The Pelham Concert Series will return in 2025 – and it will be bigger, says one of the people behind the event.
“I think it was probably exceeded my expectations,” said Jill Primeau, who through her own company – Jill Primeau Productions – put together the four-show series with Sonic Unyon’s Tim Potocic. “I had my Spidey sense that it would do well, and that people would enjoy it, but you never know.”
Both Primeau and Potocic possess the right pedigree – Primeau at one time was the artist liaison for Toronto’s Massey Hall and Potocic produces the annual Supercrawl in Hamilton each fall among other events – so they both knew they had a shot at making the series a success.
And a success it was. All four shows in the inaugural series – Terra Lightfoot, The Sadies, Spencer Burton, and Hawksley Workman – were sold out and Old Pelham Town Hall – with its 150-person capacity for events – proved to the perfect venue, Primeau said.
“The hall is great. It’s actually well set up in terms of acoustics and all that stuff,” she said.
While many locals took in the shows, the series acted as a bit of a catalyst to bring in people from out of town, including Hamilton, Cambridge, Mississauga, and Toronto.
And some of those who bought tickets were not necessarily fans of the artists at first.
“One of my neighbours I talked to about it, for instance, and before they knew that I was involved, they had already bought their Hawksley tickets.”
It turned out the neighbour and a friend had looked online for music by all the artists and settled on Workman, whose show was the finale of the series back in December.
“That’s how they chose to go and I’d be interested to see how many people – I know lots of people did know the artists – I think there were some that just wanted a fun night out.”
The performers themselves put in a lot of work to make the series a success, Primeau added.
“The artists, through the power of their social platforms, really help to push the push the show(s) out,” Primeau said. "I think the social advertising that we do kind of promotes to the community and everybody. It just kind of expands the reach.”
Pelham’s location was also a big help, Primeau said.
“It’s a great location in that way, because we are so close to St Catharines and Niagara Falls – and even Hamilton, if you want something special and a little bit different, it’s the place to go.”
While each artist in the series brought something to the table, Primeau really appreciated working with Burton, who coincidentally was the most local of all the artists as he lives in Pelham, not far from the venue on his family farm in Ridgeville.
“We really worked together to promote it, and he and I talked a lot just to get ideas for how to promote it,” Primeau said. “And it was really helpful.”
As for who may be in the lineup for 2025, Primeau said that the announcement will come in the spring.
