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Community Corner

Rockin' on the River Celebrates 25 Years

Midnight Special, Evil Ways kick off season heavy on classic rock, and it's all free.

Rockin’ on the River has added a couple of wrinkles to this year’s 25th anniversary summer lineup: three big video screens give visitors far from the stage an up-close look, including one that’s 16 feet by 10 feet, said Event Chairman Bob Earley, and a bunch of prize giveaways. “Everybody gets a free ticket.”

This Friday’s prize is a $500 gas card from 16 Kids Deli at the Schmitt Family Marathon. Drawing is held at 10 p.m., and the prize winner must be present. Other prizes include a Movado watch, a Rivers Casino trip and autographed guitars from the living members of Pink Floyd and Led Zeppelin.

Friday’s event will feature what Rockin’ on the River bills as “two headliners,” first with Evil Ways (a Tribute to Santana) and then Midnight Special, veteran classic rockers who feature rock of the 1970s and ’80s. Expect a steady diet of Queen, Boston, Journey, Styx, Led Zeppelin and Foreigner, plus a “Collection of Epic One-Hit Wonders.” Will “My Sharona” be among those? It’s not on the Cincinnati-based Midnight Special website playlist, but Free’s “Alright Now” is.

“I think this is going to be our biggest year ever,” Earley said.

The bands are selected with a demographic of ages 30-65 in mind, and less likely to appeal to the under-21 set, Earley said. Most of the entertainment is classic rock, with lots of tribute bands (Zoso covers Led Zeppelin, and other bands pay tribute to Dave Matthews, Kiss, Van Halen, Queen and Jimmy Buffett); June 3 will go country with Broken Road (a Salute to Rascal Flats), Caliber and Cuyahoga Falls’ own The Blue Ticks. Big Brother and the Holding Company, most famous as Janis Joplin’s band, will bring some authentic ’60s sounds on June 24.

Earley said the three big screens and nine cameras set up by Aggressive Sound costs about $1,100 to produce. There’s room for more cameras and even karaoke with the audio/video equipment. Music videos will play during periods between live sets, and that was on display Wednesday night in a test run of the equipment. 

“It’s even better than I imagined,” Earley said.

Rockin’ on the River has added some new food choices, including sushi from the Golden Dragon. Rocco’s pizza and Guy’s BBQ are some other new attractions.

One other noticeable change at this year’s Rockin’ on the River will be the new 8 p.m. the city enacted recently to control what the city considered a problem of crowds of youths gathering near the Rockin’ on the River site, underneath the Portage Trail bridge and elsewhere nearby.

“I said last year at the end of the year, we will have that fixed by next year,” Mayor Don Robart said. “I’m not worried about it at all.”

Kids are still welcome at Rockin’ on the River, Earley said, just don’t go hanging out under the bridge. “Nothing good comes of that.” 

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