A new music festival is coming to the Town of Prescott.
A COVID compliant event called the Upper Canada Folkfest will be happening on Saturday, October 3rd at the Kinsmen Amphitheatre. The festival will run from 1:00pm to 6:00pm that day and features Ontario based performers James Keelaghan, Jim Bryson, Lynn Hanson, Anna Ludlow and family act Tripod, who are Terry Tufts, Katherine Briggs, and Beth Tufts.
George Tierney, founding member of the group behind this project, says the team started working on this project last January because there was a clear appetite for another music festival in Eastern Ontario and folk music was notably missing.
“Once live music was permitted to return to local stages (under strict guidelines) we began to wonder if safely launching our festival this year was still a possibility. It began with selecting the
venue and seeing if we had a willing host. With the safety of our guests and performers being the single most important consideration, the Prescott’s Kinsmen Amphitheatre quickly rose to the top of the list. It’s easy to control traffic, separate the performers and seat about 100 people safely in pairs. In short order, the Town of Prescott was on-side.”
Mayor Brett Todd says he is thrilled the town is concluding the warm-weather season with Upper Canada Folkfest after a difficult year, which saw cancellations of the St. Lawrence Shakespeare Festival and the Sunday Night Concert Series.
“I can’t thank the organizers more for staging such an impressive music festival here in Prescott. Being able to welcome this strong line-up of artists to our beautiful outdoor Kinsmen Amphitheatre at Prescott Marina is a great way to underline that we are coming back from the coronavirus and are committed to bringing live music back to the Fort Town.”
The COVID-19 safety measures that will be in place include:
- All organizers to wear masks for duration of event.
- Performers to wear masks when not on-stage.
- All guests to wear masks while standing.
- Assigned seating (guided by volunteers) to minimize traffic in stands.
- Seating in pairs only. No group seating or moving chairs permitted and enforced.
- Standard safety questions asked on arrival of volunteers, guests, performers.
- Regular reminders from stage.
Tickets are available by e-transfer here.