Photo: Hailey BollingerThe annual MidPoint Music Festival has announced the first batch of performers for this year’s event, as well as a few other changes.

Heading up the lineup is Cincinnati’s own Walk the Moon, which is working on its anticipated follow-up to hit album Talking Is Hard (featuring the huge single “Shut Up and Dance”). Joining the group are The New Pornographers, Broken Social Scene, BADBADNOTGOOD, Valerie June, Frightened Rabbit, Dan Deacon, Noname, Seun Kuti and Egypt 80, Citizen, Mandolin Orange, The Cactus Blossoms, Aaron Lee Tasjan, William Elliott Whitmore, Charly Bliss, Bedouine, Flint Eastwood, Ghost of Paul Revere, David Luning, DYAN and Adam Torres. More artists will be announced later this summer.

Last year was MPMF’s first year under the management of Music and Event Management Inc. (or MEMI), a subsidiary of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra that also operates local venues like Riverbend, PNC Pavilion and Taft Theatre. (CityBeat previously ran MPMF for several years.) The 2016 event was moved to four outdoor stages in a consolidated area of Over-the-Rhine.

For 2017, MPMF is on the move again. This year it will take place in the area surrounding Taft Theatre, with shows being held at the Taft (and in its Ballroom), the nearby Masonic Center (which was used for for the 2016 MusicNow fest) and on an outdoor stage on Fifth Street at Broadway. The event is also scaled back to two days (previously it has been held over three days), but there will be a special kickoff concert on Sept. 22 (details TBA).

Full weekend passes ($115) go on sale this Friday at 11 a.m. through ticketmaster.com, mpmf.com or at the box offices of Riverbend and the Taft Theatre. VIP tickets are also available.

Artists interested in submitting for a possible slot at the festival can do so through Aug. 1 here. It’s free to submit.

Vendors interested in participating can find more info here.

Find the latest updates at mpmf.com.

Here's the "highlight reel" created for MPMF 2016 by Bluestone Creative and Alias Imaging: