There’s nothing like live music!
Check out all of The Cedar’s upcoming concerts and events on our calendar at the link below.
Our initiatives
Learn more about our flagship grant-funded programs like Global Roots Festival and The Cedar Commissions.
Make a contribution to The Cedar!
Generous supporters like you keep global music thriving in the heart of Minneapolis.
Upcoming Events
Texas-bred singer/songwriter and Big Thief guitarist Buck Meek returns to The Cedar behind his release Haunted Mountain.
Recent News
As summer comes to a close and we welcome in autumnal happenings — the start of school, Labor Day weekend celebrations, and Global Roots Festival — we also welcome a wonderful new team member to The Cedar Cultural Center. John Marks is joining us as The Cedar’s Operations Director: his first day is September 5, 2023!
Check out our 2022 Annual Report celebrating our 33rd revolution. We are proud of all that we did and we’re excited to share this with you.
In late April, The Cedar’s Sr. Box Office and Development Operations Manager MJ Gilmore sat down for a Zoom interview with the emotive and storied Ethiopian-Israeli musician Gili Yalo in advance of his forthcoming show at The Cedar on June 1! MJ was joined by Abreham Tsegaye and Jote Mulat — owners of Café Jote, an Ethiopian coffee shop just a block away from The Cedar. Faysal Abraham, former Cedar Operations Director, also stopped in for the interview.
Calling in from sunny Los Angeles, Gili shared vivid details of his life through this interview. He talked about the story of his name, the first cover he ever did, and the significance of his return to Minneapolis.
The Cedar is pleased to announce that we have added new staff and board members! These staffing additions are aligned with an organization-wide visioning session we did in October 2022, coalescing our hopes for the direction of The Cedar and distilling them into actionable items: one of which was building new audiences for the amazing artists we present here.
Our sixth and final spotlight interview in this year’s cohort is with Sophia Deutsch (she/her). Sophia is a cellist and composer. Her creation for the 2022-2023 Cedar Commissions, Vis Vitae, is an exploration into our planet as a sonic landscape. Simultaneously charmed and overwhelmed by the vast sources of inspiration in the concept of ‘nature,’ Sophia embraces the heavy weight of it by trusting her body’s interpretation of these earthly phenomena. She spoke with Twin Cities music writer Youa Vang about the legacy of earth-inspired music, the restriction and subsequent freedom provided by classical training, and the wisdom of a mentor.
Our fifth spotlight interview in this year’s cohort is with Biaban (Aram Kavoossi, he/him). Biaban is an electronic musician and beatmaker. His new work for the 2022-2023 Cedar Commissions Oil and Dust is a sobering look at the omnipresent nature of oil. Inspired by the novel Cyclonopedia by Reza Negaristani, Biaban explores the narrative device of oil as sentient and ravenous, and all the while, claiming humans as dependents. Biaban spoke with Twin Cities music writer Youa Vang about the history of oil in Iran, channeling the characterization of this substance into a sound(s), and gratitude for collaboration.