Reimagining NYC Venues to Keep Live Performance Alive

Drastic Times for Live Performance Call for Alternative Measures

NYC larger venues and cultural institutions are reimagining their spaces to keep live performance alive. The pandemic continues to shake the performing arts and music world to its core with no short end in sight. A new push by some of the city’s larger venues and cultural institutions are lobbying to hold live performance offerings in their vast spaces.

Permission to operate would be a huge boost to a NYC nightlife that remains crippled by the coronavirus. NYC’s music, theatre and comedy venues remain closed. The latest telling sign that they will remain dark for the unforeseeable future is last week’s news from the Broadway League extending the Broadway shut down thru May 2021. It does not, however, answer the need to save all the independent venues, the majority of which are smaller spaces that, even if equipped for social distancing, given the 25% capacity law, would still not be profitable enough to cover their costs, especially back rent.

The Push to Offer Live Performance

Park Avenue Armory, The Shed and St. Ann’s Warehouse are a few of NYC’s larger venues lobbying for permission to offer live performance. Broadway is backing this push to provide theatrical productions an opportunity to stay alive. This valiant appeal appears to be a viable and disruptive alternative to reopening the Broadway theatres for a variety of reasons. The top reason is for health concerns, namely the coronavirus. Most of Broadway’s theatres are older and are not conducive to operating at a profit with social distancing and pandemic protocol guidelines in place.

The Big Question

If you offer it, will they come?  It may be premature to answer but, a good indication will be the attendance data from the city Museums, which recently re-opened their doors at diminished capacity and additional state-guided protocols. If these statistics are positive, then the answer is absolutely YES! We can only hope…

The Result – Socially Sparked®

Anything is better than nothing. Keeping live performance in New York City alive where culture-deprived fans can get their fix is Socially Sparked and worth permitting! — Forever #sociallysparked Tweet us @sosparkednew & @asparks01

To learn more about the larger effort to Save Our Stages visit the website: saveourstages.com