Last Updated on February 25, 2022, 9:15 PM | Published: February 25, 2022
OKLAHOMA CITY (Free Press) — On Sunday, February 20th, award-winning Indie darling Lucy Dacus took the stage at OKC’s historic Tower Theatre to a sold-out crowd, the very first full-capacity audience that the Tower has welcomed in very nearly two years.
Since the first wave of COVID began spreading through Oklahoma in March 2020, venues have been struggling to get back on track, facing shutdowns, tour cancellations, and countless false starts.
When the Omicron variant started wreaking havoc throughout the past December and January, long-planned concerts and events saw cancellations and rescheduling across the city, and the staffing and supply shortages brought on by the virus significantly slowed development of new events and new venues alike.
Cancelled January
“January was pretty devastating,” said Chad Whitehead, co-manager and lead talent buyer for Tower Theatre, Ponyboy, and the upcoming Beer City Music Hall, the impending launch of which had to be pushed back from early March to April due primarily to the Omicron surge slowing building and development.
“We lost some pretty wonderful shows,” he told me. “We had two nights with [country singer-songwriter] Colter Wall that both sold-out instantly. And just cancelled. All those January shows.”
After two full years of low-capacity events, a nationwide dearth of touring acts, and OKC’s first highly publicized (and expectedly controversial) vaccination requirement for entry, those Colter Wall performances would have been Tower’s first chances to welcome back a packed house. Instead, Chad and the full Tower team had to wait until Lucy Dacus and her legions of OKC fans filled the space this past weekend.
“It was very moving to be at the Dacus show,” Whitehead said. “I don’t know if it means everything’s in the clear, and obviously none of us know that, but it did prove that this industry is moving forward, and that we can be successful in Oklahoma City despite the challenges that the pandemic has brought.”
Beer City Music Hall
That newly restored confidence is coming at just the right time for Whitehead and the full Tower/Ponyboy team, as they prepare to welcome their long-in-development new sister venue Beer City Music Hall into the family.
After what is now years of planning, building, setbacks, and familiar COVID-era complications, the doors were finally slated to open for Beer City next week, before January’s myriad difficulties forced them into one final postponement. The venue (located at NW 2nd and Western, just around the corner from Fair-Weather Friend Brewing) is now adding the finishing touches and is on track to launch in April.
“We are working ferociously to deliver an incredible lineup to help get that venue off to a good start,” said Whitehead. “We did have some shows lined up for March, and we are honoring all those dates. Those shows will play off either at Ponyboy or Tower Theatre, and it’ll be great. I’m really excited, and I’m glad that we had the flexibility to move them and really just to have Beer City. You know, having Ponyboy into Beer City into Tower is part of our overall business strategy of being able to flex shows up and down when there are things like this or demand grows.”
Beer City Music Hall will have a capacity cap of 500 people, placing it perfectly between Ponyboy’s 150-person limit and Tower Theatre, which can accommodate all the way up to 1,000 fans.
“It gives us a very flexible middle point between Ponyboy and Tower, with the goal that we can grow with an artist as they start their touring career at a venue like Ponyboy, and then we have a room to grow them into at Beer City as we build that relationship and build that fan base. Then we can build that fan base on into Tower, and then eventually into Criterion.”
Evolving Market
The sellout crowd for Lucy Dacus was only the tip of what promises to be an exceptionally busy year for the Tower, continuing Tuesday, March 1st with one of Whitehead’s most anticipated shows of the season: alt-rock veterans Gin Blossoms celebrating the 30th anniversary of breakthrough album “New Miserable Experience.”
“This is a really special tour for the anniversary,” he told me, “so it was something I really wanted to work on for Oklahoma City.”
Whitehead’s insistence on working to build and expand a competitive, enviable entertainment scene in OKC is finally beginning to bear fruit in the ways that he’s always hoped to see, with loads of great venues and hungry audiences all enticing more and more of the best acts to book here.
“The first problem was that for a long time, we didn’t have the rooms, and now we do,” Whitehead said. “Criterion and Jones Assembly and Tower really all came online at about the same time, and with 89th Street and now Beer City coming, we have the right mix of rooms for all different levels of great acts.”
The other hurdle in OKC’s race to compete in the music scene has been more difficult to pinpoint or address.
“I think the second part is just changing and growing the culture of music fan appreciation in OKC,” he said. “We do have a good fan base, but I think there’s a lot of growth that still needs to happen with the city.”
Luckily for Whitehead, for Tower Theatre, for the upcoming Beer City Music Hall, and for fans of great live music all over Oklahoma, it’s finally looking like that growth is happening. After two years of unprecedented complication, crowds are coming back to concerts, and concerts are coming back to OKC.
To keep up with news, announcements, tickets, and schedules for Tower Theatre, Ponyboy, and Beer City Music Hall all in one place, visit towertheatreokc.com.
Brett Fieldcamp has been covering arts, entertainment, news, housing, and culture in Oklahoma for nearly 15 years, writing for several local and state publications. He’s also a musician and songwriter and holds a certification as Specialist of Spirits from The Society of Wine Educators.
