For this episode I interview Brodie Schwendiman, owner operator of The Casbah in Hamilton, and member of the "Hamilton Music Advisory Team". Brodie's been hosting live music for over a decade. And while the music scene has shifted, and recent years have seen a drop in attendance amongst the younger generation, no one creating or supporting music was prepared for a global pandemic, and an immediate end to all live in-person shows with no end date in sight. And yes, some musicians have been able to keep a presence online...but what happens to the spaces we've grown up playing in, that we love, trust, and are created and maintained by people with years of devotion and experience? If we lose these spaces during the pandemic, will we ever be able to rebuild anything like them?
Music venues were amongst the first spaces to have to close their doors, and will likely be among the last to be able to re-open. Going forward we'll have to assume that spaces will have a much lower capacity, and stricter guidelines around health and safety. The current business models of most venues depend on bodies in a room. The ripple affect of the loss of music venues is huge, touching many different industries beyond just the owners or the performers. If we want to return to being able to gather together to watch music, we need to completely re-think how we fund these spaces, and find new collective solutions.
To keep up with what Hamilton's doing to support these conversations: www.hamilton.ca/music
You can find out more about Brodie's venue the casbah, and the "Indie Rock Relief" benefit he has set up at https://casbahlounge.ca/
For conversations happening at the global scale, www.saveourstages.com
This interview was originally recorded on May 15th 2020
