Festivals near Boston

Cradle of college rock and home to an indie scene that runs from the clubs of Allston to the stages of Cambridge, Boston nurtures a musical identity built on garage energy, literary folk, and loyalty to its homegrown bands. An hour down the road, the Levitate Music Festival pitches its tent on the seaside fairgrounds of Marshfield, blending sun-soaked reggae, roots, and wide-open rock. Further north in Lowell — the old mill city where Jack Kerouac grew up — The Town and the City turns bars, galleries, and cafés into a springtime concert circuit where folk, indie, and spoken word answer one another from block to block, faithful to the town's beat spirit.

The electronic side runs just as deep: the Above & Beyond Group Therapy 700 collective brings its luminous trance for a milestone edition, while Boston Bitdown gathers chiptune and 8-bit devotees for a gleefully geeky night of electro — a smaller but thriving face of the city. FestT calculates your FestiScore — the affinity between a lineup and your favorite artists — and keeps dates, headliners, and ticketing up to date. Everything you need to map your season across the Massachusetts South Shore, the banks of the Merrimack, and the late nights of the Hub.