O.A.R. To Perform In First-Ever Annual 'Glencoe Live' Concert

GLENCOE, IL — The platinum-certified rock band O.A.R. is set to headline the first-ever Glencoe Live concert over Labor Day weekend. Organizers from the nonprofit sponsoring the event hope it will become an annual tradition in downtown Glencoe.

All ticket revenue from the concert will be donated to the parent teacher organization in Glencoe School District 35, according to the Kadens Family Foundation. The event is expected to generate $100,000 in revenue for the Glencoe Schools PTO.

"This past year wasn’t easy on anyone, and this is a of way saying thank you to all of the students, teachers, parents and staff for adjusting every bit of their life to keep moving forward during such uncertain times," according to a statement from the foundation.

All attendees at the Sept. 4 event should fully vaccinated against COVID-19, test negative for the virus or wear a face covering during the concert, organizers announced.

Ticketed attendance in the Temple Court parking lot will be capped at 3,000, and the event is limited to those 21 and over. Organizers said the first 850 tickets sold out within 90 minutes.

Pete Kadens is the founder and namesake of the local nonprofit behind Glencoe Live. He said he hopes it will become an annual event to provide financial support to the local public school district.

"Everyone loves coming together for outdoor live music and good weather so I'm hopeful this is the type of thing that can be a big fundraiser for our schools here for years to come," Kadens told Patch.

Kadens said he has been planning a Glencoe music festival since 2019, but the emergence of the COVID-19 virus and associated restrictions in Illinois prevented it from going ahead last year.

"I always had this vision of doing a fun community event that brings people together. Because we can go to the Winnetka Music Festival right up the road or we can go to Ravinia right up the road, but we don't have anything in our town like it," Kadens said. "So we were working on it and I was always going to do it as a fundraiser for the schools — my kids are in the schools and I love the school system here."

Kadens said the capacity limit for the 3-acre village parking lot falls within the limits set under the "Bridge To Phase 5" stage of Gov. J.B. Pritzker's Restore Illinois coronavirus response plan.

That means even if the governor orders that the state backtrack to previous phase prior to Phase 5's full reopening, the event will be within its per-square-foot attendance limits.

"As long as we're fully compliant, we're happy," Kadens said. "The village wants to stay fully compliant, my family and the schools they all want to stay fully compliant, so that's what we're going to do."

Kadens formed his family foundation after stepping down in 2018 as chief executive officer of the multi-state marijuana company Green Thumb Industries, or GTI.

As of earlier this year, Chicago-based GTI had licenses for 96 retail cannabis locations and 13 marijuana manufacturing facilities in a dozen states.

Kadens, a serial entrepreneur, said he quit after realizing he was addicted to his work and career as a CEO. According to an online biography, he currently serves on five corporate boards and has donated millions of dollars to those in need.

The mission of the foundation he formed in 2018 is to close gaps in wealth and education in the United States. According to the most recent available IRS data, it received over $1.3 million in income in 2019 and had more than $64,000 in assets at the time.

"We ignite pathways out of poverty for underserved communities through quality access to education," he said. "That's what we do."

Opening for headliners O.A.R. — the Rockville, Maryland, natives who hit No. 2 on the Billboard charts with "Shattered (Turn The Car Around)" in 2008 — will be The Samples, a Boulder, Colorado, band that melds rock, reggae and folk.

Kadens said he O.A.R. had been one of a few bands he had his eye on booking since 2019, as the demographic expected to attend — those between about 30 and 70 — are among the band's primary audience.

"I was trying to find someone who the core group of folks who are going to be there are familiar with. Obviously, I think we hit a sweet spot because we sold out the presale tickets inside of 90 minutes. I think we picked the right band," he said. "My goal was to start a tradition of bringing the community together and getting the community to support an event that would then end up endowing our public schools here."

Tickets for the general public go on sale Saturday for $40 each.

"In the future though," Kadens added, "I'm not going to finance 100 percent of it."