In the June high-noon heat, Franklin Park was awash with the ethereal and delicate sounds of Cigarette. The decade-old D.C. band joined the Smithsonian Folklife Festival program D.C.: The Social Power of Music and the DowntownDC Business Improvement District for a lunchtime concert on June 27, 2019.

We spoke to bassist Richard Howard about the inspiration for the band, the nature of the scene, and how in D.C. “you use the music as a gathering spot…and then you can go from there.”

Nichole Procopenko is a program curator for D.C.: The Social Power of Music.