What a decade, huh?
Hard as it is to believe, our humble little Oklahoma City Free Press is set to celebrate ten years in November, ten years of Oklahoman arts, city community, truly independent, on-the-ground metro news, and of course, local music.
When our founder, Brett Dickerson, launched Free Press in earnest as a daily metro news source in November of 2016 (he’d published just a few sporadic stories earlier that year, but didn’t commit fully until November,) no one could have foreseen the impact it would have on the awareness of the community and the encouragement of Oklahoma’s creative scene.
So we wanted to celebrate properly, and that means gathering some of our favorite local performers, partnering with some of our friends and collaborators, and taking over one of the metro’s best live music venues for a night dedicated to the same craft of storytelling, creativity, and originality that drives the work we do right here.
On Friday, November 13th, Free Press will be partnering with Norman’s legendary Opolis to bring a trio of stripped-down solo sets from some of the most exciting and engaging songwriters on the scene in a one-night-only blowout benefitting the Norman Music Festival, Oklahoma’s largest free music event.
The night’s lineup was selected from artists that have meant a lot to Free Press over the years, and, in particular, that have been featured numerous times in this very column.
LABRYS going it alone for solo set
Penny Pitchlynn was first featured here on Free Press as part of the stalwart Broncho, performing at the grand public opening of OKC’s now integral Scissortail Park way back in 2019.
But it’s as LABRYS that she’s appeared here, possibly, more than any other musical artist, owing to her fantastically consistent output of some of the most effective, hardest-hitting, and straight-up best music in Oklahoma.
So it was a no-brainer to reach out to her to help us celebrate not only Free Press, but also the Opolis and the Norman Music Festival, two other organizations with which she shares loads of history and support.
Since dropping a string of increasingly electrifying singles that culminated in the widely acclaimed album “10:10” and over a year’s worth of full-volume, full-band stormings of stages across the metro and the country, Penny has recently been bringing LABRYS back down to a powerfully intimate solo presentation.
And it’s in that mode that she’ll be taking the Opolis stage on the 13th, a more singular and solitary presence, but no less passionate and intense, with the focus on her songwriting and the palpable, human stories at its core.
Nia Moné stripping down the R&B sound
When Free Press was on the scene in April of 2022 for the grand opening of the long-awaited Beer City Music Hall, the venue’s surprise first-ever performance turned out to be the star-launching moment for celestial R&B queen Nia Moné.
Since then, she’s gone on to be one the scene’s most in-demand performers, one of the city’s hottest bookers with her own cross-genre MOOD CTRL showcase at Blue Note, and of course, a consistent can’t-miss at NMF.
She’ll be helping us to celebrate by paring down her normally lush, grooving, band-oriented sound and offering a more deeply personal peek into her soulful, sensual songwriting.
Of course, that also means it’ll be a perfect chance to catch her trademark confidence and easy rapport with the audience up close, and you don’t want to miss that.
Late Night Messages throwing it back to basics
One of the things that Free Press has always been proudest of in our coverage is lifting up the remarkable talents of young creatives and upstart artists across the scene, and there are few recent breakouts that fit that bill better than Late Night Messages.
Mashing up groovy, gazey electro-pop and earnest, heart-on-sleeve lyricism, they’ve been popping off as one of the most intriguing and potentially exciting OKC acts of the last few years, with their “Imposter Syndrome” EP catching some special attention and securing them a buzzed-about spot at April’s NMF.
But when they open up the Opolis stage on the 13th, they’ll be shedding much of the synthy bedroom-pop production and tossing it back to their earliest, freshest performances, with singer and bandleader Jonathon Martinez offering a no-frills, guitar-and-vocal-focused set, offering his songwriting on full, honest display.
And that sounds like a perfect way to kick off night that we hope to be reminiscing about after another ten years.
Join us, won’t you?
OKC Free Press presents LABRYS, Nia Mone, and Late Night Messages at Opolis on Friday, November 13th, benefitting the Norman Music Festival and celebrating 10 years of independent news.
CLICK HERE for tickets.
You can find out about local music and performance happenings in the OKC metro multiple times each month in this music column by Brett Fieldcamp. | Brought to you by True Sky Credit Union.
Brett Fieldcamp is the owner and Editor in Chief of Oklahoma City Free Press. He has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly two decades and served as Arts & Entertainment Editor before purchasing the company from founder Brett Dickerson in 2026.
He is also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.
