For the past two decades, the Lottery League has brought random Cleveland musicians together and given them two months to rehearse and come up with 10 minutes of original music they then perform at a culminating concert dubbed the Big Show.
This year, founders Michael James and Jae Kristoff have again staged the event and the newly formed musical groups will perform on Saturday, June 27, at a day-long concert that takes place at Ingenuity Cleveland. Local breweries Butcher & Brewer, Market Garden, Immigrant Son and Collision Bend have collaborated to make special beers related to this year’s event, and local graphic artists have designed six different posters for the truly unique concert.
One recent afternoon at Visible Voice Books, James and Kristoff talked about the show’s origins and the way it takes local musicians out of their comfort zones to collaborate with strangers, something they say works particularly well here in Northeast Ohio.
Talk about the beginnings of this event. I think it dates back to 2006.
Kristoff: At the time, I was doing a collaboration project called Land of Buried Treasure. We were collaborating with different musicians, including Michael. We did a CD at the time with 50 to 70 musicians who came in over a 72-hour period at Zombie Proof Studios downtown. Musicians stuck around, and you’d great these weird combinations of musicians. We made a CD, and after, that I was approached by more musicians. We were thinking about what we do next. There was a MySpace message that [local musician] Ed Sotelo put up after seeing a local band with an amazing drummer at the Beachland. And he said he wished every band in town would break up, and we could pick bands all over again. That got the wheels turning. We could do something like this where we could have musicians come together and have an NFL-type draft. We could randomly place musicians together. A council was formed, and it evolved into musicians that never played together before. In 2007 when we were really planning it out, that was when we had the idea of having a baseball card for each musician. They could learn about other musicians and also promote what they were doing and what groups they were performing with. Back then, we didn’t know how it was going to go.
That first year produced 33 new bands from 144 local musicians?
Kristoff: Yes, and we didn’t know if they would all make it to the Big Show. That two-month period prior to the show was magic. All the bands stayed together and played the Big Show. Since then, there have been 275 bands that were created, and they all made it to the Big Show.
James: The only band that didn’t perform was Ted Flynn’s. He passed away in 2013. He was a legend in our scene and passed away a day before the Big Show. We did a video tribute to him.
Are any of the original 33 bands still around?
James: None of those bands, but some of the combinations of musicians still play together. The oldest band that’s still around is Hiram Maxim from 2013. They’ve recorded with Martin Bisi (Sonic Youth) and done some significant stuff. They’re killer live, too.
Kristoff: Each season, there are a half dozen bands that are still around when the next Lottery League happens.
Was it always the intention to do it every two to three years?
James: We started every two years and then went to every three years. But three years feels like we’re starting all over again. We wanted to make tickets free. Since 2013, with the third season, we have made it free. Three years gave us a break. We did that from 2016 to 2019. We were raising funds trying to get sponsorships every three years. After 2019, we decided to go back to the two-year model. We made that announcement that we were going to do that in 2020 and then everything fell apart. The nature of what we do is each band is assured a drummer and a rehearsal space, so the idea of us trying to get musicians rehearse during COVID in a tight rehearsal space was difficult. We had to make sure people felt safe, so that’s why we returned in 2024.
Kristoff: When this one is over, we’ll be working toward 2028. We need to know that we have our sponsors at least a year in advance. Being every two years now, we are meeting on a regular basis..
What have been some of the wilder ensembles that have played throughout the years?
Kristoff: Because we work with Chuck [Karnak] from All Go Signs, a lot of the times the bands will bring creative visuals and videos. We have screens on the stage. We had bands score videos and people in costumes. When there are 44 bands performing, the bands like to stand out if they can.
James: When Queen of Hell played in 2016 in druid robes with a cross with string of Christmas white lights around the border of the cross and having a player come out and turn it upside down because it was on a swivel, the audience was packed. They then ripped into this Black Sabbath-meets-Thin Lizzy riff. I still get goose bumps to this day thinking about that performance. It was unreal. We appreciate the time musicians all give. They have to attend an orientation and check egos and bring an open mind to their group. We stress all that, but what has organically grown out of this is that we can tell when the bands have been working on this throughout the two months from the draft to the Big Show. You hear countermeasures and added instrumentation that can only be outgrowths of the added time spent rehearsing. When are 39 to 44 bands, you aren’t likely to get an earworm stuck in your head from a song you’ve never heard before. They’ve put so much more the visual presentation. There is costuming, staging and props and video elements. They take on personas within their projects. You have to come up with your band name and identity. You have to get people’s attention, and they’ve just watched 44 other bands. At first, our advice was to write your best 10 minutes of material. The songs have been there, but capturing people’s attention in a sea of unfamiliarity is hard.
Kristoff: We’ve had over 700 local musicians perform as a part of this. We don’t expect them to click. So many of us musicians can go back to when we’re teenagers and the people we make music with are usually in our comfort zone. It says about Cleveland musicians that they can take themselves out of their comfort zones.
James: People in L.A. and Buffalo have done their versions of the Lottery League. They’re not the same. There’s something special with Cleveland. I think a lot of it has to do with Jae and his reach to draw people into this challenging idea. You form bands you have interests with and not with people you don’t know. It’s such an unnatural way to put musicians together. The magic we felt immediately in 2008 was there from the beginning. We’re all in the same music scene and that’s the thread we all share, and it’s enough. It’s been wild and always gratifying. The commitment from the musicians is staggering. A friend of mine is in [the local band] Tetraviolet. They performed in 2024 and are still together. He’s come up to me and said, “This is the best band I’ve ever been in, and you have given me three best new friends.” Man, that is great. What do you say to that?
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