In the multicultural stew that is Broward County, a new music festival coming to Miramar looks so much like a heretofore missing ingredient that its arrival this month might lead one to muse: Well, it’s about time.
And actually, time — as in Y2K — is precisely what it’s about.
The Y2K Summer Jam, set for Sunday, July 20, at the Miramar Regional Park Amphitheater, will mix genres, decades and cultures into a Caribbean-spiced, musical pepperpot stew of its own, as it expands the popular Y2K-party theme into a dance-happy, daylong celebration.
“It’s a curated festival of musical acts and cultures from the new millennium coming forward,” says promoter Delando Thorpe, who calls it “Florida’s official Y2K event.” Jamaican dancehall artist Baby Cham and a slate of international DJ mixmasters will inspire throwback vibes with their fusions of hip-hop, reggae, dancehall, R&B, pop, rock, Afrobeat, Haitian kompa and soul.
“The DJs have history in mixing all these different genres together,” says Thorpe, a Jamaican-born entertainment and banking executive. “It’s not like they play a song and play another song. These are remix kings. We call them the 2K mixmasters, because they know how to mix all genres in their setlists.”
Thorpe and Jason Grant, a local entrepreneur and entertainment professional, operate Kingston 21 Events. The company is involved in the promotion and production of the Miramar fest as well as others locally and elsewhere.
What sets the Summer Jam apart, of course, is the Y2K theme, a popular divertissement that celebrates various trends and aesthetics of the nascent millennium. Thorpe says that with other festivals “it’s just straight what’s happening now. You’ll hear the hot songs from last year and this year, as opposed to the 2000 decade, the 2010 decade.”
The promoter says that part of the purpose for presenting Y2K is one of preservation.
“What I’ve realized is that we need to preserve music and culture,” says the promoter, a 38-year-old resident of both Miramar and Plantation. “And what tends to happen is that the only way to do it is to have a space for it. An event is the only way you can actually create that kind of box, that space that someone who has lived through these timeframes can go to to hear those songs that they grew up on and actually enjoy that nostalgic feeling. It’s basically like a museum of art, in essence.”
For the Summer Jam “museum space,” DJ Calli B is a natural as the headliner. His deep-rooted Caribbean influences and genre-blending sets have made him a standout on the New York nightlife and international Caribbean music scenes as a producer and remixer as well as mixmaster. A New Yorker by way of Spanish Town in Jamaica, Calli B has been DJing for over 20 years — including at the annual Miami Carnival and the Best of the Best International Music Festival of Caribbean music at Miami’s Bayfront Park.
“The 2000s to 2020 was my heaviest time of DJing in clubs, college parties, parties in Jamaica — so I’m pretty well-versed in that era,” Calli B says. “And I’ve played at a lot of ’90s- and 2000s-themed parties. They are always something to look forward to because you get to hear music that you haven’t heard in a while.”
The Y2K-theme trend seems to have slipped by South Florida, he says. “They have Y2K parties all over the United States and their version of Y2K parties in Jamaica. But I don’t really see too many in Broward County or Miami, or even Florida.”
Calli B predicts the Miramar event may make up for it. “This one is going to be a heavy turnout,” he says, based on its all-star lineup of DJs and a performance by Baby Cham. A 25-year veteran in what promoter Thorpe calls “the reggae dance space,” Cham counts Alicia Keys among his international collaborators. Other DJs on the bill include Willy Chin, DJ Nicco, DJ Timmy, and Buzz.
“The Summer Jam format is more about getting people to dance rather than to watch a performance,” says Thorpe. The general admission area will essentially serve as a dance floor, though seating and other amenities will be available via VIP packages.
“But we still want them to dance,” he says.
Getting people to do that is, as DJ Calli B describes it, a two-way street: “It always makes me play better when I see everybody partying to the music I’m playing. It’s always a good feeling to be on stage in front of thousands of people to make them enjoy themselves and bring them a feel-good type of vibe. That’s my job as a DJ, and I think Y2K is the perfect party to do that.
“And, you know, sometimes you have to play what they’re not expecting. Sometimes you get a better reaction out of a crowd when you play music they didn’t know they wanted to hear.”
As Thorpe envisions it, this debut Summer Jam is only the beginning. Plans call for another festival before year’s end, with two more planned next year during Memorial Day weekend and later in the summer.
The future versions will expand beyond the predominantly DJ format, according to Thorpe, adding that the hope is to produce a performance-based festival at least twice per year in Miramar.
“We’re just bracing for impact right now because we’re hatching it, but people have been giving it a good reception.”
Thorpe says he expects a crowd of up to 3,000 people at the Miramar Amphitheater, where there will be plenty of parking along with complimentary food from 3 to 6 p.m.
“There will be a lot of different cuisines,” he says. “Colombian cuisine, Caribbean cuisine and a bit of American cuisine — and a special Caribbean soup.”
The Y2K Summer Jam — all in all, a new variety of multicultural musical stew.
IF YOU GO
WHAT: Y2K Summer Jam
WHEN: 3-10 p.m. Sunday, July 20
WHERE: Miramar Regional Park Amphitheater, 16801 Miramar Parkway
COST: $30 general admission with code Y2KWEB; VIP packages are $128-$191
INFORMATION: y2kevent.com
This story was produced by Broward Arts Journalism Alliance (BAJA), an independent journalism program of the Broward County Cultural Division. Visit ArtsCalendar.com for more stories about the arts in South Florida.