SOUTHINGTON — Lake Compounce has unveiled a lineup of national and local music acts to kick off the debut of its floating performance stage for the summer season. CeeLo Green, Everclear, All 4 One, Jerrod Nieman, and Canaan Smith are all booked as headline acts this year for the summer concert series, alongside several tribute acts that will be playing over the weekends.
Country artist Jerrod Niemann kicks off the concert series on Sunday, May 28. Concerts will then be held every Saturday up through Labor Day weekend in September, with four consecutive shows being held between July 1 and July 4th to celebrate Independence Day.
Tickets for the concerts will be free with general admission to the park or season passes. Seating will be first come first serve, though patrons can bring towels to sit on the beach to see the stage in the Crocodile Cove waterpark — the music will be heard throughout the park.
In July an extravagant fireworks display will be held to cap off the end of each concert at 9 p.m. A full itinerary of all the concert dates, artists attending, and pricing is available on Lake Compounce’s website.
“We're really excited about it,” said Compounce marketing director Lindsey Winters. “A lot of people have some really great memories of when they came to concerts here in the late ’80s and early ’90s. So we're excited to bring back some bands that they may know from that time period and beyond and give them a little nostalgic feel while they're enjoying a day at the park. For the cover bands too, it's really just a nice way to add some atmospheric sounds to the park in a unique way when people are enjoying their visit.”
Park organizers sought to bring a diverse range of musicians to the park from a wide selection of genres, to attract visitors with many different musical interests.
While for now, the park seeks to use the stage primarily as a concert venue, they’re thinking of also potentially using it to enhance their seasonal offerings like Phantom Fest and Holiday Lights - though the plans aren’t concrete.
The stage will be installed shortly ahead of the summer season in early April, being delivered nearly entirely built.
It will float around 60 feet offshore from the lake beside the water park, and have a full suite of lights and sound systems that will enhance the concert experience.
“Our team's working really hard on getting the stage set up. Our maintenance and our operations team is working closely together on the whole setup of it and making sure we have everything down. Everything's going really well. The team is really positive and we're looking forward to it,” said director of operations Megan Major.
“We're always looking for new ways to expand our offerings, and this was just kind of a no-brainer for us because of our history and how people always associate Lake Compounce with concerts and bringing it back. This is just the first step in expanding those offerings.”
Despite concerns from some patrons about how the presence of the stage might impact being able to safely swim in the lake, the officials noted that the safety and maintenance team have been working diligently to ensure safety for all guests at the park.
Lake Compounce will open for its summer season on the weekends starting April 29th, with the adjacent waterpark Crocodile Cove opening May 27.
cmetzger@record-journal.com