About Us

Grand Performances is non-profit organization that provides free access to the global performing arts. Our mission is to inspire community, celebrate diversity, and unite Los Angeles through free access to global performing arts.

All of our shows are free, outdoors, all ages and open to the public. Most of our events take place at California Plaza in the Grand Avenue Arts District of Downtown Los Angeles, next to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA), The Broad and Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Founded in 1986, over the last 37 years Grand Performances has presented free live concerts featuring Stevie Wonder, Ozomatli, Kamasi Washington, Madame Gandhi, Ana Tijoux, Soulection, Aloe Blacc, Angelique Kidjo and countless others.

Hailed as the "Best Free Outdoor Summer Concert Series" by Los Angeles Magazine and called "a grand gift to the public... democracy in musical action" by the Los Angeles Times, Grand Performances presents an annual season of free performing arts events featuring local and global artists in music, dance, theatre, poetry and more at the breathtaking California Plaza in the heart of Downtown. 

Grand Performances strives to create transformative experiences that spark a greater appreciation of the arts, enrich and broaden understanding of global cultures, and encourage audiences to interact with the world around them.  Grand Performances offers a welcoming and inclusive open-air environment in the heart of downtown Los Angeles and works with a network of community partners to ensure everyone is encouraged to participate.

Our audience is multicultural and multigenerational and comes from every socio-economic group and geographic area of LA County.  Grand Performances is a national leader in its field, and widely known for its eclectic programming and commitment to serving the arts, artists, and the community.

GP History

Launched in 1987 during a time of redevelopment in downtown Los Angeles, Grand Performances (GP) is SoCal’s longest-running presenter of free global and local performing arts.  Over the years, Grand Performances has nurtured artists from L.A.’s own neighborhoods, often providing early career opportunities.

Artists such as daKAH Hip Hop Orchestra, Ozomatli, Diavolo Dance Company, La Santa Cecilia, and Kamasi Washington all received breakthrough presentations on Grand Performances' stage. In addition, a longtime commitment to presenting contemporary artists from Latin America, Africa, and Central/East Asia has brought important world-class touring artists to our community and has ensured the stage reflects the many faces of Los Angeles.  

Grand Performances was conceived in the late 1980s by the City of Los Angeles and its Community Redevelopment Agency to enliven Bunker Hill with free performing arts programs, and to introduce downtown Los Angeles to thousands of people for whom this was not yet a destination.

As part of a unique public/private partnership with the property owners of California Plaza, Grand Performances became “the urban experiment that works,” bringing together the nation’s most diverse audience including people from all fifteen council districts to experience world-class artists reflective of the diversity found in neighborhoods throughout the City.

As one of the oldest free performing arts programs in the region, Grand Performances has served over 1 million people since its inception with live performances, related workshops, master classes and audience discussions; and has developed partnerships with the Los Angeles Unified School District, the Los Angeles Public Library and numerous youth organizations to provide opportunities for children to interact with the arts and artists.

Grand Performances would first like to acknowledge and thank the former Community Redevelopment Agency of the City of Los Angeles and the CRA/LA, a designated local authority and successor, for their commitment to the arts; and most importantly for recognizing the critical role that free performing arts has in maintaining a creative, cultural, and economically vibrant Los Angeles.  

Thanks to the vision of Mayor Tom Bradley and the CRA, GP has presented world music, dance, theatre, spoken word, film, and poetry in the performing arts spaces of California Plaza for over 30 years.  This performing arts program has served as a backdrop to the transformation of the downtown community for over three decades.   

GP acknowledges the current and past owners and managers of One Cal, Two Cal, and the Hotel at California Plaza (Cal Plaza), the three of which make up the mutual benefit corporation Plaza Commons, Inc. (PCI), for their support of the performing arts program. 

Artistic Vision

Believing that access to the arts should be a right and not a privilege and believing that all our presentations should be offered with the finest technical support available, the vision that drives Grand Performances’ programming is complex and addresses multiple concerns including:

Artistry

• A high priority for artistic excellence
• Programming that reflects genre diversity
• Artists that reflect the cultural diversity of our community
• Developing, commissioning, and producing artistic works by innovative artists as part of our services to the community
• Supporting and nurturing the careers of local artists

Access

• It is important to the artists to know that they are reaching America’s most diverse audience, and it is important to the audience to know that they are part of that audience
• We must continue to have innovative marketing programs that result in community-wide audience development without regard to economic condition

Meaning

• Expand programs that engage the audience and also demonstrate how the arts comment on a variety of social issues that pertain to the broader community
• Scheduling artists whose works are meaningful to various segments of our community, thereby providing other segments of our community with opportunities to better understand the many communities that make up Los Angeles

Leadership

• Recognizing our unique position in the broader arts community and providing leadership assistance as that community strives to contribute to the broader community in Los Angeles
• Collaborating with other art and non-art community-serving organizations to strengthen ties to the communities; provide audiences with new information about others that positively impact on community health; and to build stronger support teams for all Grand Performances work


Our vision is at times to pleasantly surprise audiences, and at other times, challenge audiences. Grand Performances brings together audiences to discover artists often unknown to the Los Angeles public. Grand Performances fulfills its mission by presenting innovative performing arts programming; by supporting new creative works by well-known artists; and by providing audiences opportunities to use performances as a stimulus for deeper conversations about art and how society can influence art.

Prepared by Former Executive Director Michael Alexander in
September 2009 and revised December 2015.