Abigail McNatt Photography: Four Chord Music Festival 2

The annual Four Chord Music Festival. Most may not be familiar with the newest Pittsburgh tradition started by Four Chord Music. As mentioned on their Facebook page, it is an all-day music event held in the wonderful city of Pittsburgh, PA. As of the end of 2015, there have only now been two of these festivals, but they plan on continuing it for many years to come.

The festival usually features bands of the pop/punk, punk, ska, alternative, and rock genres. This year's Four Chord Music Festival was held at the Xtaza Night Club in the Cultural District on December 13th, 2015 and featured bands such as Harbour, Hit the Lights, Survay Says, The Spacepimps, Anti-Flag, and Yellowcard, most of which I had the privilege of getting to shoot.

Since this concert festival is an all day thing, myself and the friends I went with were unable to go the whole day, so we were only able to catch about half of the bands. The festival had two different stages: the main stage and the second stage. I only ended up staying by the main stage so I could get a good spot to get great pictures.

The first bands at the start of the event went on around noon to one o'clock. They included: Handicap Parking Lot (Main Stage), Across State Lines (Second Stage), Drop The Act (Main Stage), Cynimatics (Second Stage), and the list went on.

Once we got there, we were just in time for the bands we were most excited to see and I was most excited to take pictures of. First up was Aaron West & the Roaring Twenties, an acoustic band started by Wonder Years' frontman, Dan Campbell. The rest of the bands throughout the night were much more punk and heavier so it was a nice touch to include a set where the crowd was not moshing or crowd surfing and was just enjoying the music. Next up on the main stage was The Spacepimps, a local Pittsburgh pop/punk band who's been doing music for almost 10 years. Lead singer and guitarist, Rishi Bahl, is actually the host, promoter, and band recruiter of the festival itself. They pumped up the crowd and livened the vibes to keep up the energy.

Many may not be aware of this but at 'legitimate' shows, the typical amount of time photographers are allotted to take pictures is the first 3 songs for each band or artist, and then they are sent back to their seats. Due to the time limit, between sets I hung out on the side off stage because as the festival continued, the crowd got crazier and crazier and I did not trust my expensive professional camera in the middle of it all. I also got some great shots from those angles as well.

Next on the lineup, was pop/punk/rock band from Ohio, Hit the Lights. They were probably my favorite band of the night to shoot because lead vocalist, Nick Thompson was working the stage and playing around with the fans and the photographers in the photo pit. They were also some of my best photos from the night. HIL continued to keep the crowd as energetic as possible, as I watched many of the fans in attendance sing along to every word. Continuing the trend of keeping the crowd alive, was hardcore punk band, Citizen. Like most of the bands that I was able to catch during this festival, they also were a fun band shoot because of their high energy and hilarious facial expressions.

One of the last two bands of the night was local Pittsburgh, political activist, punk/rock band Anti Flag. Once they hit the stage, I was really happy I decided to stay on the sidelines after their first 3 songs were over because by that point, the crowd was inevitably rowdy and my camera may have never made it the rest of the night. They are a band that could not give two you-know-what's about what anyone thinks of them. They stand up for their beliefs and they made that very clear throughout the course of their set. They also aim to inspire their fans and other audience members to make a difference by announcing a call-to-action several times during the show. They were not my type of music, however from a photographer perspective, they were fantastic. They used the stage like they owned it and they also made their way into the crowd, so it was sort of difficult to keep up.

The final band, and the band most everyone came to see, American pop/punk-esque rock band, Yellowcard, rocked the stage. Fans from all over came to see them perform and that was blatantly obvious by the myriad of voices singing each and every lyric the band sang. They owned the stage and were yet another great band to shoot. Being much more my genre of music and having been familiar with them prior to the festival, I thoroughly enjoyed the duration of their set, and clearly, so did everyone else in audience.

Overall, The Four Chord Music Festival of 2015 was a huge success and a fantastic night. It was such a surreal experience to shoot my first official show and I cannot wait to do it again in 2016!

Check out a few of my favorite shots down below!

For the rest of the pictures from this night, click here!