IN CONCERT
What: The Victoria Listening Room Series, featuring Guy Davis and Roland Barrett
Where: James Bay Athletic Association Clubhouse, 205 Simcoe St.
When: Sunday, 6:30 p.m. (doors at 6)
Tickets: $30
Concerts run by music fans for musicians and the fans who support them would not appear to be a novel idea, until you take a closer look at how the music industry is run worldwide. With ongoing issues pertaining to the sale — and eventual resale — of concert tickets, not to mention the lacklustre concert quality of some A-list acts, fans have a right to be skeptical in 2018.
Victoria promoter Brett Leach is hoping to offer an alternative: The Victoria Listening Room, a rotating series of live music events, not unlike a house concert, that passes money directly from the fans to the artists.
The novelty of what he is proposing at the James Bay Athletic Association Clubhouse on Sunday comes down to room size. Where house concerts fit approximately 40 fans at their maximum — they are, after all, held in a house — the first entry in The Listening Room series, featuring Grammy-nominated bluesman Guy Davis, has the ability to accommodate 125 people.
The venue for future instalments will likely change depending on the act, Leach said.
He provides the artists with a small guarantee for each show, and will need to cover his costs. But the plan is to pass along all profits to the artists, which could result in a payday much higher than their usual fee.
“It’s about the ability to support these artist,” he said. “And to do that you have to stick your toe in the water and try and change things a little.”
When Leach and his wife lived in Ann Arbor, Michigan, they often attended shows at The Ark, a 400-seat non-profit club on which he has based his model. Years later, when the couple was living in Seattle, Leach said he came across something similar — a very successful house-concert series run for artists by promoter Bill Lippe, whose e-mail database for shows is nearing 2,000 addresses.
“I looked at my wife and said: ‘We should do it.’ ”
Leach, who is from Winnipeg, thought fondly of Victoria’s music scene when he attended the University of Victoria from 1995 to 2000. When work brought him back to Victoria in 2014, he noticed a certain style of concert — folk, blues and roots, primarily — was largely missing. He hopes that The Listening Room can add a new layer to the local music community.
“If it gets enough traction, and it makes enough money for the artists, we can take fliers on up and coming artists.”
