By cover of snowstorm Tuesday, Mayor Richard Daley’s administration officially flipped-flopped on his notion to privatize and revitalize the city’s lakefront festivals, including Taste of Chicago.
      
       In rejecting a bid by a joint venture calling itself Celebrate Chicago at a time when most of the city’s media was covering the snowstorm of the century, Daley put the city’s 2011 summer festival schedule back where it ended last year: deeply in debt and in dire need of rejuvenation. What’s more, most major summer festivals have already booked their headlining talent, meaning Chicago will have even slimmer pickings this year when it comes to booking bands for its marquee outdoor events, including Taste of Chicago, Blues Fest and Jazz Fest.
      
       Last year, Daley said the city was facing a financial crisis and endorsed the possibility of charging admission for city festivals by hiring private operators.  “You have to,” he said at the time, as quoted by the Chicago Sun-Times. “The cost factor was enormous for Taste of Chicago. No one made any money. … If it costs you more and more money every year for city services, how are you affording this?”
 

    In a lawsuit that puts a key component of the controversial Live Nation-Ticketmaster merger on trial, Jam Productions is aiming to cut ties with the nation’s top ticket agency in Chicago.

        The suit filed Monday in Cook County Circuit Court contends that Ticketmaster breached a contract to sell tickets at Park West, the Vic Theatre and the Riviera Theatre when the ticket agency merged this year with Jam’s competitor, Live Nation. 

    If Jam wins the suit and eTix, a North Carolina-based agency, is allowed to continue selling tickets at Jam-owned venues in lieu of Ticketmaster, consumers could benefit financially. On shows that sell for $40 or less, the differences between eTix and Ticketmaster service charges are relatively small. But eTix caps service fees at $8, whereas numerous Ticketmaster shows currently on the Chicago market have double-digit fees attached.

Audience members watch a music performance at Lincoln Hall, a smaller venue that's been successful in its first year open. (Tribune photo by Andrew A. Nelles)

The arena and amphitheater-level concert industry – a cornerstone of rock touring since the ‘60s – is slumping in what is normally its most profitable time of year.

   Jerry Mickelson, the cofounder of Chicago-based concert promoter Jam Productions, took a day to absorb the impact of the $4.4 billion Live Nation-Ticketmaster merger, greenlighted Monday by the Department of Justice, and then spoke his mind.

    A deal to allow a merger between the two most powerful companies in the concert business, Live Nation and Ticketmaster, was reached Monday.

    Both companies agreed to conditions set by the Department of Justice pending court approval.  Canadian regulators and 17 attorneys general also signed on to the deal.