A new event organized by a community initiative in Regina is looking to bring back the experience of a live concert festival to lend a helping hand to local businesses and offer some entertainment to folks at home.
FeSKival is set to take place on June 11-14, featuring a virtual concert from exclusively Saskatchewan artists including Jeffery Straker, JJ Voss, Heidi Munro, Jack Semple, Scott Patrick and Belle Plaine.
The festival is partnered with several local restaurants and hotels in Regina, and the FeSKival website has a number of choices to purchase a meal and or a stay in a hotel, to take part in the event.
Purchasing one of those packages provides access to watch the festival’s concert, available online, anytime during the weekend from the comfort of home or a booked hotel.
Chelsea Galloway, chief tourism and visitor growth officer from Tourism Regina, describes the event as a “hybrid” where festival-goers will still get to enjoy the food and hotel experience but in a pandemic-safe way.
“You still get to experience the local restaurants or a hotel, but you also get that live music experience through the virtual concert,” said Galloway. “We’re starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but this is a way to still be able to experience some of those elements safely.”
A collective of community groups came together to create the idea, as a way to inject some support into the local tourism industry and take one more step towards a return to the summer festivals that typically take place.
“It was important for us to support local, and support local artists who haven’t had the opportunity to perform live in over a year now,” said Galloway.
The event will also lend a hand to the Regina Food Bank, as a portion of every ticket will be donated to the non-profit. One meal purchased with a concert ticket will allow the food bank to fund 20 meals for those in need, and Galloway said the event has set a goal of funding 100,000 meals.
“It was also important for us to have a local charity to support, [and] we’re definitely still encouraging people to pick their option, pick a night to watch the concert and have a great meal, because the more people we can get involved, the more people we help,” said Galloway.
Every part of FeSKival is Saskatchewan focused, said Galloway, from the participating businesses and talent to the tech being used to facilitate the event.
Regina-based tech startups Fundraisn and GIG’N have created the event’s website portal and streaming platform, respectively.
Ticket packages for FeSKival are available for purchase online through Tourism Regina’s website portal until June 9 at 5 p.m.
