Concert presenters experience long COVID in the form of late ticket sales

At the end of the month, concert halls in Ontario can reopen at half capacity or 500 seats (whichever is lower). By March 14, the plan is to allow clubs and concert halls to accommodate full houses. It’s a positive development in a saga that has seen the live music industry devastated by lockdowns and restrictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Still, music managers and presenters aren’t in the mood to bang their heads just yet. Ticket sales are lagging. The sentiment in the industry is that consumer confidence has been shaken due to repeated cancellations and postponements.

“Tickets are flowing at a snail’s pace,” says Heather Gibson, who programs pop music at the National Arts Center in Ottawa. “It’s lamentable, and it’s very painful.” Bernie Finkelstein, Bruce Cockburn’s longtime manager adds: “People have serious doubts that the shows will happen.”

Some in the industry blame provincial policies that seem to send the message that an all-you-can-eat party at East Side Mario’s is safer than a night at the opera or a sit-down show with Cockburn at Southam Hall as part of a masked audience. Restaurants, cinemas and casinos are allowed to open at full capacity on February 21, weeks before music venues can do the same.

“We are a law-abiding people,” says Ms. Gibson. “When the government holds back concert halls from fully opening, people assume there’s something dangerous going on.”

Not all ticket sales are slow. Earlier this month, the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival in California sold out in 75 minutes, despite rising cases of Omicron in the state. This year’s lineup for the three-day affair in April includes Harry Styles, Billie Eilish and Ye (born Kanye West).

At the NAC, there is almost no room left for two concerts by young Montreal singer-songwriter Charlotte Cardin. Tickets for Mr Cockburn, 76, can be purchased in line at the same location. The evidence is anecdotal, but some observers believe that some audiences are more reluctant to enter concert halls than others.

“I think the young people have embraced the return to live music, but the older ones are on the fence,” said Paul Brooks, former program manager at the National Music Center in Calgary and currently a publicist for the music public relations firm Take Aim Media. in Brampton, Ontario.

Brooks worked on an Art of Time Ensemble concert at Toronto’s Koerner Hall in December. The show went on sale at a reduced capacity of 1,000 tickets. Of these, just over 600 seats were filled.

If older audiences have been hesitant to attend a concert before, recent cases of high-profile postponements caused by the new, highly contagious variant of the coronavirus are not going to allay their concerns. Last week, British superstar Adele was forced to scuttle a series of concerts at Caesars Palace Hotel in Las Vegas.

“We tried absolutely everything we could to get it in place on time and to get it good enough for you,” Adele said in a tearful video posted to Instagram. the hit bottom The singer said half of her crew had contracted the virus.

This week, Elton John announced he had been struck down by COVID-19, which forced him to postpone two concerts in Dallas during a farewell tour he had just resumed after a two-week hiatus. year. “It’s always a huge disappointment to move shows and I’m so sorry to everyone who has been inconvenienced by this, but I want to keep myself and my team safe,” Mr John said on Instagram.

The 74-year-old pianist said his symptoms were “mild” and he expected to be back on stage for a Saturday night engagement in Little Rock, Ark.

Less newsworthy, a series of concerts in Florida by Toronto’s Classic Albums Live was canceled when numerous crew members and musicians contracted COVID-19 during a recent series of shows in Florida. “It swept through us like wildfire,” said Craig Martin, chief executive and founder of the touring band, which features iconic albums in their entirety.

Classic Albums Live concerts attract older audiences. Upcoming dates include a performance of Fleetwood Mac’s 1977 album Rumors in Orlando, Florida, and a presentation of Led Zeppelin II in Medicine Hat. Like others, Mr. Martin experienced a soft ticket market. “It’s slow everywhere. We just did six shows in the US, none with the numbers we’ve seen before.

Due to the nearly two-year-long pandemic, his concerts in Canada in particular have been postponed and rescheduled several times. This caused a bottleneck of six concerts scheduled at Massey Hall in Toronto alone over the next four months, including live performances by Paul Simon graceland in April and U2 Joshua Tree in May. Classic Albums Live fans are loyal, but that’s a lot of shows in a short time.

“Are we going to burn the market? I don’t know,” Mr. Martin said. “The shows we’ve been doing lately haven’t reached the capacity we were looking for, but we’re very grateful to be on tour.”

Register for The Globe Arts & Lifestyle Newsletters for more news, features and advice delivered to your inbox.