Popular concert series Bluegrass Underground has announced a move to a new location. After spending nine years in the Volcano Room at Cumberland Caverns in McMinnville, TN, the concerts will move to The Caverns underneath Grundy County, Tennessee’s Monteagle Mountain for the 2018 season.
The Caverns offers the series several advantages over the Volcano Room, including the ability to increase its live audience size and offer a more flexible concert schedule. While the Volcano Room’s capacity maxed out at about 600, The Caverns can seat close to 1,000 people. The production team can also install permanent sound and lighting equipment in the cave, eliminating the need to record an entire season of televised concerts for PBS in one weekend as they have done in the past. In addition, the concert series can now serve a wider variety of concessions to its audiences, including beer.
The Caverns is also somewhat more conveniently located than the Volcano Room, sitting just ten miles from I-24 between Chattanooga and Nashville. The show’s producers believe that the new, more accessible location will help attract a larger audience, especially since there are several major cities and airports within a two and a half hour drive. “Bluegrass Underground is now far more easily accessible to the vast majority of our regional patrons as well as our international and fly-in fans,” said Joe Lurgio, the series’ general manager and associate producer.
Bluegrass Underground will continue in its current location throughout the rest of 2017, but the producers plan to start hosting performances at The Caverns in early 2018. In addition to the bluegrass and Americana bands that the series has focused on in the past, the producers hope to add a wider variety of genres to the schedule, including symphonies and even comedy shows.
For more information on the show and its upcoming move, visit www.bluegrassunderground.com.
