KINGSTON MUSIC BARGING IN?
Floating concert venue could come to city’s Hudson River waterfront
A concert hall could pop up, literally, along the Hudson River shore in Kingston.
Mayor Steve Noble said Thursday that he will have an “informational meeting” Aug. 4 with the owner of the Point Counterpoint II, a barge-like watercraft that’s 195 feet long and opens like a clam shell to reveal a concert stage.
The vessel is for sale for $2 million, and while Kingston does not have the money to buy it, “there may be an opportunity to help facilitate a public/private partnership with other parties who express interest in such a unique idea,” Noble said.
Noble did not identify any potential investor, but the website worldarchitecture.org reported the Point Counterpoint II could wind up on the Hudson River at the Hutton Brickyards property in Kingston. The Hutton property is owned by California-based MWest Holdings and recently hosted two concerts by folk/rock music legend Bob Dylan.
MWest representatives did not respond to a reporter’s request for comment Thursday.
Noble said he “was contacted by interested citizens last week regarding this potential opportunity and offered to look further into it. Since then, an informational meeting has been scheduled, and I plan to attend.”
“Some of the residents have invited the owner to Kingston [for the Aug. 4 meeting] ... and I plan to be a part of that at this point,” the mayor said.
The vessel’s current owner, Robert Bordeau, told the Chicago Tribune that Kingston “is a perfect place” for the Point Counterpoint II because the community is “going through a very creative time.”
Bordeau, 90, is the founder of the American Wind Symphony Orchestra.
The Tribune said Kingston emerged as a likely location to save the 41-year-old vessel from the scrapyard after cellist YoYo Ma campaigned to preserve
it. Ma’s plea drew the attention of Peter Wetzler, a Kingston-based composer, the newspaper said.
The Point Counterpoint II currently is docked on the Illinois River in Ottawa, Ill., about 80 miles southwest of Chicago.
The Tribune described the Point Counterpoint II as “resembling a spaceship as much as a barge” and said the vessel includes sleeping quarters and an art gallery, in addition to the popup stage.
“It opens like a clam shell to present classical music concerts for listeners on shore,” the paper said.
The Point Counterpoint II was designed by Philadelphia architect Louis Kahn and was unveiled in 1976, two years after Kahn died.