NEW Digital Concerts at The Barn & Exciting Details about Future Open-Air Venues!
by Donna Bennett,
My husband Brian Finley and I co-founded Westben in 1999 and the first concert was held on July 1, 2000, featuring a full symphony orchestra and 10 soloists. Over the years the music genres have expanded from classical to Broadway, jazz, folk, fiddle, pop, electronica and comedy.
Westben is a charitable organization with over 150 volunteers and community partners. It has developed into a year-round Centre for Connection & Creativity Through Music hosting over 90 events and experiences annually for 20 years. Or it WAS until the Pandemic.
Artistic Director, Brian Finley looking out onto Willow Hill - the new natural ampitheatre.
The Pandemic shut all live performances, workshops, choirs and band practices down. Our first instinct was to try to stay connected with our members, volunteers, audience, sponsors, and government and business partners. We moved online to create digital experiences to stay connected creating new online programming and a new interactive online “digital venue”. www.westbendigitalvenue.ca . We created over 100 new videos in 2020 including Podcasts, Musical Moments, Kids programs and Digital Concerts at The Barn all under the banner – Sunshine Ahead.
The Digital Concerts at The Barn were recorded last summer and fall at The Barn with no audience and can be seen on Westben’s YouTube Channel or Digital Venue. Westben strategically incorporated a sense of place into the videos with performances on the meadow, near the pond and other areas as well as in The Barn. Upcoming performances include:
Barbra Lica Quartet - February 13;
The Fitzgerald Family March 13;
Walking through the Mary West property Fall 2020.
Looking ahead to summer 2021 and the probable restrictions on gathering numbers due to COVID, Westben realized that it isn’t viable to present concerts at The Barn with an audience of only 50 people. Dreaming went into overdrive. It felt like “here we go again!” as in 1999.
Phase one during COVID had been to go online and stay connected. Phase two was now to bring people back together safely and comfortably.
Westben has a new plan which includes:
new barn seating,
new open-air venues,
shorter concert times,
more frequency,
targeting of smaller groups;
more partnerships and new programming around the concerts.
The Barn seating will be reconfigured to create small pods and socially distant seating for performances. Instead of seats for 400, there will be 50.
Just beyond the picnic meadow and pond, there is a natural amphitheatre to be called Willow Hill which can seat 100+. The audience will then have a great view of the performers and the whole Westben property. The second outdoor venue will be for intimate performances around a campfire.
Located right across the road from the Westben entrance is the Mary West Property, a natural area of meadows and forest managed by the Nature Conservancy of Canada. We are hoping to take small groups of people on a musical nature walk experience.
As we keep Sunshine Ahead! In our hearts and minds, we want to assure our patrons that Westben will be a safe place to visit, clothed in nature, with fun and exciting live music and nature experiences.
-Donna Bennett, CM, Marketing Director & Co-Founder
Join us for the NEXT Digital Concert at The Barn
We would love to hear from you!
What are you most looking forward to about our NEW outdoor venues next summer? Have you been enjoying the Digital Concerts?
Feel free to ask us any questions you might have!