In June, Musikfest’s official 2020 logo was retooled to include the word “virtual” in the design, a change no one thought possible before the coronavirus hit in March of this year. It’ll likely be a footnote in the annals of festival history in the distant future, but for now, it’s the safest and easiest way the thousands of annual Musikfest-goers can enjoy the 10-day festival.
But a footnote to the footnote will reveal to future festival enthusiasts that 2020′s installment wasn’t 100% virtual — it was more like 95%.
On the weekends bookending Musikfest, a limited number of people, ravenous to celebrate the festival in-person in some way, will descend on the SteelStacks campus to revel in five live concerts that were a late but welcome addition to the lineup. And the ArtsQuest team is confident that even while following all safety precautions and priorities, they can capture some socially distanced Musikfest magic.
Starting on Friday, the first day of the festival, the campus will open at 6 p.m. for those with reservations to get seated and fill their bellies before the opening notes from The Uptown Band trickle into the warm summer night.
The announcement of the outdoor shows was made on July 21, a few weeks after the ArtsQuest campus started hosting outdoor dining. In many ways, the new dining experience was a trial run for holding an outdoor show.
“We had a lot of success with it and a lot of positive feedback, which helped us hone into the point in mid-July, we felt comfortable and confident that we would be able to produce (an outdoor concert),” said Patrick Brogan, the organization’s chief programming officer and manager of the ArtsQuest Center on the SteelStacks campus.
Only five concerts, while a typical Musikfest has hundreds, may be a small number in comparison, but it feels appropriate at this point. Brogan said that the center and staff just don’t have the capacity to do multiple concerts in a day, from the turnover of multiple crowds to cleaning and sanitizing seating areas multiple times a day.
Instead, Brogan and the Musikfest team produced a unique and diverse lineup that’ll allow for people to physically come together (while six feet apart) for Musikfest. “This opportunity really is the cherry on top,” he said.
Here’s the skinny: There are five concerts that’ll be held over the next week and a half at ArtsQuest’s Air Products Town Square: Friday’s The Uptown Band, Saturday’s The BRUCE Show, The Craig Thatcher Band on Aug. 7, Hector Rosado Orchestra on Aug. 8 and Danielle Ponder plus a fireworks display on Aug. 9.
Of course, attendance for the shows isn’t a free-for-all. Reservations are required for each of the two distanced seating areas ArtsQuest has set up. There are around 60 four-person tables set up on the Town Square that can be reserved for between $20-40 depending on the show, and over on the Levitt Pavilion lawn, six-by-six-foot squares have been marked off, so for $10-15, you can bring a picnic blanket, lawn chairs or any other comfortable floor seating to enjoy the concert, which will be shown on the pavilion’s video board as well.
Brogan noted that ArtsQuest had a lot of success and safety with this sort of layout for Bethlehem’s Fourth of July fireworks display.
With 10 of Musikfest’s favorite food vendors positioned at the front of the ArtsQuest Center for the general public to pick up some grub for their virtual Musikfest viewing experience, some curious patrons might try and meander on back to the Town Square area to take in some live tunes. In fact, maybe this is your plan, too. Brogan said ArtsQuest is fully expecting some passersby to try and catch some of the concerts, and staff will be on hand to fill them in on what’s happening that night and if there are any tickets still available, but otherwise moving them along.
Of these five outdoor shows, three of them — The Uptown Band, The BRUCE Show and The Craig Thatcher Band — are sold out, but there are still tickets remaining for both the Hector Rosado Orchestra and Danielle Ponder (who Brogan called “a knockout of an artist”).
If you’re not able to make it to one of the Musikfest shows, that’s not the end-all, be-all of live music for the foreseeable future. With outdoor dining, the ArtsQuest campus has been hosting shows since July started, with Craig Tahtcher on Wednesdays, Billy Bauer on Thursdays and various artists on Fridays and Saturdays.
“We’ve learned a lot over the last month,” Brogan said. “With everyone’s safety being our top priority, it’s given us a blueprint for how to do this in a way that we feel confident for Musikfest. We’ll be continuing outdoor dining and concerts into August and likely into September if all continues to go as it has.”
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Connor Lagore may be reached at clagore@njadvancemedia.com.
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