Music venues and concerts in Ottawa/Gatineau

[rocketphish]

Expanded Festival of Small Halls is to feature Kim Mitchell and other Canadian music stars in October
This year's event will include 39 shows, up from 29 in 2022

Peter Hum, Ottawa Citizen
Published Jun 06, 2023 • Last updated 5 days ago • 2 minute read

An enlarged Ontario Festival of Small Halls will present almost 40 concerts this fall — not only in Ottawa Valley town halls, churches and community centres that have hosted its shows since 2014, but also in venues as far west as Peterborough.

Running over three weekends in October, the festival will feature Kim Mitchell performing Oct. 12 at the Showplace Performance Centre in Peterborough and multiple performances by each of Corb Lund, Kellylee Evans, the Devin Cuddy Band, Jenn Grant, the Irish Descendants, Terra Lightfoot, Ben Caplan, the Arrogant Worms, Old Man Luedecke and more.

There will be 39 concerts in all, up by 10 from 29 last year.

Tickets are to be available after 10 a.m. Tuesday at festivalofsmallhalls.frontgatetickets.com. For details about acts and venues, go to ontariosmallhalls.com.

Meanwhile, on multiple weekends between Aug. 10 to Sept. 9, the festival, an offshoot of the RBC Ottawa Bluesfest, is again staging its Chef’s Table series in partnership with the National Arts Centre.

The series, which originated during the first summer of the COVID-19 pandemic, features NAC executive chef Kenton Leier teaming up with guest chefs to serve three-course dinners on the terrace of the NAC’s 1 Elgin Restaurant looking onto the Rideau Canal. After this year’s dinners, acts including the Angelique Francis Quartet (Aug. 10-12); the Jeff Rogers Trio (Aug. 17-19); Dave Kalil, Tyler Kealey and Todd Huckabone (Aug. 31 to Sept. 2); and the Retrogrades (Sept. 7-9) will perform.

The guest chefs will be David Vinoya of the Hilton Garden Inn Ottawa Downtown (Aug. 10-12), B.C. chef Carmen Ingham (Aug. 17-19), Joe Thottungal of Coconut Lagoon and Thali (Aug. 31 to Sept. 2) and Indigenous chef Siobhan Detkavich (Sept. 7-9). Details on menus and reservations can be found at ontariosmallhalls.com.

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https://ottawacitizen.com/entertainment/...nd-other-canadian-music-stars-in-october

[huntclub]

http://yowstage.com

New 2,500 capacity concert/entertainment venue is going to be opening at Ey Centre in November 2023. Glad to see all these new venues, Ottawa needs more concerts.

[rocketphish]

Originally Posted by huntclub

http://yowstage.com

New 2,500 capacity concert/entertainment venue is going to be opening at Ey Centre in November 2023. Glad to see all these new venues, Ottawa needs more concerts.

Cool. And right on the O-Train line. Not much pre- or post-show restaurant or bar scene there though.

Thanks for the update, and welcome to the forum!

[bikegypsy]

Originally Posted by Harley613

I guess Billy Corgan and Eddie Vedder are the only surviving megaband frontmen from that era of music at this point.

We can add Anthony Kiedis and Perry Farrell to that list.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by huntclub

http://yowstage.com

New 2,500 capacity concert/entertainment venue is going to be opening at Ey Centre in November 2023. Glad to see all these new venues, Ottawa needs more concerts.

Thanks for posting. It's an interesting addition to the EY Centre. Seems to be Stage and venue that can be put up and taken down depending on the client's needs.

EY will be far more accessible with the O-Train. Should be a huge boost for them. Hope to see some hotels and restaurants around the station and EY in the near future.

[Spoonsy]

Beyond the Pale & Friends starting a music fest at City Centre

Saturday August 19th

https://thecitycentrerockout.com/


https://i.imgur.com/Un7Y7Xy.png


https://i.imgur.com/i7adKU3.png

[J.OT13]

Will it grow to be as big as Rockfest? We shall see.

[rocketphish]

...and if the musical act is boring, you just turn around and watch wrestling instead.

[DTcrawler]

What a weekend it was for culture and tourism in Ottawa!

Saturday night was A Boogie Wit Da Hoodie at the CTC. A big-name hip hop artist making a stop in Ottawa as a standalone act, rather than at a festival, is pretty rare so this was great to see.

Next we had the first weekend of the Ottawa International Jazz Festival, held in the heart of downtown. Not much of a jazz fan myself but I always love the look of this festival’s setup, with the partial overhead canopy.

Finally, we had Escapade Music Festival at Lansdowne. Attended this one myself and had an absolute blast. A good portion of the attendees made their way over from Montreal yet again, a testament to the star-studded lineup this festival continually produces.

Definitely an exciting weekend in the capital with lots of tourism $$$ being pumped into the local economy. Next up, Canada Day and Bluesfest!

[yotajoe]

Originally Posted by DTcrawler

Finally, we had Escapade Music Festival at Lansdowne. Attended this one myself and had an absolute blast. A good portion of the attendees made their way over from Montreal yet again, a testament to the star-studded lineup this festival continually produces.

Glebe NIMBY residents in shambles right now.

[OTSkyline]

Escapade has become quite the yearly event for Ottawa. To your point, I've seen many people from Montreal and even Toronto drive down for the weekend to attend. Not often that we, Ottawa, attract business & tourism from MTL/TO.

I heard the organizers did not get approval for exception to noise bylaw (would one have been granted even if they had?). In any case, I hope this doesn't drive the organizers to reconsider Lansdowne and move it back to Hard Rock Raceway... that place was a disaster, out in the boonies, created a ton of traffic & gridlock and I'm sure driving under the influence.

[J.OT13]

Originally Posted by OTSkyline

Escapade has become quite the yearly event for Ottawa. To your point, I've seen many people from Montreal and even Toronto drive down for the weekend to attend. Not often that we, Ottawa, attract business & tourism from MTL/TO.

I heard the organizers did not get approval for exception to noise bylaw (would one have been granted even if they had?). In any case, I hope this doesn't drive the organizers to reconsider Lansdowne and move it back to Hard Rock Raceway... that place was a disaster, out in the boonies, created a ton of traffic & gridlock and I'm sure driving under the influence.

And isn't Escapade a more youth oriented electronic music concert? Hard Rock seems like such a strange place for it.

[zzptichka]

Originally Posted by OTSkyline

Escapade has become quite the yearly event for Ottawa. To your point, I've seen many people from Montreal and even Toronto drive down for the weekend to attend. Not often that we, Ottawa, attract business & tourism from MTL/TO.

I heard the organizers did not get approval for exception to noise bylaw (would one have been granted even if they had?). In any case, I hope this doesn't drive the organizers to reconsider Lansdowne and move it back to Hard Rock Raceway... that place was a disaster, out in the boonies, created a ton of traffic & gridlock and I'm sure driving under the influence.

There is always Lebreton Flats. Wonder what would it take to build a big permanent outdoor stage for these festivals on the War Museum lawn. Feels like there is always somebody setting up a stage there at some point during the summer.

[originalmuffins]

Originally Posted by OTSkyline

Escapade has become quite the yearly event for Ottawa. To your point, I've seen many people from Montreal and even Toronto drive down for the weekend to attend. Not often that we, Ottawa, attract business & tourism from MTL/TO.

I heard the organizers did not get approval for exception to noise bylaw (would one have been granted even if they had?). In any case, I hope this doesn't drive the organizers to reconsider Lansdowne and move it back to Hard Rock Raceway... that place was a disaster, out in the boonies, created a ton of traffic & gridlock and I'm sure driving under the influence.

It definitely has. It creates quite a draw for those coming from Toronto and Montreal. The big names it draws certainly helps. Lansdowne seems like the perfect spot for it, and it will become even better once there is a better public transit to and from Lansdowne plus hotel options in 2.0.

[DogsWithJobs]

Was escapade succesful when they held it at rcgt park? That seems like a better backup location than the hard rock, at least from a transit perspective.
Or is that not an option now that there is a baseball team again?

[DTcrawler]

A few EDM "purists" I know preferred it when it was at the Hard Rock site because there was more open space and the organizers didn't have to do any wonky setups with the audio and laser rigging to appease the NIMBYs. I assume they were able to be more liberal with the firework displays too.

That being said, Lansdowne is far, far better from an accessibility perspective and I wonder if we'd still get the same draw from TO/MTL if it went back to Hard Rock. Personally, I think it needs to stay at Lansdowne but who knows how viable that'll be long-term with Lansdowne 2.0 construction and reduction to the Great Lawn.

Re: the noise bylaw violation... I'm not 100% certain how accurate this is, but I've heard that basically it's a loophole that city staff and festival organizers are both in on. If an application for a noise exemption gets denied, festival is a no-go. So better to just factor in the cost of a fine into the festival budget and pay it afterwards. City gets some extra revenue out of it that way as well. Again, not sure if that's actually what the plan was here all along but seems plausible.

[DTcrawler]

Originally Posted by DogsWithJobs

Was escapade succesful when they held it at rcgt park? That seems like a better backup location than the hard rock, at least from a transit perspective.
Or is that not an option now that there is a baseball team again?

Hard to know how successful RCGT Park was as a venue because that was a heavily watered-down version of the festival in the first year back after Covid.

[yotajoe]

Originally Posted by DTcrawler

Hard to know how successful RCGT Park was as a venue because that was a heavily watered-down version of the festival in the first year back after Covid.

I was there during that year. It is a much smaller venue than Landsdowne and can't accommodate the attendance its gotten the last two years. I believe it was around 10-13k daily at RCGT park and its 22-25k daily at Lansdowne.

Its gotten pretty large since the covid year.

[DTcrawler]

Originally Posted by yotajoe

I was there during that year. It is a much smaller venue than Landsdowne and can't accommodate the attendance its gotten the last two years. I believe it was around 10-13k daily at RCGT park and its 22-25k daily at Lansdowne.

Its gotten pretty large since the covid year.

Yeah, I've only ever attended when it's been at Lansdowne and I just can't imagine it being close to as good anywhere else. The venue itself contributes so much to the festival, where you have the Great Lawn Stage with the big hill acting as a sort of amphitheatre, then the Stadium Stage flanked by the stands, and finally the Aberdeen Stage, which is by-far my favourite of all, providing an amazing indoor stage experience that's unique to Escapade as far as I know, when considering other major festivals in Canada. Not to mention, Aberdeen is air-conditioned during the festival.

[OTSkyline]

RCGT is much too small and the Hard Rock is much too remote.

But someone brought up a good point about Lebreton. With it being walking distance to downtown, better served by transit, and enough space to offer several stages (see Bluesfest), I wonder why this location hasn't been tested yet.