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With in-person shows, Wonderment festival takes a step toward 'normal'

IN CONCERT What: Wonderment 2021 Where: Various venues, including Beacon Hill Park When: Friday July 30 through Monday Aug.
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Squamish DJ Andrea Graham, who performs as the Librarian, is one of the featured performers at the Wonderment festival. BOBBY TAMEZ

IN CONCERT

What: Wonderment 2021
Where: Various venues, including Beacon Hill Park
When: Friday July 30 through Monday Aug. 2
Tickets: Free

Wonderment returns to normal this weekend with four days of in-person performances, a positive step forward for the electronic music festival on the heels of its online 2020 edition, which offered a limited number of live concerts for audiences of up to 50 people.

Therein lies the difficulty for artistic director David Bodrug, who finds himself in a difficult position at present. 鈥淲e want to make sure our events are attended, but not overly attended in a way that makes it awkward for some people. It鈥檚 weird, because we still have the pandemic and don鈥檛 want to have overwhelming numbers. We鈥檝e been balancing that.鈥

Bodrug has found a happy medium for the festival鈥檚 sixth edition, which is produced by the Garden City Electronic Music Society. Evening events at Wonderment were held indoors during previous years, to maximize the audio-visual impact. Audio-visual programming is being showcased on the Sunday evening at Beacon Hill Park, with an installation by Matthew Cardinal and Stephanie Kuse at Open Space Gallery that can be viewed throughout the weekend employing some of the same elements.

In addition to the stage at Beacon Hill Park, other venues in play through Monday include Fisherman鈥檚 Wharf Park in James Bay, West Bridge Plaza (on Esquimalt Road near the Delta Ocean Point Resort), and Banfield Park (on Craigflower Road, behind the Vic West Community Centre).

鈥淭he character of the festival, we鈥檝e always tried to have events that are spacious and have room for people to sit,鈥 Bodrug said. 鈥淧eople have always just naturally spread out. We鈥檙e not the type of festival where there鈥檚 a crush at the stage and tons of people everywhere.鈥

The festival is designed to put ambient music artists into natural environments. Cardinal (Edmonton) and Kuse (Saskatoon) are the only out-of-province artists coming in for the event. With a roster of primarily local and regional favourites on tap, including The Librarian, Adham Shaikh, Longwalkshortdock, and Righteous Rainbows of Togetherness, capacities for some of the events are equipped to handle larger crowds 鈥 a well-timed development.

People are ready for a return to live music, Bodrug said. 鈥淔ifty people is too few for the park environments that we use. This year, instead of a capacity of 50 it鈥檚 at 200, with room around our event area for more than that to spread out. I don鈥檛 see numbers in the thousands for us. The numbers will be manageable.

鈥淚t鈥檚 not a big party or anything 鈥 basically, it鈥檚 environmental music. It鈥檚 a relaxed atmosphere, and in the context of the music and the parks, it works.鈥

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