Original live music is back, but national touring acts are still reluctant to get on the road, so the live scene’s return is being driven by locals.
On June 3 Ruth Eckerd Hall announced plans to make it the first major Bay area venue to experiment with socially-distanced concerts. The show—a June 11 gig from Greg Billings—is set for Ruth Eckerd Hall’s just-renovated grand lobby. The Clearwater concert hall can normally pack in just over 2,000 concertgoers, but Billings’ gig will see an audience seated at roughly 20 tables of four. Tables were $40, and demand was so high that Billings is now playing five shows total (and they're all sold-out).
The show announcements came after Gov. Ron DeSantis released his Phase II guidelines, which allowed for the reopening of concert halls at 50% capacity. Social distancing measures must be adopted, including a six-foot gap between parties.
But Ruth Eckerd Hall isn’t the only place hosting seated concert goers taking in original live music. At Seminole Heights restaurant Ella’s Americana Folk Art Cafe, guests can now book reservation-only, seated dinner shows; the June music calendar for Ella’s looks a lot like it did before Covid-19 precautions started to cripple local businesses (Beartoe, Tiny Terror and Daryl Hance are all scheduled over the next week).
The Hideaway Cafe, one of the first local venues to find a way to keep revenue coming in despite social distancing regulations, is humming, and DJs—including Charles Ku, who was one of the first to stop gigging in the wake of the coronavirus—are back at their “new normal” residencies. EDM stronghold The Ritz Ybor is even restarting its #Pound Fridays series on June 12.
A few blocks down Seventh Avenue, Orpheum (which was operating as a package store during the crisis lockdown) brought back its popular Saturday Sink-Or-Swim event. At The Attic, Forest Hoffar is reopening Ybor City's best listening room on June 20. Even jazz singer and pianist Kitty Daniels is back at her Donatello residency.
The surest sign of a jumpstart for original, local live music is the announcement of two comeback shows at Ybor City’s Crowbar, which saw its calendar (one of the busiest in the Bay area) wrecked by the pandemic, causing an estimated $400,000 in lost gross revenue according to co-owner Tom DeGeorge.
Crowbar’s first show back is on June 20 and will feature surf-noir band FayRoy, rappers Acyh, Queen of Ex and Sam E Hues, plus songwriters Shawn Kyle and Lauris Vidal. The second is on June 27 with Americana favorites Have Gun, Will Travel plus Will Quinlan and the Holy Slow Train alongside rock favorite Bangarang, rapper Mike Mass, songwriters Acho Brother and Kristopher James, and DJ Qeys (pictured).
No cash will be taken at the door, and the first opportunity to buy tickets to the shows will go to folks who donated money for commemorative T-shirts that helped put money in the pockets of Crowbar’s out-of-work bar staff. The first two concerts will also be live-streamed, according to a social media announcement by DeGeorge.
In a text message, DeGeorge told Creative Loafing Tampa Bay that his venue, which can normally host a combined indoor-outdoor capacity of just over 300, will only allow 150 through its doors for the June 20 and June 27 shows, along with the returns of Ol’ Dirty Sundays (June 28) and Crowbar’s infamous Hot Dog Party (July 3).
DeGeorge doesn’t see national acts even trying to return until the fall, so his challenge now is to book shows with high enough quality to sustain the bar until then.
“We have several challenges ahead of us but I've been thinking of the long game since the beginning so I look forward to taking the next step in this fight,” DeGeorge said. “We’ll get through this and honestly I'm just thankful for the opportunity to get back in the game.”
This is a developing post and should be updated by the end of the day.
UPDATED: 06/09/20 9:08 p.m. Updated to show Billings playing five sold-out shows and Forrest Hoffar playing The Attic.
Support local journalism in these crazy days. Our small but mighty team is working tirelessly to bring you up to the minute news on how Coronavirus is affecting Tampa and surrounding areas. Please consider making a one time or monthly donation to help support our staff. Every little bit helps.
Follow @cl_music on Twitter to get the most up-to-date music news, concert announcements and local tunes. Subscribe to our newsletter, and listen to us on WMNF 88.5-FM’s “Radio Reverb” program every Saturday from 4 p.m.-6 p.m.
This article appears in Jun 11-17, 2020.