1000 x 90

Get Tickets Now to Rock On Friday with Pat Benatar, Neil Giraldo, Melissa Etheridge

Appalachian State University’s renowned summer arts attraction, An Appalachian Summer Festival, brings the best in music, dance, theatre, visual arts and film to the mountains of North Carolina. This year’s Schaefer Popular Series includes, Pat Benatar, Neil Giraldo and Melissa Etheridge on July 15 at 8 p.m. at the Holmes Convocation Center on the campus of Appalachian State University in Boone, North Carolina. This performance, as well as all Schaefer Popular Series events, is sponsored by Westglow Resort & Spa and Rowland’s Restaurant, and made possible through the generosity of Bonnie and Jamie Schaefer.

Pat Benatar has been called a trailblazer and a rule-breaker. After an unprecedented, four consecutive Grammy wins and more than three decades in rock ‘n’ roll, she is also a bonafide living legend. Benatar ruled the early days of MTV with 19 Top 40 singles, including the Top 10 hits, “Hit Me with Your Best Shot,” “Love Is a Battlefield,” “We Belong,” and “Invincible.” Her timeless songs, including the powerful, “Hell is for Children,” which deals with the anguish of child abuse, have garnered numerous honors including Grammy Awards, American Music Awards, and NAACP Image Awards.pat-melissa-400

Neil “Spyder” James Giraldo has been a professional musician and songwriter for over four decades. Together with his collaborator, muse and wife, Pat Benatar, he changed the face of the pop charts throughout the 1980s. More than just a steel-bending guitar player, Giraldo’s innovative vision helped create the signature Benatar sound. His catalog includes more than 100 songs written for Benatar, as well as hits he helped create for Rick Springfield (Number One, Grammy-winning classic “Jessie’s Girl” and Top Ten hit “I’ve Done Everything For You” included), Kenny Loggins (Top Twenty hit “Don’t Fight It” – also Grammy-nominated) and countless others.

Known for her powerful lyrics, incomparable voice and blazing guitar, Melissa Etheridge has earned two Grammy Awards and 17 more Grammy nominations. She also scored an Academy Award for “I Need to Wake Up” from the Al Gore documentary An Inconvenient Truth, and a star on the Hollywood Boulevard Walk of Fame. For her most recent album, This is Me, Melissa Etheridge teamed with some of the most creative, inventive figures on the music scene. The result is a collection of songs right from her heart.

For more information, visit

http://appsummer.org/schedule/id/pat-benatar-neil-giraldo-melissa-etheridge

Tickets:

Tickets are $50 for adults and $40 for students and children. To purchase tickets, call or visit the Schaefer Center box office at 800-841-2787 or 828-262-4046. Tickets can also be purchased online at appsummer.org.

About An Appalachian Summer Festival

Presented by Appalachian State University’s Office of Arts & Cultural Programs, this annual celebration of the performing and visual arts is held every July in venues across the university campus, and features an eclectic, diverse mix of music, dance, theatre, visual arts and film programming. An Appalachian Summer Festival began in 1984 as a chamber music series, and retains strong roots in classical music, combined with a variety of other programming geared to almost every artistic taste and preference. Celebrating its 32nd season in 2016, the festival has risen in stature to become one of the nation’s most highly respected summer festivals, acclaimed for the breadth and quality of its artistic programming. With an audience of 27,000, the festival has been named one of the “Top Twenty Events in the Southeast” by the Southeast Tourism Society.

Festival Corporate Sponsors:

Westglow Resort and Spa, Blue Ridge Electric Membership Corporation, Northern Trust, McDonald’s of Boone, Mast General Store, Goodnight Brothers, Boone Area Visitors Bureau, Sky Best Communications, Scholars Bookshop at the University Bookstore, Panoramic Hospitality, Holiday Inn Express-Boone, Courtyard by Marriott, Country Inn & Suites, Peabody’s Wine & Beer Merchants, Chetola Resort, Creekside Electronics and Boone Ford-Lincoln.

Festival media sponsors include:

WBTV, WCYB, Charter Media, Our State Magazine, Winston-Salem Journal, Greensboro News & Record, WNC Magazine, High Country Radio, WHKY AM 1290, WDAV 89.9FM, WFDD 88.5FM, WASU 90.5FM and High Country 365.