Music Midtown was cancelled yesterday. Once a year on a September weekend in Atlanta, festival-goers rush to Piedmont Park. Tens of thousands of people await a dream-team lineup that’s just as amped to play in front of them. I was looking forward to seeing Future, My Chemical Romance and Jack White perform live. I was also excited to finally get back to a music festival.
Music Midtown never gave the official reason as to why they cancelled. However, The Atlanta Journal-Constitutional reported that the decision to cancel was based upon expanded authorized areas where open-carry firearms were aloud. This law was passed back in 2014. While Piedmont Park has always prohibited weapons from the festival grounds, it was the organizers of Music Midtown that said they were worried they’d be sued by gun owners and that the artists would cancel, AJC said. The newspaper also said that back in 2019 a decision in the Georgia Senate made it even harder for private groups to ban guns from public events.
Hopefully this doesn’t start a trend. Music Midtown’s tweet is below and you can get more in-depth details here and here.
Hey Midtown fans - due to circumstances beyond our control, Music Midtown will no longer be taking place this year. We were looking forward to reuniting in September and hope we can all get back to enjoying the festival together again soon. pic.twitter.com/cI5M37UNW8
— Music Midtown (@MusicMidtown) August 1, 2022
This was the lineup.
Your 2022 Music Midtown ✨ LINEUP ✨
— Music Midtown (@MusicMidtown) May 17, 2022
Take it in and get ready to buy Tickets on Friday at 10am!
🌈 🌳 🙌 🦉https://t.co/pyEqBBaPlN pic.twitter.com/GtQRCQyNrx
SOURCES: HuffPost | Atlanta Journal-Constitution