News Item: : Bluegrass museum ponders incentives to attract musicians
(Category: Miscellaneous)
Posted by pabg Administra
Monday July 19 2010 - 09:50:49
By Keith Lawrence, Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.
July 18--Lisa Jacobi, a musician from Ducktown, Tenn., fell in love with Owensboro last month during the River of Music Party. And she's been spreading the message to bluegrass musicians that Owensboro is a good place to live and work.
"There is so much potential for new, aspiring, entrepreneurial bluegrass, Americana, edgegrass business people, artists and musical technology gurus to grab a bit of turf in the beautiful-O, create a unique downtown community and develop a musical scene of our/your own," she wrote in an online bluegrass forum.
"The tech infrastructure is there," Jacobi wrote. "A welcoming and embracing local community is there."
Her message caught the attention of the
International Bluegrass Music Museum, which sponsors ROMP. Gabrielle Gray, the museum's executive director, and Terry Woodward, vice chairman of the museum's board of trustees, are looking into incentives to help musicians move to Owensboro.
They're looking to Paducah's nationally known Artist Relocation Program as a possible model.
The program's website says more than 50 artists have relocated to Paducah's LowerTown Arts District from Arizona, California, Hawaii, Illinois, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, Washington, D.C., and Wisconsin in the past decade.
That program offers moving assistance of up to $2,500 plus incentives for starting businesses.
"I'm going down to check out what Paducah is doing," Gray said. "It's not a lot of money, but it's a validation of what they (the artists) are doing. The city is recognizing them as artists."
"Paducah created a beautiful arts neighborhood," Woodward said. "Artists like to be around people who stimulate them. If we had enough bluegrass events, they might just decide they want to live here as well as come here to perform."
In a telephone interview, Jacobi said: "I would open it up to more than bluegrass musicians. Owensboro can be a musical incubator, but not like a business incubator where you put a bunch of people in one building. The atmosphere near the Ohio River is always inspirational."
Local officials have set an agenda for branding Owensboro as a bluegrass city and announced plans to move the bluegrass museum into the 60,000-square-foot state office building, creating performance areas both indoors and outdoors.
Jacobi said the community should court musicians who aren't established stars.
"It's just ripe for people who aren't part of the establishment and don't want to be part of the establishment," she said. "I only spent a little more than 24 hours there, but what I liked was it was not a Branson or a Dollywood. It wasn't a tourist trap. It felt like a garden spot where musicians can grow."
Her band, Steel String Session, which is described as "neoclassical-grass," was "having beers and snacks at a street-side table just down the way from the museum following the Legends Awards Ceremony" on June 24, Jacobi wrote.
They began talking about the city, she said.
Her husband, Joe Jacobi, is CEO of USA Canoe/Kayak, the governing body for whitewater sports in America. The family travels to river cities all over the world, Lisa Jacobi said.
Owensboro, she said, is "one of the best riverfront cities we've seen in the world."
"Never have I been to one that is so ripe for some entity to put its character/ownership stamp on it," she wrote in the online forum. "The museum is beautiful with a gem of an auditorium -- a solid music culture rallying point. AND, the riverfront is virtually empty of toxic or eye-pollution clutter. Our band couldn't get over the potential of it all."
"Years ago, that's what I thought would happen," Woodward said of the idea of bluegrass musicians moving to Owensboro. "One guy talked about moving his recording studio here. When we lost the IBMA (to Nashville in 2003), we were almost back to zero."
The question, he said, is "Do we just do what we do and then they want to be here? Or do we try to encourage them to move here first?"
The artists who move to Paducah aren't, in most cases, nationally known, Woodward said. And musicians who move to Owensboro needn't be either.
"There are musicians who know they aren't going to be Del McCoury or Ricky Skaggs and maybe don't want to be," he said. "We have a low cost of living. And I think the river is a big thing. People are intrigued by watching barges on the river."
Woodward said: "I think (an incentive package) could be put together -- some type of assistance. Paducah didn't really spend all that much. They ran ads in major cities. If we could get a few musicians to move here, they may attract more."
"The best kind of culture is created from the bottom up, not the top down," Jacobi said. "The cost of living is really good in Owensboro. One musician tells the next. If we can see it, others can."
ROMP, she said, "does a good job of bringing a lot of musicians in, but the community needs to really push to invite them to move to Owensboro. While they are in town for ROMP, you could have a seminar about Owensboro or get in their faces and invite them to move."
"When you attract artists, you get cool shops and restaurants," Gray said. "It makes a very strong community. And we already have a good start."
She said: "What I think Owensboro needs to do now is work on the approaches to the community, hang banners from street lamps, turn downtown into a celebration. The more everybody gets behind the celebration, the bigger the celebration and the more people we have coming to town."
"The IBM museum celebrates the past and the legacy," Jacobi wrote. "What is missing are live-energetic-artistic souls who are looking to create a present-to-future culture that would bring a dynamic electricity to this blank canvas of a town. And the historic and renovated empty buildings are stunning."
She added: "So if someone doesn't move fast on this, I'm going to call a big-circulation glossy national magazine and have it list Owensboro as one of the 'Best Top 10 Towns for Musicians' and then it will be 'discovered.' "
Reprint from Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
For more information about the content services offered by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT), visit , e-mail services©mctinfoservices.com, or call 866-280-5210 (outside the United States, call +1 312-222-4544).
This news item is from Pennsylvania Bluegrass
( http://pabluegrass.com/home/news.php?extend.147 )
(Category: Miscellaneous)
Posted by pabg Administra
Monday July 19 2010 - 09:50:49
By Keith Lawrence, Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.
July 18--Lisa Jacobi, a musician from Ducktown, Tenn., fell in love with Owensboro last month during the River of Music Party. And she's been spreading the message to bluegrass musicians that Owensboro is a good place to live and work.
"There is so much potential for new, aspiring, entrepreneurial bluegrass, Americana, edgegrass business people, artists and musical technology gurus to grab a bit of turf in the beautiful-O, create a unique downtown community and develop a musical scene of our/your own," she wrote in an online bluegrass forum.
"The tech infrastructure is there," Jacobi wrote. "A welcoming and embracing local community is there."
Her message caught the attention of the
International Bluegrass Music Museum, which sponsors ROMP. Gabrielle Gray, the museum's executive director, and Terry Woodward, vice chairman of the museum's board of trustees, are looking into incentives to help musicians move to Owensboro.
They're looking to Paducah's nationally known Artist Relocation Program as a possible model.
The program's website says more than 50 artists have relocated to Paducah's LowerTown Arts District from Arizona, California, Hawaii, Illinois, Kansas, Maryland, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, New York, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, Washington, D.C., and Wisconsin in the past decade.
That program offers moving assistance of up to $2,500 plus incentives for starting businesses.
"I'm going down to check out what Paducah is doing," Gray said. "It's not a lot of money, but it's a validation of what they (the artists) are doing. The city is recognizing them as artists."
"Paducah created a beautiful arts neighborhood," Woodward said. "Artists like to be around people who stimulate them. If we had enough bluegrass events, they might just decide they want to live here as well as come here to perform."
In a telephone interview, Jacobi said: "I would open it up to more than bluegrass musicians. Owensboro can be a musical incubator, but not like a business incubator where you put a bunch of people in one building. The atmosphere near the Ohio River is always inspirational."
Local officials have set an agenda for branding Owensboro as a bluegrass city and announced plans to move the bluegrass museum into the 60,000-square-foot state office building, creating performance areas both indoors and outdoors.
Jacobi said the community should court musicians who aren't established stars.
"It's just ripe for people who aren't part of the establishment and don't want to be part of the establishment," she said. "I only spent a little more than 24 hours there, but what I liked was it was not a Branson or a Dollywood. It wasn't a tourist trap. It felt like a garden spot where musicians can grow."
Her band, Steel String Session, which is described as "neoclassical-grass," was "having beers and snacks at a street-side table just down the way from the museum following the Legends Awards Ceremony" on June 24, Jacobi wrote.
They began talking about the city, she said.
Her husband, Joe Jacobi, is CEO of USA Canoe/Kayak, the governing body for whitewater sports in America. The family travels to river cities all over the world, Lisa Jacobi said.
Owensboro, she said, is "one of the best riverfront cities we've seen in the world."
"Never have I been to one that is so ripe for some entity to put its character/ownership stamp on it," she wrote in the online forum. "The museum is beautiful with a gem of an auditorium -- a solid music culture rallying point. AND, the riverfront is virtually empty of toxic or eye-pollution clutter. Our band couldn't get over the potential of it all."
"Years ago, that's what I thought would happen," Woodward said of the idea of bluegrass musicians moving to Owensboro. "One guy talked about moving his recording studio here. When we lost the IBMA (to Nashville in 2003), we were almost back to zero."
The question, he said, is "Do we just do what we do and then they want to be here? Or do we try to encourage them to move here first?"
The artists who move to Paducah aren't, in most cases, nationally known, Woodward said. And musicians who move to Owensboro needn't be either.
"There are musicians who know they aren't going to be Del McCoury or Ricky Skaggs and maybe don't want to be," he said. "We have a low cost of living. And I think the river is a big thing. People are intrigued by watching barges on the river."
Woodward said: "I think (an incentive package) could be put together -- some type of assistance. Paducah didn't really spend all that much. They ran ads in major cities. If we could get a few musicians to move here, they may attract more."
"The best kind of culture is created from the bottom up, not the top down," Jacobi said. "The cost of living is really good in Owensboro. One musician tells the next. If we can see it, others can."
ROMP, she said, "does a good job of bringing a lot of musicians in, but the community needs to really push to invite them to move to Owensboro. While they are in town for ROMP, you could have a seminar about Owensboro or get in their faces and invite them to move."
"When you attract artists, you get cool shops and restaurants," Gray said. "It makes a very strong community. And we already have a good start."
She said: "What I think Owensboro needs to do now is work on the approaches to the community, hang banners from street lamps, turn downtown into a celebration. The more everybody gets behind the celebration, the bigger the celebration and the more people we have coming to town."
"The IBM museum celebrates the past and the legacy," Jacobi wrote. "What is missing are live-energetic-artistic souls who are looking to create a present-to-future culture that would bring a dynamic electricity to this blank canvas of a town. And the historic and renovated empty buildings are stunning."
She added: "So if someone doesn't move fast on this, I'm going to call a big-circulation glossy national magazine and have it list Owensboro as one of the 'Best Top 10 Towns for Musicians' and then it will be 'discovered.' "
Reprint from Messenger-Inquirer, Owensboro, Ky.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
For more information about the content services offered by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services (MCT), visit , e-mail services©mctinfoservices.com, or call 866-280-5210 (outside the United States, call +1 312-222-4544).
This news item is from Pennsylvania Bluegrass
( http://pabluegrass.com/home/news.php?extend.147 )