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I Made Rock ‘N’ Roll, Indiana’s Black rock festival, is taking a gap year and will return in 2026, GANGGANG announced Tuesday.

Alan Bacon, co-founder of GANGGANG, said they’ll spend the next 14 months working on developing I Made ‘N’ Roll into something more than just an annual festival. They’ll create videos on the genre’s history and work with local artists to fundraise and campaign ahead of the event’s return in 2026.

“We’ll be taking a deeper, more intentional dive into the genre and focus on how we can create a concert experience all-year long,” Bacon said at Tuesday’s State of the Culture event at the Kan-Kan Cinema & Restaurant.

GANGGANG, in partnership with Forty5, launched I Made Rock ‘N’ Roll in 2024 to celebrate the role of Black artists in shaping rock ’n’ roll history. The festival, held May 18 at the American Legion Mall drew thousands with headliners like Janelle Monae and Gary Clark Jr.

About 130 people attended State of the Culture, where GANGGANG, a cultural development firm founded in 2020, reported on its impact and future programs. Other highlights include:

• GANGGANG generated $13 million in total revenue between 2021 and 2024.
• BLACK: A Festival of Joy will return this summer.
• Since 2021, the BUTTER Fine Art Fair, held over Labor Day weekend, has brought in $900,000 in sales to support Black visual artists.

Mirror Indy reporter Mesgana Waiss covers arts and culture. Contact her at 317-667-2643 or mesgana.waiss@mirrorindy.org.

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I Made Rock ‘N’ Roll festival will return in 2026

by Mesgana Waiss, Mirror Indy
February 11, 2025

<h1>I Made Rock ‘N’ Roll festival will return in 2026</h1> <p class="byline">by Mesgana Waiss, Mirror Indy <br />February 11, 2025</p> <p>I Made Rock ‘N’ Roll, Indiana’s Black rock festival, is taking a gap year and will return in 2026, <a href="https://ganggangculture.com/about/#:~:text=GANGGANG%20is%20a%20first%2Dof,local%20creatives" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">GANGGANG</a> announced Tuesday.</p> <p>Alan Bacon, co-founder of GANGGANG, said they’ll spend the next 14 months working on developing I Made ‘N’ Roll into something more than just an annual festival. They’ll create videos on the genre’s history and work with local artists to fundraise and campaign ahead of the event’s return in 2026.</p> <p>“We’ll be taking a deeper, more intentional dive into the genre and focus on how we can create a concert experience all-year long,” Bacon said at Tuesday’s State of the Culture event at the Kan-Kan Cinema &amp; Restaurant.</p> <p>GANGGANG, in partnership with <a href="https://www.forty5.com/about" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">Forty5</a>, launched <a href="https://mirrorindy.org/i-made-rock-n-roll-photos/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">I Made Rock ‘N’ Roll</a> in 2024 to celebrate the role of Black artists in shaping rock ’n’ roll history. The festival, held May 18 at the American Legion Mall drew thousands with headliners like Janelle Monae and Gary Clark Jr.</p> <p>About 130 people attended State of the Culture, where GANGGANG, a cultural development firm founded in 2020, reported on its impact and future programs. Other highlights include:</p> <ul class="wp-block-list"> <li>GANGGANG generated $13 million in total revenue between 2021 and 2024.</li> <li><a href="https://blackjoyindy.com" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">BLACK: A Festival of Joy</a> will return this summer.</li> <li>Since 2021, the <a href="https://butterartfair.com" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener">BUTTER Fine Art Fair</a>, held over Labor Day weekend, has brought in $900,000 in sales to support Black visual artists.</li> </ul> <p>This &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://mirrorindy.org/ganggang-indianapolis-i-made-rock-n-roll-music-festival-2026/&quot;&gt;article&lt;/a&gt; first appeared on &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://mirrorindy.org&quot;&gt;Mirror Indy&lt;/a&gt; and is republished here under a &lt;a target=&quot;_blank&quot; href=&quot;https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/&quot;&gt;Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License&lt;/a&gt;.&lt;img src=&quot;https://i0.wp.com/mirrorindy.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/cropped-Mirror-Indy-square-logo-1.png?resize=150%2C150&amp;amp;ssl=1&quot; style=&quot;width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;&quot;&gt;&lt;img id=&quot;republication-tracker-tool-source&quot; src=&quot;https://mirrorindy.org/?republication-pixel=true&amp;post=45519&amp;amp;ga4=G-X0R0QW371R&quot; style=&quot;width:1px;height:1px;&quot;&gt;&lt;script&gt; PARSELY = { autotrack: false, onload: function() { PARSELY.beacon.trackPageView({ url: &quot;https://mirrorindy.org/ganggang-indianapolis-i-made-rock-n-roll-music-festival-2026/&quot;, urlref: window.location.href }); } } &lt;/script&gt; &lt;script id=&quot;parsely-cfg&quot; src=&quot;//cdn.parsely.com/keys/mirrorindy.org/p.js&quot;&gt;&lt;/script&gt;</p> Copy to Clipboard

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