Sandra Bernhard and singer Martha Wash
headlined Utah's gay pride parade and festival in Salt Lake City.
Comedienne-actress Bernhard performed
Saturday night at the festival's Washington Square stage, while dance
diva Wash wowed the crowd on Sunday.
Thousands of revelers cheered on Sunday
as nearly 90 floats wound their way around Salt Lake City's downtown
streets in what's become Utah's second-largest parade. Afterward,
the festivities moved to Washington Square, where vendors tended
booths and various artists performed on three stages, including
singer Angie Evans, the DC Cowboys, a group of “dancing,
shirtless cowboys” and a dancing troupe that performs traditional
Aztec dances.
Organizers said they believed the
weekend-long festival would top last year's record 20,000 attendees.
“Yesterday was tremendous,” Michael
Westley, a spokesman for Utah
Pride Center, the group behind the city's gay pride festival,
told the Salt Lake Tribune on Sunday. “It exceeded our
expectations by 100 percent.”
Organizers weaved this year's festival
theme “Our History, Our Future” into the celebration by adding a
civil rights history exhibit and three hours of children's
programming. Both events were new this year.