Pandemic cancels North Hall Arts Fest, Porter-Phelps music series
5/16/2020
by Steve Pfarrer, Daily Hampshire Gazette
Two weeks after the Green River Festival was canceled for 2020, two longstanding summer arts series have also fallen victim to the COVID-19 outbreak.
Organizers of the North Hall Arts Festival in Huntington, and of the summer concert series at the Porter-Phelps-Huntington Museum in Hadley, have canceled their 2020 seasons because of the pandemic.
The Huntington festival had planned on offering 11 events, ranging from jazz, country and baroque music to theater, at the town’s historic North Hall between May 23 and Sept. 20. But in a statement, organizers said given safety concerns and the uncertainty of the pandemic’s duration, “we believe that cancellation is the safest course of action.”
And at the Porter Phelps Museum, home since the 1980s to the summer music series Wednesday Folk Traditions, organizers say their research into pandemics of the 19th and 20th centuries has convinced them that “the impact of COVID-19 will be with us for a long time.”
Until an effective vaccine is developed, museum Director Susan Lisk said in statement, the Hadley museum will be closed not just for Wednesday Folk Traditions (seven concerts) but for a smaller summer music series, A Perfect Spot of Tea, as well as all other public programs and events.