At the Levitt Foundation, our belief that joy is a fundamental human right guides our work to empower communities through free, live music. It’s why each and every Levitt lawn from coast to coast is designed to be a welcoming destination for all of the community members it serves, regardless of one’s gender identity, sexual orientation, and beyond.

And it’s not just the lawns—Levitt stages are also proudly inclusive. All season long, critically acclaimed musical artists who are a part of the LGBTQIA+ community perform at Levitt locations, fostering joy amongst audiences and reveling in the freedom of authentic self-expression.

In honor of this year’s Pride Month—which is all about celebrating the LGBTQIA+ community and reflecting upon its history and cultural contributions—we’re shining the spotlight on the numerous LGBTQIA+ performers spreading messages of love, individuality, and empowerment with every note and harmony they bring to Levitt stages across the country.

Keep reading to learn more about a few LGBTQIA+ artists performing this season who are building community through music, one concert at a time.

Alysha Brilla

Alysha Brilla (photo by Nadiya Marwah)

Equal parts composer, producer, multi-instrumentalist, audio engineer, and artist, Canadian global roots musician Alysha Brilla is the epitome of multihyphenate magic. Having performed on the Levitt AMP Stevens Point Music Series stage in June and set to enchant the Denver community on Aug. 1 with an appearance at Levitt Pavilion Denver, Brilla is known for her unique sound, which the artist calls “healing music medicine.” Brilla, who is queer, has earned nods from both the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television and the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, totaling a whopping three JUNO and one Canadian Screen Award nominations.

Influenced by the multifaceted cultural tapestry she was raised beneath—a mixed-race, mixed-religion household with one white and one Indo-Tanzanian parent—Brilla’s songs explore themes of cultural identity, social justice, and queerness. The artist’s soulful 2014 hit “Jenna” tells a sapphic love story, with lyrics like “Jenna, you lit a fire in my heart / When we kissed I felt a little spark” atop sunny brass instrumentations.  Her latest single, “Shine”—a collaboration with Chorus of Courage, an artistic collective of survivors of violence and their allies—is a contemporary soul anthem of perseverance and hope.

DeerLady

DeerLady (photo by Sasha Pedro)

With a band name that speaks to Indigenous storytelling, indie rock duo DeerLady (a nod to the Native folklore spirit “Deer Woman” or “Deer Lady”) is the brainchild of two seasoned musicians: Mali Obomsawin, a Native award-winning singer, songwriter, and instrumentalist, and guitarist-composer Magdalena Abrego, whose avant-garde sensibilities are informed by her queer identity.

Embodying qualities of both Abrego’s self-identified “queer experimentalism” and Obomsawin’s Americana background, DeerLady’s fuzzy indie rock sounds are balanced with melodic poetry that dives into themes of, as explained by the duo, “intimacy under colonialism”—a motif that hits close to home for the two musicians of Odanak First Nation (Obomsawin) and Mexican/Puerto Rican (Abrego) descent.

Where there is hardship, though, blossoms hope, and those who see DeerLady rock out at this year’s Levitt AMP Gallup Music Series in August will fall for the newcomer band as its two members bring their courageous narratives and sonic experimentalism to this New Mexican community, known as the “Heart of Indian Country.”

Set to perform tunes from their successful debut album, Greatest Hits—which includes songs like “Believer,” a warm shoegaze track that reads diaristic, with lines like, “I still wanna believe / I still wanna believe in somewhere else,” along with “There There,” a bedroom rock song many will recognize from Season 3 of the acclaimed Hulu show Reservation Dogs—DeerLady is sure to invigorate Levitt audiences with their queer and Indigenous authenticity this summer.

Kameron Ross

Kameron Ross

Dazzling audiences during June’s Arlington Pride (a rental event hosted by Levitt Pavilion Arlington) was Texas native Kameron Ross—a next-gen and openly gay country music artist who is defying norms with an unapologetically queer Southern flair. One of only a few openly LGBTQIA-identifying performers in the country space, award-winning Ross is nothing short of a pioneer. Since childhood country concerts à la Shania Twain, the singer knew he belonged on a stage—and evidencing that fate was Ross’ rise to prominence as a finalist on America’s Got Talent in 2020.

Four years later, the rising star is still rocketing through the scene, having earned the title of “Best Male Performer” by Dallas Voice, along with a Queerty Award nomination for his music video for nostalgia bop “If I Could Go Back.” So it is no surprise his performance during Arlington Pride was such a smash, electrifying the Dallas/Fort Worth area’s diverse LGBTQIA+ community and its allies earlier this month. At the festival, Ross delivered an affecting collection of original songs, along with covers of songs long-loved by the queer community, including Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody.”

And, though Ross is a solo artist, he is hardly a “lone” star. Throughout his rise to success, he’s consistently used his platform to uplift his LGBTQIA+ peers and foster social change in and beyond the country space. Most recently, his cinematic music video for 2023 hit single “Sway,” featuring Ru Paul Drag Race’s Alyssa Edwards, expressed themes of self-acceptance and encouraged audiences to join the movement to combat anti-drag and anti-LGBTQIA+ legislation in the United States.

OKAN

OKAN

Hear one song from OKAN and you’ll be feeling better than okay—courtesy of the group members’ expressive, rhythmic beats that joyously speak to their colorful multicultural background as Afro-Latina musicians. Co-led by Elizabeth Rodriguez and Magdelys Savigne, both of whom hail from Cuba and now call Canada home, JUNO Award-winning and Latin GRAMMY-nominated queer Latin-fusion group OKAN blends the roots sounds of their Afro-Cuban heritage with a variety of other sonic flavorings, including jazz and folk.

The pairing is also breaking traditions: with Rodriguez as a classically trained violinist (once the concertmaster of Havana’s Youth Orchestra) and Savigne a maven of orchestral percussion (having studied at Havana’s University of the Arts), the musicians create lush Latin soundscapes within genres that female instrumentalists have been historically underrepresented in.

As the dynamic duo is set to perform at the Levitt AMP Woonsocket Music Series this June, along with Levitt AMP Utica, Levitt AMP Springfield, and Levitt Pavilion Dayton in July, East Coast audiences are guaranteed to be swaying to blissful rhythms characterized by Rodriguez’s extraordinary fiddling, Savigne’s impeccable timekeeping, and both musicians’ warm vocal melodies—delivered in Spanish and revealing stories about immigration, bravery, and love. Through their discography and live performances, the duo also advocates for a variety of social justice issues they hold close to their hearts, such as freedom of expression, LGBTQIA+ rights, and gender equality.

Pom Pom Squad

Pom Pom Squad

When Mia Berrin of one-woman-show Pom Pom Squad was in her early 20s, she experienced a transformative queer romance that—by no exaggeration—changed her life trajectory. Before falling in love, she frequently felt isolated as a young Puerto Rican American woman experiencing her coming-of-age years in predominately white spaces. She also had a penchant for angsty rock music, but never truly saw herself represented outside of female punk and grunge icons like Courtney Love. So, for the Orlando-raised Latina, surviving her first queer heartbreak unexpectedly helped the musician reclaim her identity as a queer woman and as an artist.

Berrin’s path from there led to her becoming an indie music darling, one whose high-spirited, largely DIY-indebted tunes double as anthems of rebellion, self-discovery, and vulnerability for the LGBTQIA+ community. Today, as Pom Pom Squad—an intentionally ironic project name that speaks to the standards of white femininity that the artist frequently competed with in her adolescence—Berrin is a universally acclaimed rockstar whose latest album, Death of a Cheerleader, has racked up over 7 million streams on Spotify to date.

This Pride Month at Levitt Pavilion Dayton, the artist put on a show featuring her candid take on contemporary grunge rock that undoubtedly earned her some new listeners. With support from a full band that sounded straight out of the ‘90s, Pom Pom Squad won over the Dayton community’s heart with vivacious live arrangements of Berrin’s biggest hits, including “Red with Love” and “Head Cheerleader.”

The Levitt Foundation is proud to foster joy and inclusivity by building community through music. Check out our 2024 season overview to see what other award-winning musical talents this year’s Levitt season has in store!