LEE, Maine — A 32-year-old Massachusetts ticket broker is launching an outdoor concert venue on Mount Jefferson that he hopes will complement the Bangor Waterfront, he said Tuesday.
Bostonian Tickets owner Kevin Zimmerman has 10 music acts lined up to perform at the inaugural Matrix Music Festival at the newly renamed Mount Jefferson Resort on the weekend of July 29-31. The scheduled performers include New England jam, reggae and rock bands such as Zach Deputy, Roots of Creation, DJ Icculus & Friends, Paranoid Social Club, The Alchemystics, Adam Ezra Group, Lovewhip, Sean Chambers Band and Tackling Triumph.
Zimmerman said he wants his Matrix Pavilion, the summer music component of the resort, to resemble venues at Montage Mountain in Scranton, Pennsylvania, Hunter Mountain in Hunter, New York and Red Rocks Amphitheater in Morrison, Colorado — mountainous places known for multi-day music festivals, recreational activities like zipline riding, camping and excellent acoustics that draw several thousand to their events.
Mountains such as the 751-foot-tall Mount Jefferson, Zimmerman said, “absorb sound in a great, great way, much better than when you’re playing to an open field.”
“You feel the bass sound a long way up the mountain. I have been to other festivals on mountains and you can really enjoy the sound. All the trees will help muffle the sound [from disturbing neighbors] and keep it full,” Zimmerman said. “It’s almost like a natural amphitheater.”
Selectman Aaron Knowles said town leaders are hopeful that Zimmerman’s plans will help draw many new businesses to Lee, which had a population of 922 according to the 2010 census and is located east of Lincoln near Interstate 95’s exit 227.
Zimmerman met with the Board of Selectmen on Monday and expressed an interest in being a good neighbor — working to keep the neighborhood undisturbed by activities at his venue.
“He expressed to us that he wanted to start slowly and work cautiously and he seemed to have the right attitude about working with townspeople,” Knowles said.
The slow and cautious approach, Zimmerman said, is important to making sure that he doesn’t overload the resort, which right now has permits for as many as 1,500 people.
Zimmerman, of Tewksbury, bought the 51-year-old Mount Jefferson Ski Area from the Delano family. He completed the purchase of the 160-acre parcel for an undisclosed price on Jan. 15. Zimmerman also purchased a 6-acre plot adjacent to the south side of his property Jan. 21.
Night skiing, camping, snow tubing and, eventually, outdoor concerts are among the activities Zimmerman said he wants to add to the ski area. He said he expects to spend close to $100,000 this year turning the ski area into a music venue. His workers felled trees on about five acres this week and are starting a host of interior renovations to the facility.
He might get 10 more acts for Matrix Music Festival, which campers are welcome to attend, and hopes to draw as many as 1,500 people to the shows. Tickets are available at matrixmusicfestival.com and will go on sale at the Route 6 business in April, he said.
The portable stage, Zimmerman said, will likely be built in what is now the parking lot, which he hopes to have paved. It will face toward the mountain, with plenty of open area for people to set out tents or chairs.
“We’re going to start to do hopefully five to 10 concerts this year and have hopefully bluegrass music, country, rock. Maybe some electronic,” Zimmerman said. “Just music of all different types for all different types of people.”
Eventually, his business could grow to host concerts that draw 10,000 to 30,000 people, he said, which would rival Darling’s Waterfront Pavilion in Bangor, an open-air amphitheater that seats 16,000. But at 1,500, his venue is a smaller, more intimate alternative to Darling’s that could draw some of the same acts, he said.
“I have been to festivals on other mountains that are almost the same size as this,” Zimmerman said. “It’s the same layout, it’s the same thing. As a ticket broker for the last 10 years, I have seen the live entertainment business grow and how festivals are going to be becoming big. It’s like taking my career, my business, to the next level.”