Editor’s note: This is the second of a three-part series about COVID-19’s effect on Brown County’s arts scene.

The Brown County Music Center is not the only venue struggling among the uncertainty a global pandemic brings.

RELATED: County OKs “bridge loan” of up to $150,000 for Brown County Music Center

Three other entertainment venues also are dealing with silence and emptiness, all while paying to keep the lights on.

The Brown County Playhouse went dark, with the exception of its historic lamp posts out front, on March 17.

“This hit at us a time when we were kind of coming out of our down season, so we had events scheduled and we were gearing up and getting ready to launch back into our live show season,” Executive Director Hannah Estabrook said last week.

Every show after March 14 until the beginning of May has been rescheduled for later in the year. The only show that was canceled was the Singing Hoosiers show because it was an Indiana University-affiliated event. IU is now an online school for the rest of the school year.

“Everything else has been postponed instead of cancelled. We’re really grateful for that,” Estabrook said.

Estabrook and the Playhouse Board of Directors wrestled with the idea of closing the Playhouse down. It has nine paid employees.

“It’s really hard to make that decision, because if we don’t have events, we don’t have work for our employees, and it’s really hard,” she said. “Not only for the financial devastation of closing, but just the emotional of having no one around or in the building is sad.”

Estabrook is the only full-time employee. She and the Playhouse bookkeeper are the only employees working currently.

Estabrook said the board was split about closing, but the board and Estabrook decided it was better to have the shows go on when they could be successful and everyone felt safe to attend.

“I didn’t want anybody to feel as though they had to make the decision on themselves whether or not they would be safe coming to our venue,” she said.

Some of the Playhouse’s visitors, employees and volunteers are also in an at-risk category for the virus because they are older.

“I don’t feel as though it’s responsible for myself to ask for everybody to continue on with their lives as normal when life was not going on as normal,” Estabrook said.

One show, the Back in the Day concert, was initially rescheduled from March to May, but Estabrook said the Playhouse will wait to see how the state of the pandemic is before deciding on moving that show again.

“Luckily, they are local, so it’s easy to for us do so. As of right now, everything seems to be good, up and running back in May,” she said.

Estabrook said that when limitations on social gatherings are eased by the state government, she would try to run movies again.

“We can keep the patrons distanced in the audience, take our extra precautions to keep everybody safe. That will be the next step,” she said.

Usually, the Playhouse pays large deposits in March and April for shows in the summer and fall, but that is not the case this year with the pandemic happening.

“A lot of artists and booking agencies are reaching out to everyone and saying, ‘Don’t worry about the deposit. We understand everything is so crazy right now.’ Not having to pay large deposits to bands has helped a lot,” Estabrook said.

To help with finances during this uncertain time, the Playhouse has started a new marketing campaign: 2020 for 2020.

The campaign has two options for people to donate: $2,020 or $20.20.

Anyone who donates $2,020 will get a full year of unlimited shows and bring a friend with them. Donating $20.20 gets a forever show ticket, similar to a forever stamp from the post office.

“You buy it for $20.20 now, and in the future, you can use it on a show that might have a value of $35,” Estabrook said.

“That way, no one is locked into a specific date; they can use it whenever they feel safe and want to start to venture out into the world. … We are collecting this money by selling those packages and we can keep ourselves operating, because a 70-year-old facility is kind of hard to keep open.”

The Playhouse has received donations from past performers who want to help keep the theater around.

It’s also saving on costs during this time by having everything unplugged and turned off, and not having to pay rent.

“When we said we ‘went dark,’ we did it to save as much money as we possibly could until we’re able to get open again,” Estabrook said.

During this down time, though, improvements have been made to the Playhouse, including repainting the floors with extra slip-resistant paint and organizing the chairs in the theater by color, so in the future, the Playhouse can sell tickets for different areas. The Playhouse also plans to redo its concession area during this time.

“My audio engineer, he’s my major handyman, and he’s been so bored, so he goes over there all the time fixing up random stuff. I’m grateful,” Estabrook said.

Estabrook said she wants the community to not get discouraged during this time and encouraged folks to check out the Playhouse’s Facebook page for updates on improvements being made.

Bill Monroe’s Music Park

Bill Monroe Music Park and Campground has been operating in Bean Blossom since the 1930s. It’s been through World War II, the Vietnam War, and now it’s in the midst of another war with this global pandemic.

“We’re just hunkering down,” said Rex Voils, president and CEO of the music park and campground.

“We’re going to come back.”

On April 6, Gov. Eric Holcomb ordered all campgrounds closed except for those who are permanent campers.

That day, Bill Monroe’s shut down its campground until the ban is lifted. It currently has six permanent campers who pay around $3,000 a year to live there.

“The sooner we all stay at home and limit our actions to flatten the curve, the sooner we can all resume public interactions and spend time camping with our families,” Voils said.

The park’s museum and camp store are also closed.

Once the order has been revised or lifted, Voils said the campground will practice social distancing by only renting every other campsite to encourage campers to remain apart from each other.

“With over 55 acres, we have the ability to keep campers at a safe distance while allowing them some outdoor space,” he said.

The music park and campground’s office is also shut down with only person working who answers the phone. Any transactions are done through a window. The office employee and a maintenance man both work 30 hours a week currently.

All campsite and cabin reservations have been rolled over to new dates or rolled over to 2021 dates.

The park uses subcontractors for work, like supplying rugs and paper towels for their bathrooms or pumping their septic system, and those subcontractors are not working right now. Voils said they are also not hiring part-time help for the summer, like they usually would do by now.

The John Hartford Memorial Festival set to go in May was the first event the park had to postpone, Voils said. It will now be Sept. 30 through Oct. 3.

“I think it caught everybody by surprise. We were scared for our health and everybody’s health. We thought it would be the best decision since it was right at the end of May to postpone that,” he said.

The park is evaluating the Bill Monroe Bluegrass Festival currently scheduled for June. That festival has been running for 54 years.

“We’re just waiting on what the governor tells us to do,” Voils said.

The festival will be postponed if necessary as part of the contingency plan.

“The bluegrass family is a tight-knit family. There’s been people coming here for 50 years to this park. They’ve called and gave us their support. They said, ‘Hey, if we have to postpone or roll it over to next year, we’re there for you,’” Voils said.

“It makes you feel good, because this place is special with Bill Monroe purchasing this back in the 1950s. It has a lot of history to it. The festival has a lot of history to it. We’re going to keep that going if the good Lord is willing.”

John Hartford and the Bean Blossom Blues Fest were both sold out, with the bluegrass festival almost 75 percent sold out. “We were on track to have our biggest year yet, but this has hit,” Voils said.

“It doesn’t only hurt us as a festival grounds here, but it hurts the entertainers, too, because now their work has went down to cramming these festivals in if we can get them open in August, September and October. … It’s going to be rough.”

There is a concern that with many festivals possibly being rescheduled for later in the summer and early fall, there may be a limit on what is available as far as sound, lighting and other stage production. That is something the park has already run into with a sound guy being booked for another festival, forcing them to find another to replace him, Voils said.

This closure is already affecting the park’s budget, since spring break season is one of their busiest times.

“We had no camping during spring break, no cabins. We have over 17 cabins we rent out with our campers and we’ve had no rentals. We probably had 40 or 50 cancellations of cabins. There has been no income coming in,” Voils said.

He said the park is going to try and apply for the Paycheck Protection Program through the federal government.

“It’s really hurt us, but this place has been here since 1939. Something will happen where we’ll be able to come through and we’ll all stick together and bring it through,” Voils said.

Any future announcements on postponing future festivals will be made on the park’s Facebook page and on its website, BillMonroeMusicPark.com.

Mike’s Dance Barn

Mike’s Dance Barn costs owner Mike Robertson around $2,500 a month “just sitting there,” he said last week.

That’s for insurance and utilities only.

“This month is going to be tricky, because I pretty much spent all of my savings keeping it going last month,” Robertson said last week.

He had his last event at dance barn on March 7. The venue usually has live music on Saturday nights and line dance lessons on Mondays.

However, Robertson also has a roofing company, which had work coming in with the recent storm damage.

“We’re still allowed to go out and do roof jobs, especially if it’s a tree is on a house, which is what we’ve had,” he said.

Recently a Facebook fundraising campaign was started to help Robertson out during this time. It brought in around $650.

At the dance barn, Robertson employed a bartender, an employee who ran his food counter and a custodian, along with an accountant, who said she will not take pay until this “straightens up,” Robertson said.

“A lot of it I do myself, so I’m the employee that doesn’t get paid,” he said.

Robertson said he may have to look into government assistance after some parties and events have been canceled.

He encouraged people to watch Facebook for any other fundraising campaigns in the future.

“There’s nothing been going on. The building is just sitting there costing me. You have to keep utilities and insurance and all of that caught up,” he said.

“Everything pretty much came to a screeching halt.”

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