Where’s the party? Everyone in Healdsburg knows the answer to that—it’s at the Plaza, every Tuesday at 6pm til 8. Long known by the direct, unglamorized name as Tuesdays in the Plaza, the summertime music series starts just after Memorial Day and runs to the end of August. This year those dates are May 26–Aug. 25.
Last week Matt Milde, the city’s recreation supervisor, created an impromptu “reveal” video for Facebook to list the 10 bands that will perform at this year’s Tuesdays in the Plaza series. Erica Guiterrez, from Corazón Healdsburg, helped with the translations and announcement.
The rundown of the list, in front of a burbling fountain and the Gazebo, covered the highly anticipated bands and performers coming to town, starting next Tuesday, May 26.
The music series isn’t quite as time-honored as a Fourth of July parade, or even the Twilight Parade this week. It’s only been a tradition for about 25 years, bringing weekly live music to the downtown square, but it has turned into a major social event. Friends and neighbors gather at impromptu picnic spots beneath a palm or pine to share food, beverages (usually wine) and conversation, or to dance with abandon in front of the Gazebo stage.
Sources remind us that prior to the introduction of the event, the Plaza was often a hangout for bike clubs, and not always a safe place in days gone by. The Hells Angles were a regular presence in the 1960s, and one particular location in town attracted them almost as much as the bars, the fountain in the Plaza. “They kind of took over that part of the Plaza. There would be biker chicks taking sponge baths in the fountain,” the Healdsburg Museum’s Holly Hoods told a reporter in 2018.
Continues the story, by Marie Butler, “A concerted effort by the city and chamber of commerce in the 1980s birthed a redevelopment agency, which helped jump-start the languishing downtown. Now, tasting rooms, shops and award-winning restaurants ring the Plaza.”
Now, too, the wine is more likely to be a curated vertical tasting than a jug, but the desired result is the same: a convivial gathering of the community to share an evening of live music together. Plaza Street is closed to traffic between Healdsburg Avenue and Center Street so the food trucks can set up in time to open at 5pm. Music starts at 6pm and goes to 8pm, though the wind-down period can last a song or two. In previous years alcohol consumption was rigidly cut off at 8pm, but several years ago the City Council decided to loosen the consumption rules.
Who’s Playing the Plaza?
This party starts next week, Tuesday, May 26, with the arrival of The Sun Kings—one of the most in-demand Beatles bands around. Their tag line is “As Nature Intended,” picked up from an unofficial release of the Get Back sessions—just four guys playing their hearts out for a small audience, crafting the magic that still casts a spell on listeners. The Sun Kings do not imitate the Beatles, cut their hair to match or don spectacles, but play their roles as musicians first. Even former Rolling Stone editor Ben Fong-Torres likes them.
Subsequent Tuesday performers include Rocio y su Sonora (June 9), a cumbia band led by the charismatic singer Rocio who has earned a loyal audience in Healdsburg with almost-yearly appearances. The next week (June 16) Lavay Smith & Her Red Hot Skillet Lickers bring an audience-engaging performance of jazz and swing as part of the Healdsburg Jazz Festival this year.
County music plants its flag on July 14 when Dustin Saylor and the Stowaways, the same band that teaches line dancing at Coyote Sonoma every month, take the stage. One can imagine the footwork at the Gazebo lawn that night: wear closed-toe shoes at the least. Not to be outdone, the Caribbean reggae band Sky Eyes, a well-traveled “music-in-the-park” group whose material runs from roots reggae to hip-hop, comes to town June 30.
A blues theme runs through the Tuesdays menu, too. It’s kicked off by the funk-and-soul show of the Ariel Marin Band on June 2 and continues with the roots-blues-rock Shawn Jones Band on June 23. Chicago blues is represented by none other than Ali Kumar, a traditional harpist with a Bollywood vibe, on July 7.
There are other acts, 14 in all—a tribute band called Playing the Dead on July 28, Top 40s pop from Cassie B on Aug. 11 and Banda Potrero on Aug. 18. The season ends on Aug. 25 with none other than Super Diamond, a tribute not only to Neil Diamond but to the Healdsburg Museum’s 50th anniversary celebration.
The complete schedule can be found on the city’s website at healdsburg.gov/335/Tuesdays-in-the-Plaza.
