The first annual Simply Songwriting Music Festival (SSMF), a grassroots celebration of songwriters and songwriting in Los Angeles, will be held on Saturday, May 15 from 1-4pm at St. Elmo Village, 4830 St. Elmo Drive, southeast of the intersection of La Brea Avenue and Venice Boulevard. The event, co-sponsored by Musicians Institute along with the LA City Cultural Affairs Department, OG3 Records and Carvin Musical Instruments, will feature seven outstanding unsigned songwriters performing their work. The festival is free to the public.

Among the performers is an MI graduate and hip-hop artist known simply as Hypnotic. Other artists range in style from rap to surf-folk, urban blues and melodic ballads. The festival is intended to encourage independent artists while also celebrating the ethnic and cultural diversity of the Los Angeles music scene.

St. Elmo Village, founded in 1969, is the city's oldest artist-run art and community center, offering regular workshops in arts including painting, computer graphics and photography to children and adults in the Los Angeles area.