Early 2008 Prog Changes

It has been a tough early couple of weeks for the Northeast prog scene, but hopefully, as is often the case, the music will carry on.

 

As most of you have heard by now, after 10 years running NEARFest, co-founders Chad Hutchinson and Rob LaDuca will be retiring from the festival.  Their announcement says that arrangements are being made to transfer the festival and its “crucial diverse band selection” to a new organization.  Let’s hope for a successful transfer and continuation of what has become of the world’s premier prog showcases.

 

RoSfest announced this week that headliner The Flower Kings will not be able to make it this May due to their drummer situation.  This is unfortunate as NewEARS was hoping to be able to schedule another local Flower Kings performance based around their appearance at RoSfest.  We are all hopeful that we may see The Flower Kings again later on in the year around their scheduled November European tour with special guest drummer Pat Mastelotto who is best known in the prog community for his work with King Crimson.

 

Closer to home, a very promising new venue for a 2008 NewEARS Art Rock Series, the Acton Jazz Café, has just announced a “temporary” closing due to financial hardship.  We just had our first gig with them at the end of 2007 with the NewEARS Eve Tony Levin/IZZ show which was a sell-out and was expected to lead to more shows in the new year.  We wish the AJC a speedy recovery and hope that this great venue does not disappear forever.

 

Finally, after 7 years as our webmaster and designer, NewEARS’ own Keith Reedy has also announced that he will be retiring from his samaritan position.  Keith has spent countless hours supporting NewEARS over the years with not only the web site, but graphic design for flyers and link supports and all we could ever repay him with was a couple of tickets to a show.  We want to publicly thank Keith once again for all he has done for us.

 

That does leave an open position for a new NewEARS webmaster and graphic designer.  If anybody is interested, please get in touch with us either through the site, yahoo or the PO Box 1434, Littleton MA 01460-4434.

 

Somehow, Prog Will Carry On in 2008.

 

Fred T.

~ by fredth on January 17, 2008.