Rochester, NY – Organizers of the 2020 KeyBank Rochester Fringe Festival (Tuesday, September 15 – Saturday, September 26) will open this year’s show-submission process on Friday, March 1, 2020 at 9 a.m. (EST). Through April 15 at 11:59 p.m. (EST), artists and producers from all over the world may submit production proposals at no cost directly to the 2019 Fringe’s 20+ venues via rochesterfringe.com.
“We are one of the very few fringe festivals in the U.S. without application fees,” Festival Producer Erica Fee. “As always, we strongly encourage shows to apply as early as possible, as venues begin booking immediately.”
Based on the Edinburgh Festival Fringe model, the vast majority of the Fringe’s performances and events are selected by the venues themselves in this way; only a few headliners and all of the outdoor entertainment are curated by the Fringe itself. Once negotiations with a venue are completed, shows must pay a registration fee. That fee ranges from a minimum of $50 for a production with one ticketed performance to a maximum of $150 for a production with multiple ticketed performances.
The 2019 KeyBank Rochester Fringe Festival extended from 11 to 12 days, featured more than 650 performances and events – over 200 of them free – and broke all previous attendance records with more than 100,000 visitors.
From its five-day debut in 2012, the KeyBank Rochester Fringe Festival has become one of the fastest-growing and most-attended fringe festivals in the U.S. It is also the largest multi-arts festival in New York State. As a bifurcated festival, it allows for a combination of headline entertainment curated by the non-profit Rochester Fringe Festival as well as an open-access portion programmed by the venues themselves. Renowned among the world’s 200+ fringe festivals for its spectacular, outdoor, free events as well as its large number of free performances in general, Rochester’s Fringe was also the first in North America to feature a Spiegeltent. From comedy to theatre, from music to dance, from visual art and film to spoken word, and from children’s entertainment to multi-disciplinary collaborations, the festival’s diversity also extends to venues that span the gamut from parked cars to grand theatres.
Rochester Fringe Festival connects and empowers artists, audiences, venues, educational institutions, and the community to celebrate, explore, and inspire creativity via an annual, multi-genre arts festival. It was pioneered by several of Rochester’s esteemed cultural institutions including Geva Theatre Center, the George Eastman House and Garth Fagan Dance; up-and-coming arts groups like PUSH Physical Theatre and Method Machine; and higher-education partners such as the University of Rochester and Rochester Institute of Technology. The organization’s overarching mission is to make arts readily accessible to audiences, as well as to provide a platform for artists to share their ideas and develop their skills, while stimulating downtown Rochester both culturally and economically.
ABOUT KEYBANK: KeyBank's roots trace back 190 years to Albany, New York. Headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio, KeyCorp is one of the nation's largest bank-based financial services companies, with assets of approximately $145 billion at December 31, 2019. Key provides deposit, lending, cash management, and investment services to individuals and businesses in 15 states under the name KeyBank National Association through a network of over 1,100 branches and more than 1,400 ATMs. Key also provides a broad range of sophisticated corporate and investment banking products, such as merger and acquisition advice, public and private debt and equity, syndications and derivatives to middle market companies in selected industries throughout the United States under the KeyBanc Capital Markets trade name. For more information, visit https://www.key.com/. KeyBank is Member FDIC.
Media please note: High-resolution photos from the 2019 KeyBank Rochester Fringe Festival may be found here, or visit https://rochesterfringe.com/press for complete 2019 Press Assets.
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