What Was Lilith Fair?

Most seasons we pick an artist. In the fall of 2024 we picked a festival instead.

Lilith Fair ran for three summers, 1997 through 1999, with a revival in 2010. Sarah McLachlan started it after being told, repeatedly, that radio stations wouldn't play two women back to back and promoters wouldn't book two women on the same bill. She booked a whole tour of them. It became the highest-grossing touring festival of 1997.

What that gave us, as a chorus, was an embarrassment of riches: Natalie Merchant, Sheryl Crow, the Chicks, the Indigo Girls, Sarah McLachlan, Lisa Loeb, 10,000 Maniacs, Jewel, Alanis Morissette, Des'ree, Shawn Colvin and Tracy Chapman, all in one afternoon. "Soak Up the Sun" for the openers. "Fast Car" as a duet. "Galileo" to close.

It also gave our upper voices the kind of material they rarely get: songs written by women, for women's voices, about wanting things. "Hands," "Adia," "Wide Open Spaces." And it gave the teens "Stay," which they more or less took over.

Proceeds that season went to The Second Step, which supports people who have experienced domestic violence — a fit we didn't have to strain for.