Notes from Saturday in the Park's Dave Bernstein

With the continual “evolution” of local news, and local print news, we feel lucky we are still here alive and able to provide a preview of the 2026 Saturday in the Park Festival! Thank you to Dave, Earl, Tracy, and everyone at the SCJ. We know things get tighter and tighter, yet you still crank out the news every day and have room to produce the BCJ on top of it.

This year’s fest will be awesome! We’ve wanted to have Joe Bonamassa play for many years, and this is the year. Joe is amazing and, among other things, has a cool connection to Tommy Bolin, who I believe played the bandshell once way before SITP. Earl interviewed Joe and wrote a great story about it in this publication.

This year marks the 250th anniversary of our country, and regardless of your political perspective, I think we all can agree we live in a country that welcomes free speech and freedom of expression, making presenting events like Saturday in the Park easy. I’m sure there are countries where we would have to be very concerned about content and the like, not to mention limitations on attendance size. Not in the USA. And better yet, everyone is free to attend… and for free. No limitations exist — not the color of your skin, your religious or political beliefs, nor anything else. Just show up and enjoy the show; you are welcome here, no matter who you are!

SITP isn’t easy. It takes a huge crew to put it on, and most are loyal volunteers. Without our committee first, and our sponsors, there would be no SITP. Period. One of our most loyal and long-term volunteers, second only to my own tenure on SITP, was Steve Kohl. Steve passed away at the end of last year. He worked on the fest for 30+ years in a multitude of roles. Steve was quirky and endearing, and we loved him, and we all greatly miss him. I’m convinced that few people were happier than Steve during dinner backstage or while having a burger in the volunteer tent. He did love to eat, and he preferred the Sioux City Symphony meetings, with their lavish meals, to ours. We will miss you, Steve. This one's for you, buddy.

This year I also lost a friend of our promoting endeavors, Mike Allard. Mike attended almost all of the shows we (with Adam) presented — all but one SITP, I believe — and many paid shows, like the bus road trips we promoted to see the Allman Brothers in Minnesota and in Lincoln, among many, many others. Mike was almost always with his right-hand man, George Norton. When he wasn't, and I ran into him or spoke with him, he would say, “Allard, party of one."” But then Mike got married, and it became "party of two." I had lunch with Mike and George a few months ago after I heard Mike was sick. His situation was pretty dire. We discussed shows, and because I knew we were close to booking Joe, I hinted around it, knowing he would love that. Sadly, I didn’t realize Mike had decided to stop treatment, and unfortunately, he passed away a week or so later. This one’s for Mike and George as well. There were no more loyal fans of the live music we have presented than those dudes!

So here we are: 2026, USA 250, SITP 36. It’s been a long run, but a good run. I turned 60 and will be inducted into the Iowa Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame this summer, along with Adam. Weird concept. Robert Plant will play the Orpheum in October, and Joe Bonamassa, the Marcus King Band, Evan Honer, Tech N9ne, and a ton of other great musicians will play the bandshell on July 4. There will be a drone show at the end of the night. Our city and community supports this free event with its time and resources, and amazing volunteers gather to put this on. All of this is pretty cool, and I feel pretty fortunate to be here with everyone, enjoying an amazing day in Grandview Park.

Time to wrap this ramble up and send it to AI to spell and grammar check (cue the SITP haters now…). Have a great time out there, be kind to one another and buy a random stranger a beer or a funnel cake or something… just to mess with them. It's going to be a fun year, and we thank you for supporting us! —db