The acclaimed folk/roots/soul artist ushered in a new era for the historic building with an ebullient attitude and passionate singing. Get the lowdown on Monday’s concert hall debut in words and photos.
Ever Joyful: Valerie June on stage at The Big Room on Monday. (Photo/Chelsea Whitaker)
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Appropriately, Valerie June’s latest album opens with the uplifting track, “Joy, Joy!” — a song that also reflected her buoyant, jubilant performance Monday night in christening Grand Rapids’ newest concert venue, The Big Room, just north of downtown on Ottawa Avenue NW.
“You’ll find that joy, joy in your soul,” she sang midway through her solo Memorial Day tour stop, and many fans amid the 1,200 attending the show discovered just that during her upbeat set amid the gleaming new room.
June announced early on that she’d never been the first artist to plays a new concert venue before, and she made the most of that opportunity.
Christening The Big Room: The crowd of 1,200 with the venue’s stained-glass backdrop. (Photo/Chelsea Whitaker)
Showcasing her unique vocal timbre, June unfurled traditional melodies, country blues tunes and songs such as “All I Really Wanna Do” from her latest album, “Owls, Omens, and Oracles,” and the fuzz-guitar-laden “Workin’ Woman Blues” (from 2013’s “Pushin’ Against a Stone”), which proved to be one of the evening’s highlights.
It’s hard to imagine a happier, more ebullient stage performer than the colorfully bedecked June, who regaled fans with stories from her youth and her career while routinely switching from acoustic guitar to banjo to electric guitar to ukulele throughout her 80-minute show, sparking a standing ovation after a two-song encore.
(The concert started about a half-hour late after flight delays caused June and her crew to arrive at the venue later than expected on Monday.)
Of course, many attendees at the free show (which required tickets obtained online) were just as interested in checking out the new digs located next door to Silva, both owned/founded by Mark Secchia, who introduced June and described the two-year odyssey of creating the Grand Rapids entertainment complex.
The New Stage: Valerie June filled it with an upbeat attitude and lots of instruments. (Photo/Chelsea Whitaker)
“This is absolutely amazing for us and it’s such a feeling of gratification at this point,” Secchia said. “And it’s also momentous for us because yesterday we were an active construction zone, and starting from today, we are a fully functional event center.”
Secchia also said The Big Room aims to add to the robust history of the historic, 100-years-plus-old building that once housed everything from indoor baseball to carnivals. “That’s an energy we want to keep moving forward,” he said.
There was plenty of that energy on display Monday night, with a fair share of favorable first impressions.
“Isn’t this amazing?” gushed former Grand Rapids Mayor Rosalynn Bliss, with several other attendees describing The Big Room as “awesome.”
Aside from raves about The Big Room and its amenities — two bars, smartly adorned restrooms, helpful staff and those ravishing, brightly lit stained glass windows at the back of the venue — musicians and concertgoers interviewed by Local Spins suggested that baffling, banners and/or acoustic treatments could improve the sound quality and eliminate the harshness/boominess of the concert hall, especially because of its high ceilings and hard surfaces.
For her part, the ever-bubbly June was tickled by the crowd and the brand-spanking-new setting, noting that life is short and special nights like these should be embraced.
“We don’t know how long we’ll get to stay,” she quipped, “so we may as well enjoy it.”
PHOTO GALLERY: Valerie June at The Big Room
Photos by Chelsea Whitaker
VIDEO: The Big Room’s Opening Night
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