“If the churches can gather without any restrictions and the Temple is following the CDC recommendations for socially distancing and the masks, then why not?” she said in the lobby prior to the performance. “People can exercise personal responsibility and be out in public.”
“This is the first step forward,” Lance Beatty, president of the Beatty Capital Group that owns TempleLive, toldTraffic was light. Pairs of bartenders at two stations — one to handle the transaction and one to fill the order — stood idle after the show began. During the intermission between opener Lauren Brown and McCready, one bartender, in gloves, leaned her forearms against the bar while she scrolled on her phone.
“This impacts the artists, the venue owners, ticket sales, all the way down the line,” Beatty said. “I don’t care if you’re Kenny Chesney. If I’m a concert promoter, I can’t pay the same price [for reduced capacity]. “It’s like we’re a family,” said Donna Mason, who made the 90-minute trek from Bentonville, Arkansas. “When you go to a Bishop Gunn concert, all the people know each other.”
It was quiet between songs as McCready tuned his guitar. A toddler cried out. A man introduced to the audience as “Mr. Johnny” glided around the stage on a hoverboard wearing shorts, a blazer, and a fedora, puffing from a vape pen.