Summer wraps up with Boothbay Harbor’s multi-day HarborFest featuring local chefs, tasting, art and music aplenty including three headline performances at the historic Opera House downtown. Marcia Ball, Adam Ezra and Raging Brass will each take to the stage this September and help kick-off the fall season. 

Friday, Sept. 1

Singer and pianist Marcia Ball has been blending Texas blues, Louisiana swamp ballads and New Orleans second-line rhythms into her distinctive roadhouse roots-rock for 30 years. Her “barrelhouse style of play, her relentlessly feel-good party tunes and her soulful roadhouse band are iconic in the Gulf Coast music universe,” says USA Today. She’s been called a gritty yet elegant piano pounder with a bluesy voice and witty songwriting while her albums mine the New Orleans R&B and soul traditions. Marcia Ball and her band help to kick-off HarborFest with their concert on Friday, Sept. 1. Advance tickets are $25 and available through the Opera House box office. Tickets are $30 on the day of the performance. Marcia Ball’s concert is made possible thanks to special sponsorship support from J.Edward Knight Insurance.

Saturday, Sept. 2

It’s difficult to impart the roots-steeped, road-trippin' essence of the Boston-based Adam Ezra Group into a single word, but frontman Adam Ezra nonetheless keeps one in mind as something of a mantra, “community.” To the musicians at the heart of the group, community is epitomized by a belief they all share, one that has long doubled as a mission statement for the group: namely, that making music together is itself a form of grassroots organizing, capable of nothing less than changing the world.  Beyond the bounds of the group, Adam has been reviewed as “not since Springsteen and Bono have I seen a lead singer with his talent and charisma,” says Jack Casey of WERS radio in Boston. Adam Ezra Group’s songwriting is making waves around the country and they have received “Song of the Year” at the New England Music Awards. A songwriting partnership with the legendary John Oates is currently taking Ezra back and forth between Nashville and touring. Tickets for the Saturday, Sept. 2 concert by Adam Ezra and his band are $20 in advance and $25 on the day of the show.

Friday, Sept. 8

Raging Brass was established in 2014, in South Portland, by composer, arranger and trumpeter, Marc Chillemi. Some know Marc from the dance band Primo Cubano, which he has been a member of for the past decade. Raging Brass is a 8-piece band featuring some of Maine’s top players including tubist Rafael Fryre, drummer Gary Gemitti, alto saxophonist Mike Ayotte, tenor saxophonist Kyle Hardy, trombonist Dave Noyes, vocalist and guitarist Matt Wasowski, and special guitarist Paul D’Alessio. Improvisational by design, Raging Brass plays an eclectic blend of styles including New Orleans Jazz, Ska, Roots Reggae, Samba, and popular dance music from Africa called Soukous, Highlife, and Afro-Beat. Although Raging Brass is new on the scene, they have already shared the stage with national acts, Red Baraat, John Brown’s Body, G. Love & Special Sauce, and John Popper from Blues Traveler. Raging Brass performs Friday, Sept. 8. Specially priced advance tickets are just $15 and  $20 on the day of the show.

Tickets for all performances are currently on sale at the Opera House box office, 86 Townsend Avenue, Boothbay Harbor or by calling 633-5159. The box office is open Tuesday-Friday from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tickets are also available (advance only) at www.boothbayoperahouse.com. All shows at 7:30 p.m., doors for seating open at 7. For other HarborFest events and information visit boothbayharborfest.com.