all-ages festival footprint with separate 21+ bar areas and a fenced perimeter for capacity control. Event details and the official schedule are posted on the promoter's site and ticket pages; see Local Mojo for the festival page and links.
The founders say they are hopeful Mojo can become a regular spring fixture that re-centers live music in downtown Boston. Whether it scales to the heights of earlier City Hall Plaza festivals remains to be seen, but organizers and local bands say they are optimistic about next Saturday's debut.
