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In the video made for the 50th anniversary of the Marblehead Festival of Arts, co-founder Fred Goddard said there is a pool of talent in Marblehead “that is kind of scary, brains galore.”
He might have been talking about the artists or his fellow festival founders — either way, that description still holds true, particularly when it comes to Brian Wheeler, performing arts chairman and producer of the Concerts at Crocker Park.
From teenage helper to producer
It was 1975, and a teenage Wheeler was sitting on a bench watching a bunch of guys scurry around Crocker Park building a stage.
“I thought, ‘oh, wow, that's pretty cool, what's that all about?’” he said.
At the time, he had no idea what the festival even was, but he liked the guys so he joined them as “a teenage pair of hands at 16,” he said. Fast-forward 51 years: Wheeler just turned 68, and he’s still got his hands, and everything else, in the mix.
Wheeler said by 1998 or ’99, he was producing the event and aside from one early year, hadn’t missed a show. But he doesn’t just produce; he also emcees, which means he essentially lives at Crocker Park for the four-day festival run or, as he puts it, “from load in to load out.” Since his partner Robb Macomber retired, he also hires the bands as well as the audio and lighting people.
“It's his vision,” he said. “What you see at Crocker now is really his vision, I'm just executing his vision on the technical side.”
The hallmark of the Crocker Park Concert Series is probably Wheeler’s consistency.
“My end hasn’t changed a lot over the years,” he said. “I’m relentlessly consistent.”
Concertgoers might hear different genres of music as trends have changed, and Wheeler said he works to bring in diversity, but the basic operation has remained the same over the last 60 years — it’s all about the music.
A musician by trade, Wheeler said he’s able to do a lot with his limited budget.
“I can still find the gems,” he said. “The area is filled with remarkable musicians.”
Finding the gems
Wheeler said he’s always on the lookout for something special and while they might have daytime bands that play cover tunes, the nighttime bands are generally more unique.
“And this year we’ve just got a great lineup of some really, really cool stuff,” he said.
Wheeler joked that every year he is as excited as he is this year, but he truly believes this year to be special. They are opening with “FARHOF Night,” which is Folk, Americana, Roots Hall of Fame, he said. Housed at the Boch Center Wang Theatre, FARHOF aims to honor history and build a foundation for the next generation of folk, Americana and roots musicians. Mark Erelli sits on the Boch Center board and is also “a brilliant songwriter, wonderful singer, really, really talented,” and will open the concert series with his string quartet, Wheeler said.
And opening for Erelli will be local favorites Mason Daring and Jeanie Stahl & Friends, whom Wheeler refers to as Marblehead’s unofficial hall-of-famers.
Wheeler said he likes to do theme nights. In the past, they’ve had a Berklee College of Music night, a Boston Music Award winners night and this year, they are having a country night, which he calls a home run. It kicks off with Elisa Smith & her Band, a Nashville award winner who just happens to live right in Marblehead, not far from Wheeler.
“We search the world for talent and find it two streets over,” he joked.
Thursday, Little Sugar Kings perform, “and they're just an incredible Afro-Cuban jazz band.” On July 4, the big night, local band Better Than Nothing will perform.
“This is their last waltz,” Wheeler said. “They’re going to bring local musicians up, myself included … and a few others will be joining them for this kind of historic last gasp if you will.”
In between, there will be Glass Harbor Band with classic and original rock, Haitian music and jazz with Neidgine Destine, Marblehead School of Music, Whalers — Sea Rock and many others.
For the full lineup, go to Marblehead Festival of Arts | Independence Day Weekend | Marblehead, Massachusetts.
A live classroom
While the core of the Crocker Park Concert Series hasn’t changed, one thing has: the event’s internship program, which has continued to grow.
“We are a live classroom, and for 25 years we’ve brought 10-15 kids into Crocker,” Wheeler said.
College and high school kids, many of whom have no idea what Crocker Park is or where Marblehead is, live with the series, like Wheeler, from load-in to load-out. Wheeler said during their four-day workshop, they learn live sound, stage management, band management, live lighting and neighborhood management.
“Oh, one of the other differences that I can tell you for sure is our respect for the neighborhood … that is at the forefront of anything we do,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler said his goal is always to have a weekend where everyone — participants, audiences and neighbors — can walk away having had a great time.
So he took on the challenge to make that happen and to mitigate any sound issues with residents living nearby.
“And I learned some interesting things,” he said.
Mostly what he learned was how to stop the window rattling and still have a great sound.
“Now the bass players, they may complain about it … I'm not as worried about what they think I have a higher calling I need to worry about, because I serve at the pleasure of the neighbors,” he said.
It’s a seven-minute video, but Wheeler said they play it before the headliner every night of the festival. Wheeler wrote the song that plays behind the photo montage that shows the history of the festival. He also urges everyone to watch it to the very end, where Goddard tells a story about the founders holding meeting after meeting trying to figure out how to bring the festival to life. Goddard said often, after a meeting, a group of them would head to a local establishment — maybe The Molly Waldo, now gone, or Maddie’s Sail Loft — where they’d talk up the festival before passing a can up and down the bar, urging patrons to toss in their bar change to support the festival.
“We raised our profile tremendously and sometimes would raise $35 or $40 a night after a meeting, which made us very happy,” Goddard said.
“He captures the whole thing … In those few words, he captures 50 years of the festival at the time,” Wheeler said.
“Everything’s so divisive, so divided,” he said. “But when you come to Crocker, you’re under the umbrella of music and there’s no aisle, just smiles.”
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