Penticton

Dream Cafe celebrates 20 years and continuing to make it through the pandemic

20 years of the Dream Cafe

Chelsea Powrie - Oct 12, 2021 / 4:00 am | Story: 348268

Photo: Contributed

Penticton's Dream Café is celebrating a major milestone this month with many special hybrid shows to welcome their 20th year in business safely.

The 2021/22 season will be a new initiative to bring back fans and supporters of the venues, and welcome new ones.

"Reopening The Dream Café wasn’t an option, it was a requirement," says Lori Keith, Dream Café's coop chair.

"The music industry relies on this venue as an anchor of Western Canadian artist routing and is widely seen as a safe place to launch a concert tour or profile an emerging artist.”

They hosted 225 shows in 2019, pre-COVID. The pandemic hit them hard, but they said they had the support of government.

“Both the Provincial and Federal governments really stepped up for us," Keith said.

"The Dream survived the last year and a half with support from Creative BC through the Amplify BC grant, and we are able to reopen at half capacity, only with the assistance of the Government of Canada through the FACTOR grant. We can honestly say that we wouldn’t be here without their support.”

This season's show schedule include 20 performances. Acts are as varied as JUNO award nominated folk legend Harry Manx, the world renowned jazz pianist (and JUNO winner) Laila Biali, and the critically acclaimed blues guitarist David Gogo.

“Our new hybrid show model features a limited seating live performance and a week of streaming access," said Hazel Bennett, artistic director.

"This makes our shows affordable and accessible to a much wider range of fans.”

Upcoming shows include: