Ohio Stadium is often thought of as the home of football, but this summer it will play host to another wholly American form of entertainment: the first-ever Buckeye Country Superfest.
There have been a wide variety of concerts held at the historic Ohio Stadium in the past, ranging from progressive rockers such as Pink Floyd to hallmarks of heavy metal such as Metallica, but until the Rolling Stones came to town May 30, the Shoe hadn’t been filled with music in over a decade.
On June 20 and 21, the outdoor arena will change its tune from The Ohio State University Fight Song and cheers for the home team to the rousing sound of some of country music’s biggest stars.
The line-up will be split up between the two nights with performers Blake Shelton, Rascal Flatts, Lee Brice, Tyler Farr and Cassadee Pope taking the stage June 20. Kenny Chesney, Keith Urban, Cole Swindell, David Nail and Parmalee will follow the next night.
Matt Thomas, singer of Parmalee, is looking forward to performing in Columbus.
“We’ve performed there a few times, at some smaller places, but Ohio Stadium is going to be huge,” Thomas says. “It’s going to be one of those big, crazy events.”
With Ohio Stadium’s new seating capacity of 104,944, “big” seems an apt descriptor. The work to transform the stadium from hallowed sports arena into deluxe music venue, then back again, will take five to six days. An enormous stage will be set up on one end of the field with the rest, roughly 65 percent, dedicated to additional seating. Other concert equipment such as delay towers, used to coordinate speaker output so that the sound is uniform throughout the stadium, and spotlight towers will be erected on the field as well.
As part of the event, a free Buckeye Country Superfest Fan Fest – featuring meet-and-greets with the artists, refreshments and its own set of live country music – will be held near the stadium at the St. John Arena and the French Field House.
This will be the first time Festival Productions Inc, the mind behind the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, has brought a Country Superfest to Columbus, but it’s an old hand at organizing enormous music festivals. Similar Country Superfests have been held in Baton Rouge and Jacksonville. The Bayou Country Superfest is celebrating its fifth annual hosting this year, while the Florida Country Superfest is in its second year.
Plans to bring the music festival to Ohio Stadium have been in the works since 2005, and it isn’t for a one-time appearance. There are hopes to turn the Buckeye Country Superfest into a new Columbus tradition.
“Expect it to be an annual event,” says Gary O’Brien, director of communications for Columbus Arena Sports & Entertainment, which also manages shows at Nationwide Arena and the Schottenstein Center. “Country shows at the Schottenstein Center do well, and there’s been a great reaction from country fans in the Midwest, so it just made sense to bring a Superfest to Columbus.”
After renovations to the stadium last year – including additional seating, a new entrance, new lighting systems and a new carpet of turf – were completed, OSU Athletics Director Gene Smith made pushes to highlight the stadium’s utility for the community. After the decade-long lull in concert activity, the Buckeye Country Superfest and the Rolling Stones concert are perfect for re-establishing Ohio Stadium as an iconic landmark not just for sport, but for all forms of entertainment, O’Brien says.
The Buckeye Country Superfest is a reserved-seating event, and both two-day and single-day tickets are available through ticketmaster.com, all Ticketmaster outlets and the Schottenstein Center box office.
Kyle Banfill is a contributing writer. Feedback welcome at gbishop@cityscenemediagroup.com.
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