Overview Portland's Back Cove Music and Arts Festival is a two-day music festival in Payson Park, a 48-acre city park on the shore of Back Cove in Portland, Maine. Its two stages, the Baxter Stage and the Longfellow Stage, take turns through the day. No two sets overlap. National headliners share the bill with Maine performers. GoodWorks Entertainment and Shore Sound Entertainment produce the festival, with local help from State Theatre Presents. On site The stages face wide grass lawns, and the Portland skyline sits across the water behind the crowd. A splash pad and playground sit in the middle of the park. Food trucks from local and regional chefs park in rows, with vegan, vegetarian and gluten-free options, and the bars pour beer from Maine and regional breweries. A crafts area holds artisan vendors, art installations, a henna tent and lawn games, and free water stations run across the grounds. The festival goes on rain or shine. VIP holders get viewing areas at both stages and a shaded lounge with private bars and air-conditioned restrooms. People arrive on free shuttles from off-site lots, by bike valet or on Greater Portland Metro. Audience Families turn out in numbers. Children 12 and under get in free with a ticketed adult, so parents push strollers between the stages while kids run through the splash pad and adults spread blankets on the lawns between sets, and by evening the rail in front of the headliners is packed. Crowds dance through the funk and soul sets. Talent and Influencers Past bills have included Jack White, Lord Huron, The Roots, Turnpike Troubadours, Lucy Dacus, Margo Price, St. Paul and the Broken Bones and Thee Sacred Souls, alongside Cimafunk, Sarah Kinsley and Madi Diaz. Student bands from the Maine Academy of Modern Music open each day, and the Pihcintu Multinational Chorus, a Portland choir of refugee and immigrant girls, has performed too. Lucy Dacus once officiated three weddings on stage during "Best Guess." The next lineup is unannounced. Track record Before Back Cove, no major music festival had run in a Portland city park since Mumford and Sons brought its Gentlemen of the Road Stopover to town. The City of Portland has since approved a multi-year contract that keeps the festival in Payson Park, with an option to extend it. The organizers give $100,000 a year to the Portland Parks Conservancy, add a per-ticket surcharge for the city and hold two public community meetings each year. Brand presence Beverage brands make up most of the partner roster. Maine brewers Allagash, Baxter Brewing and Oxbow pour alongside White Claw, Tito's, el Jimador, Jack Daniel's, Jack Daniel's and Coca-Cola, Sun Cruiser and Monster Energy, and mainelove rounds out the partner wall. Beer and spirits reach the crowd through the general bars, and VIP areas at both stages run their own private bars.