Published: July 01, 2009 02:35 pm      

White Lick Arts expands its concert schedule

DANVILLE — “We’ve never had a summer like this.”

That’s the promise Norm Gulley makes for this season’s White Lick Arts concert series at Ellis Park.

The Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra performs for the 24th consecutive year. But for the first time, the Hendricks Symphony Orchestra and the Marshall Tucker Band are also on the schedule.

This edition of the ISO features a performance titled “Musical Postcard from Europe.” Maestro Mario Venzago, the ISO’s musical director, will conduct. It’s his first outdoor performance since coming to Indianapolis.

“He thought it was about time to break out of his shell, I guess,” Gulley said. “He asked other people in the ISO where to go, and they said Danville.”

“Musical Postcard from Europe” is 8 p.m. July 16. Tickets are $12 in advance or $15 at the gate. Children ages 6 and younger will be admitted free. To order tickets, call 745-2223 or visit the website at www.whitelickarts.com.

On July 31 the Hendricks Symphony Orchestra performs “All American Pops,” including Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” and classics by the likes of Scott Joplin and Rodgers and Hammerstein. Gates open at 6 p.m. and the show begins at 8 p.m.

The Hendricks Symphonic Society, which also includes the Symphonic Choir, formed in 2007. Led by Maestro Benjamin Del Vecchio, both entities perform regularly throughout the year.

“I never realized we had that kind of talent out this way,” said Gulley, a classical music fan who organized White Lick Arts in the ’80s. “They are very good, and the people of Hendricks County I don’t think have latched on yet.”

The itinerary isn’t limited to classical music. The Marshall Tucker Band brings their country fried rock to the Ellis Park amphitheatre at 7 p.m. Aug. 22. Formed in 1972 in Spartanburg, S.C., the group is credited with helping establish the Southern rock genre. Hendricks County native and blues phenom Max Allen will open the show. Tickets are $15 in advance or $20 at the gate.

“We were so fortunate to get them,” Gulley said.

Credit Bill Bailey. The Avon-bred businessman, who served as the town’s first board president when it was incorporated in 1995, started helping Gulley with White Lick Arts three or four years ago. Gulley says Bailey hounded him about bringing the Marshall Tucker Band here for a couple years. Gulley finally told him to work on it.

“I never dreamed he’d get them,” he said. “But here they come.”

Tickets are on sale at businesses all over the county and even in Mooresville, Indianapolis, and Greenwood. Radio station WKLU 101.9 also is heavily promoting the show.

“People are calling from all over,” Gulley said. “Ticket sales are booming already.”

It’s a nice problem to have. It wasn’t always thus.

“There’s been nail-biting years,” Gulley said. “A couple years we lost big money. But we made up for it. We’re stronger now than ever, and able to bring in concerts like this.”

In fact, Gulley says Bailey already is working on bringing ZZ Top here next summer.

“He’s not kidding,” Gulley said. “We’re worried about handling this crowd.”



wade.coggeshall@flyergroup.com