2023 Downtown Concert Series Lineup Announced

By Jeremy Coumbes on March 14, 2023 at 1:09pm

Music returns to the city center this year as Jacksonville Main Street has announced the lineup for the 2023 Downtown Summer Concert Series.

The beloved annual event on the downtown plaza kicks off on Friday, June 3rd, and runs for eight weeks of free concerts in a wide array of musical styles.

Jacksonville Main Street Executive Director Judy Tighe says this year again presents a great lineup of entertainment, with the opening night seeing the return of an artist she says many people missed getting to see the first time around.

We’ve got a great lineup. Steepwater Band is coming back they were very popular a few years ago but we had a rain date for them so not as many people got a chance to hear their talent. So they are coming back to kick things off, and we’ve got a full lineup all the way through July 28th.”

since 2018, the downtown concert series has been a self-funded venture of sorts after Levit Amp funding was no longer available.

Tighe says the success of continuing the series over the years has come down to the community as whole pitching in to keep the music flowing through downtown each Friday, and that is more important than ever as the cost of everything continues to rise.

And not just Jacksonville, there are some regional sponsors from smaller towns around us, and we are very grateful to all of you for making this possible. We did have a fun fest last year to try to earn some more money because we could see that our costs were going up.

Bands have all raised their rates, and the travel fees are more. It’s inflation, it’s hitting everywhere, and our community has really stepped up. We just love putting this on and seeing everybody come downtown. It’s kind of like a great big-town reunion. It’s a great place to meet up with friends and met new friends.”

Tighe says she thinks a big part of the success of the concert series is the amount of diversity when it comes to genres of music hitting the stage each week. “We’ve maintained that for the entire time, we’ve been doing these concert series. We’ve got everything from rock to blues, Motown, R&B, country, and bluegrass. We try to run the gambit every year.”

The concert series kicks off with the aforementioned Steepwater Band on June 2nd and wraps up on July 28th with the acclaimed tribute band Almost Elton, performing Elton John’s greatest hits.

The series takes the week off during the Morgan County Fair, but otherwise, the free concerts are a weekly happening downtown for eight weeks.

For more information on the downtown concert series, including a full list of performers, visit jacksonvillemainstreet.com, or find Jacksonville Main Street on Facebook