The 46th annual Summerfolk event is changing its format for the festival by offering physical Covid conscious spaces.
A release notes, the event to be held Aug. 21-22 in Owen Sound is assisted by community members and local venues in hosting live music for limited audiences at more than 20 stages across the city during the day, as well as streaming the performances in the evening.
For this year’s event, the organizers are making a plan to meet a variety of possible public health guidelines, by having the audience stay put while the musicians travel between the locations to avoid mixing any of the large crowds.
When residents purchase their tickets, they will be valid for a single afternoon at one of the smaller venues, and if guidelines allow, a few larger stages at Kelso Beach Park, the traditional festival location.
Tickets will also be available for the afternoon shows to gain access to the evening live stream broadcast from inside a larger local venue. Options to purchase stand alone tickets for the live stream will be available as well.
“Each venue will be a little bit different we’ve presently got 21 venues, 10 of those are backyards, and most of the backyards would have, under the rules, a capacity of 50 people spaced,” says Summerfolk Artistic Director James Keelaghan. “We have some larger backyards, that are massive, some of them we would probably be able to get 100 or 150 people spaced depending on what the regulations would be.”
Keelaghan says with the booking of over 40 musical acts, they are requesting performers within a three hour radius of Owen Sound to ensure no long distance performers come to the area and avoid any potential Covid cases.
“We don’t want to encourage people coming from long distances and we are also not going to be providing hotels for the performers, so we wanted people who were in a distance were they could drive up, do their gigs and then head home,” says Keelaghan.
Summerfolk General Manager Jaret Koop says they are incorporating as many of the elements of the festival as they can.
“If all goes as planned, the audience will get great live acts in a friendly atmosphere and beautiful locations,” says Koop. “We’ve already confirmed many of the locations but we’re going to find a few more. We’ll release more information about the criteria over the coming weeks so people can volunteer their backyards if they want to.”
As the Covid guidelines continue to evolve, the event organizing team plans to make more announcements on the venues, musical lineup, and ticket information on the event’s website.
Those looking to volunteer or offer their backyard can contact Summerfolk in early July when the selection process is released.
