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Bend’s got one (Hayden Homes Amphitheater). There’s an amazing one in the Gorge (the Gorge Amphitheatre). Even Ridgefield, Wash., has one (RV Inn Style Resorts Amphitheater).
And finally, Portland now also boasts an outdoor music venue where you can sing along under the stars.
It’s Providence Park, mostly known as home of the Portland Timbers and Thorns but as of the summer of ‘24, Portland’s new home for stadium rock.
Timbers CEO Heather Davis says the completion of new seating capacity in 2019 sparked the move toward music. (The park can now hold 30,000 people for a concert, up from less than 20,000 when the park offered music two decades ago.)
Previously, Davis says, bands looking to play stadium gigs leapfrogged over Portland. The city boasts popular indoor venues such as the Crystal Ballroom and the Roseland and hosts big arena shows at Moda Center, but for outdoor shows, bands working their way up or down the West Coast have skipped Portland. With Providence Park’s expansion, those bands now have a summer home in Goose Hollow.
“We got to the capacity where we can hold middle-market stadium shows,” Davis says. “Before, there was no outdoor venue in Portland that could support stadium tours.”
With its beefed-up capacity, team officials began thinking about bringing concerts back after a more than 20-year hiatus, only to lose momentum during the pandemic.
Davis says affected parties, who can hog-tie new ideas with red tape, welcomed the idea of bringing back concerts to a stadium that’s pretty quiet except for game nights.
“The neighborhood and the city have been incredibly supportive as has the [adjacent] Multnomah Athletic Club,” Davis says. “Everyone has come to the table to help.” (It doesn’t hurt that the city is the Timbers’ landlord.)
The enthusiasm may reflect a long history of concerts at the park, stretching back at least as far as 1957, when Elvis Presley brought his show to Portland.
Dave Leiken, former longtime owner of the Roseland Theater, one of the city’s busiest music clubs, promoted outdoor concerts in the 1990s when Providence Park was called Civic Stadium. Leiken says Portlanders loved big outdoor events. Acts that included Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and Bonnie Raitt played there. Van Halen and Jimmy Buffett drew capacity crowds.
“We sold a lot of beer at those shows,” Leiken says. “We also did a Kenny G show as a fundraiser for the MAC club. It didn’t go great.”
This summer’s schedule will start light, with two acts more likely than Kenny G to draw big crowds: Foo Fighters on Aug. 16 and Green Day on Sept. 25.
So far, ticket sales are exceeding expectations.
“Everyone really recognizes how important it is to bring more activity to downtown,” Davis says. “And that it’s a venue that we want to use for the benefit of as many Portlanders as we can.”