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Get ready. It's almost time for one of the best little music festivals in the Southwest. Yes, the Taos Solar Music Fest is back in a big way. Two great days and nights of fun on June 30 & July, 2012 in Kit Carson Park in beautiful Taos, New Mexico.

The Taos Solar Music Fest festival dates back many years and it has grown into something very special for those that appreciate really good music and a totally fun time.

For 2012, the headliners are Lyle Lovett, Los Lobos, Michael Franti and Spearhead, the Del McCoury Band, Sonny Landrith, and Mat Tierney. Plus, more acts will be announced.

This year something new has been announced: the 1st annual solar music festival band competition.

For any and all of you aspiring musicians, here is your chance to be seen and heard by hundreds of people at the Annual Taos Solar Music Festival.

The first place winner will receive 45 minutes of main stage time on either Saturday June 30th or Sunday July 1st.

Michael Franti and Spearhead

The Sound Of Sunshine – the inspired and inspiring new album by Michael Franti & Spearhead " is a kind of musical sun shower, a bright, beautiful and often buoyant song cycle created to bring all kinds of listeners a sense of hope during rough and rainy times for so many in our world.

"Music is sunshine," says Michael Franti, one of the most positive and conscious artists in music today. "Like sunshine, music is a powerful force that can instantly and almost chemically change your entire mood. Music gives us new energy and a stronger sense of purpose."

"Music is something you can't hold in your hands, smell it, taste it or even see it, yet somehow just coming together and feeling these little vibrations that tickle our eardrums can somehow lift us all up out of our most difficult moments in life to unimaginable heights."

Lyle Lovett

Lyle Lovett released his self–titled debut album in 1986 to excellent reviews. Five singles from that album made it onto the country charts, but Lovett wasn't satisfied within the traditional confines of country music. He continued to experiment in jazz, folk and pop within the country framework and he has won several Grammy Awards since his first in 1989 for Lyle Lovett and His Large Band.
In 1979, he left Texas to study abroad in Rothenburg, Germany. There, he met a local country musician called Buffalo Wayne, who included Lovett in a country–western themed event in Luxemburg in 1983.

Lovett signed with the label in 1986 and released his self–titled debut album later that year, to excellent reviews. Five singles from that album made it onto the country charts. But Lovett wasn't satisfied within the traditional confines of country music. He continued to experiment in jazz, folk and pop within the country framework. Pontiac, Lyle Lovett's second album, showcased this sound and eventually went gold.

Though mainstream recognition has eluded him, Lovett has earned a cult following around the world with a modern, eccentric sound coupled with literate, witty lyrics. In 1989, he won a Grammy for Best Male Vocalist for the album Lyle Lovett and His Large Band. The Large Band referred to a horn section and several backup singers, including Francine Reed, without whom some fans feel a Lyle Lovett concert is incomplete.

Los Lobos

At this stage in their illustrious career, a new album by the East Los Angeles rock band Los Lobos is a highly anticipated event. Since they began as Los Lobos Del Este Los Angeles in 1973, they have evolved into a respected artistic entity searching for themes and topics that are an interpretive pulse of our times. Using musical molds built on the blues, rockabilly, jazz, Latin and their own Mexican-American heritage, Los Lobos have never beat their fans over the head with politics or agendas. Instead, they subtly challenge them with conscienceraising songs and thought-provoking lyrics. Their latest Hollywood Records release – "The Town and The City" – certainly does that.

"As artists, we take our experience and put it into painting, stories or songs," says Louie Perez, a multi–instrumentalist with Los Lobos and the principal lyricist for this 2006 album. "Right now, when the world is in this incredible state of flux, it's impossible for this experience not to affect your work."

"Somewhere halfway through the making of this record I found this linear sort of plot, a story of struggle" explains Perez, "So I thought, I'm not going to resist and followed my intuition. It was like a flashlight waving at the end of a tunnel that I had to go after."

Discover More and Get Your Tickets at: Taos Solar Music Fest Web Site

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