Music in the Park enjoyed another successful year, entertaining crowds outside the Lacombe Memorial Centre throughout all of Summer 2018.
Ellen Corea, one of the organizers of the event put on by the Lacombe Performing Arts Centre, said it was a really good summer for the program
“We started in June and we had great weather throughout except for the very last program, which we went into the church for,” she said. “Our numbers have increased every year. We are getting fabulous numbers and we had a very good program this year as far as the number of bands we had and the different genres of music. We were really pleased with that.”
Corea believes there are several reasons why Music in the Park has enjoyed such growing success.
“The combination of a very festival-like atmosphere and of course we are partnered with the community market,” she said. “It has been a fabulous event with the community market, the music and we have also had some special events coordinated with it.”
One aspect Corea and her organizing committee has enjoyed is Lacombe residents of all ages have come out to enjoy the show.
“It is really bringing out lots of people and I think the thing we really like is that different generations are there,” she said. “We have young families, we have youth and teenagers and we have had older people. It has been a really good mix all summer.”
To fit the may different interests, Music in the Park tries to bring in many different types of musicians.
“This year, about 40 per cent of our performers were bands we haven’t had before — which was great,” she said. “It gives the audience a little bit of a different view of what kind of music is out there. We have had bands from Edmonton and Calgary, but we try to draw from a lot of local and Red Deer musicians.
“Red Deer has a fabulous music scene, so we are lucky to be so close.”
Corea said planning is already underway for 2019.
“We have already booked a couple bands for next year and we have had some thoughts about what we would like to do,” she said.A”t this time of year, we sit down and discuss how everything went and what we would like to see.
“We start booking in about November. We will bring back some of our favourites and we will look for some new ones as well.”
Corea was grateful for the ongoing support the program has received.
“I would like to thank all of our supporters and the different organizations who have helped monetarily to help the program,” she said. “The crowd has also been really generous with their donation, which helps us prepare for next year. We pay all of our bands, so its good to have the cash available to do that.
“We have had great support and it all helps us keep the program going.”