Johannesburg - After a successful edition in Cape Town, the highly anticipated Cotton Fest returns to Johannesburg with a riveting music line-up.
Taking place in the inner city on February 4, the festival will once again bring together established and young emerging local talent performing live across three stages.
To showcase the diversities in popular music genres and to fuse the gaps within the different local movements, Cotton Fest also celebrates fashion and sport.
Synonymous with celebrating youth culture, this multi-layered lifestyle festival includes a full-day concert, merchandise, a cafeteria, and a sports area.
Cottom Fest will feature over 160 of South Africa’s finest young musicians, including Cassper Nyovest, A-Reece, Anele Zondo, Blxckie, DBN Gogo, DJ Maphorisa, Musa Keys, Sjava, Uncle Waffles, Young Stunna, Sino Msolo, K.O, Priddy Ugly, Nadia Nakai and Black Diamond.
Festival-goers will also have a curated shopping experience as they cop merchandise at the University of Cotton Fest’s tuck shop.
Co-founder Alain Ferrier said: "With what started out as a great idea between (the late rapper) Riky Rick and me many years ago, to a whole culture movement called Cotton Fest. Alongside his family, we are extremely excited to be building on Riky’s legacy and extending the festival to my city, which was always part of our plans."
The team decided to further build on his legacy by creating a platform to support creative students in year one.
"We are extremely excited to have the privilege to assist young people achieve this huge milestone in their educational journey,“ said Riky’s widow, Bianca Naidoo.
“When we started Cotton Fest, the idea was not just to have a once-off concert, but to do so much more for the culture as a whole, and offer support within the community. Now with the additional financial injection from Puma, this year we were finally able to make the Cotton Fest Creative Programme a reality and action this support.”
This year, Cotton Fest has taken things a notch up by expanding the music festival and bringing new and elevated elements, such as the open mic contest, Friends Day, the creative programme, and campus activations throughout the year.
The open mic competition was recently launched on social media, and the Cotton Fest team “opened up the playing fields” by further allowing young, unknown talent to perform at the festival.
From the over 500 entries received, the top 10 finalists will be hand-picked to perform at a closed event in front of a live judging panel at the AMPD studio. The top 3 artists or DJs selected will get to perform at Cotton Fest.
The Star