Good news, too late for summer?

With Governor Walz announcing COVID restrictions may be ending sooner than later, it looks like we might have a relatively ‘normal’ summer! Which will be exciting for bars, restaurants, event centers, tourism - all industries that have struggled, or shut down completely, with the COVID pandemic.

This article, from the Star Tribune, explains that while it’s exciting for concert venues to reopen, the announcement may have came a bit too late. It looks like most places were expecting to be able to open for the fall, so they haven’t been planning anything for the summer and wish they had gotten a heads-up about the announcement. Most concerts are booked months and months in advance, not weeks. Large national tours will also have the struggle of trying to figure out traveling with difference restrictions in different states.

Others, such as the organizers of We Fest in Detroit Lakes MN, announced their August music festival in the hopes that they wouldn’t have to cancel. They just decided to take a gamble, which looks like it’s going to work out for them! It was a large gamble, that it doesn’t look like many other events were willing to take.

Other annual events that normally happen in the summer have been outrighted cancelled for the second year in a row. Rock the Garden normally occurs in June, and was totally cancelled for both the 2020 and 2021 season. I hope it comes back in 2022! The Basilica Block party, normally in July, is looking at September dates.

Personally, I’m very excited for the (safe) return of live music! However, the Star Tribune article brought up points that I hadn’t thought about before, and how live music might not exactly be back in time for the warm weather.

-Jess