First Central Basin Community Concert is Sept. 20

MOSES LAKE — Tickets are on sale for the 2015-16 Central Basin Community Concert Association season, with the first concert scheduled for Sept. 20 at the Wallenstien Theater on the Big Bend Community College campus. This will be the concert association's 62nd season.

The association sponsors four concerts per season, and until this season has been a subscription series where participants bought one ticket for the entire season. But there's a change for 2015-16 — tickets also will be sold for individual concerts, said concert association board member Mary Anderson. Season ticket sales will continue also, and season tickets are available at the Moses Lake Chamber of Commerce office and from concert association members.

Season tickets are $60 for adults, $135 for a family pass, $85 for single parent families and $30 for college students. Tickets to individual shows are $33 for adults, $70 for families, $45 for single parent families and $17.50 for students.

The concerts for 2015-16 are jazz musician Ronnie Kole, Sept. 20; ventriloquist Kevin Johnson, Oct. 29; the group Hits & Grins, playing music from the classic country repertoire, March 2, 2016; and the vocal pop group Bandstand Boogie, April 23.

Kole is the featured performer Sept. 20, with the concert scheduled for 3 p.m. Kole is influenced by the music of New Orleans, one of the birthplaces of jazz and where musicians have been playing new riffs on the form for more than a century.

Concert association members work with a booking agency, Live on Stage, to select the artists, Johnson said. Since the agency also works with other local concert associations, Central Basin season tickets can be used to attend concerts in other communities, she said. It's called reciprocity, and Central Basin has reciprocity agreements with associations in Wenatchee, Tri-Cities and Sunnyside. The reciprocity agreements also extend to the west side, to concert associations in Everett, Centralia, Longview and Shelton. Reciprocity actually extends throughout the Pacific Northwest, she said.

The concert association was formed in the 1950s to bring live performance to the Columbia Basin, and some of the current board members have been involved from the beginning. Anderson said concert association members hope to get more people involved, especially younger people — and especially when it comes time to pick the concerts for next season. The group picks performers based on the amount of money they've raised prior to auditions for the following season, which occur in the fall.

The goal is to select acts that appeal to the widest audience, Anderson said, and getting the widest possible opinion on the possible selections helps with that. People who want to buy a ticket, or who want more information, can contact Anderson, 509-760-6908.