Let's Eat Charles Street 2012
From my good friend, Laura Rodini, at the Historic Charles Street Association —
Where will you be on Saturday afternoon?
That's the day of our Let's Eat Charles Street Festival, and everyone in Baltimore will be there!" Let's Eat Charles Street is the best thing to happen to Charles Street since Starbucks," says Haluk Kantar, owner of Cazbar Restaurant.
With restaurants like The Beef Brothers, Mick O'Sheas, Sascha's, Caribou Coffee, Midtown BBQ & Brew, Lumbini, Mina's Delights, Ban Thai, Cazbar and HomeSlyce Pizza Bar on hand, you can be sure you won't leave feeling hungry.
And I'm proud to say that our Let's Eat Charles Street festival will be the launching pad for Baltimore's first sushi truck, called Noodlerolla. Owner James Sin is the former Executive Chef at Sticky Rice, and his first food truck venture has been highly anticipated. "We will be serving sushi, bento boxes and even Korean fusion," James says.
Music To Your Ears: An Interview with The Carousel Rogues
Great food and shopping make up only part of what we have in store for you on May 12th. Six great musical acts will be taking the stage. Here's the lineup:
12-12:30pm - Jenee & Cornell
12:30-1pm - Charles Towers' apartments favorite R&B artist, Kevin Phillips
1-2pm: Andrew Grimm & June Star
2-3pm: Karter Jaymes, a 2-Time Grammy nominee
3-4pm: The McTell Brothers
4-5pm: Our headliners, The Carousel Rogues, sponsored by WTMD
I recently had the pleasure to sit down with The Carousel Rogues' lead singer, Caitlin Nethery Anselmo.
"My husband, Zach Anselmo, and I were friends in high school. We started dating a year after we formed a band," Caitlin says. "We fell in love over music."Zach plays guitar and vocals and their friend, Daniel Wiley, rounds things out on keyboard. Their Indie-pop sound was quickly noticed by Baltimore area alternative radio."We played on WTMD's 'Baltimore Unsigned' a few years ago. After we put out our self-titled album, program director Scott Mullins liked one of our songs, 'Clementine,' and added it to their rotation."
"It became the number one song on their station for several weeks." Caitlin says their music is influenced by bands like Weezer, Phantom Planet and The Cardigans. "We definitely have late-90's sensibilities," she laughs, as well as other, indie sounds such as Teenage Fan Club.
"We also like a lot of music from the 1960s. I mean," she adds, "Who's not influenced by The Beatles"?
"Another source Caitlin credits for inspiration may seem unlikely: children's fantasy novels.
"I wrote a song about this Andrew Peterson book for laughs. Dan (the keyboardist) encouraged me to send it to the author - we found his email address on his website. Andrew liked it so much he actually passed it on to his producer, Ben Shive. He reached out to me a couple months later about meeting up in Nashville to discuss working on some kind of project together. That's how our first record got started.
"The Carousel Rogues will begin recording their second album in Nashville this July. They'll be playing Clementine at our festival. So all you WTMD lovers, be sure to check them out! See you all on Saturday!
A Few Festival Nuts and Bolts
Of course, putting on a street festival requires lots of help from different sources, and I would like to thank Carrollton Bank for their generous sponsorship, and the City of Baltimore for all of their assistance in securing our permits. The entire 300 block of N. Charles Street between Saratoga and Mulberry Streets will be closed to traffic as of 4:30 am on Saturday. So if you normally park there on the weekends, make sure you have another spot by then. Here are two alternatives: Our friends at PMS Parking offer weekend specials at their St. Paul Garage (behind the Tremont, at the corner of Charles & Saratoga) and their Franklin Street Garage (next to the Pope Garden at the intersection of Charles & Franklin). You can park all day at either garage for just $5.
The following bus schedule is in effect on Saturday, May 12 between Saratoga and Mulberry Streets: The No.3, 11 and 64 Lines will operate their regular route on northbound Charles Street. They will be diverted left on Fayette Street, right on Park Avenue, right on Mulberry Street, then back to their regular route on Charles Street. Bus stops at Fayette, Lexington, and Saratoga Streets, will be inoperative on Saturday, May 12th until 6pm.Southbound routes are all on streets other than Charles Street and will not be affected.
How You Can Help Out!
I've also been getting a lot of questions from folks who want to know what they can do to help out on May 12. This is what I'm telling them:If you like us: Come on out and support our 40 local businesses and great live music that afternoon. And while you're here, make sure you fill out one of our surveys provided by our friends at The Downtown Partnership. We'll have raffle tickets for $75 worth of Zipcar driving credit to give away for filling it out! And if you like us, you like us, you really, really like us: You will consider volunteering a few hours of your time on Saturday. Our beer & wine tent and donation tables are already well staffed, but I'd love to have a few more folks help us with our setup between 9am and noon on Saturday, or manning our 2 awesome bounce houses in our children's play area. Please email me if you're interested, and my sincerest thanks for your support! — Laura Rodini
