History Ottawa<\/a> will be \u201ca world-class venue\u201d when it opens later this summer.\u00a0<\/p>\n\u201cIn my opinion, it\u2019s going to be one of the top five venues across the country, and it\u2019ll be right here in Ottawa,\u201d Shafaee said, speaking on a panel on arts and culture in the downtown core.<\/p>\n
With construction ongoing at the Rideau Street site, Shafaee said the venue has already garnered interest from artists.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re super-excited to be able to bring it to life later this summer, which is even more exciting that we now have a target date. We\u2019ve got a full calendar lined up in September right through the fall, with special events and concerts.\u201d<\/p>\n
OBJ reached out Friday to ask about a specific opening date, but did not hear back.<\/p>\n
History Ottawa will open in the city at a time when interest in live music is growing, Shafaee said, and mid-sized venues like History will fill a gap in the local market.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe tend to see an artist in London or Windsor. They\u2019ll go to Toronto, Buffalo and Syracuse and then they\u2019ll hop back on the 401 and go to Montreal. They\u2019ll always just drive through Ottawa and skip it,\u201d he explained. \u201cThey want to play markets that they\u2019re able to build themselves in \u2026 and when you lose that in Ottawa by not having this room, the artist doesn\u2019t resonate with the city.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe thought that the only way to be able to do that is to build a mid-size venue in Ottawa. We\u2019re the only market in Canada that doesn\u2019t have this kind of space,\u201d Shafaee said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When a property became available at “arguably the most important corner\u201d in the city at Rideau Street and Sussex Drive, \u201cwe had to jump on it,\u201d Shafaee said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Once complete, the venue will not only bring sought-after artists to the ByWard Market, but solid production as well.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we’ve found is it’s created an experience, because it’s evolved from just being about a singer. It’s gone into production. It\u2019s all about visuals, lighting, pyrotechnics and things like that. Being able to bring History, where we\u2019ll bring not only world-class talent, but world-class production to the space. This will also elevate the vibrancy of Ottawa and what it\u2019s bringing to the downtown core.\u201d<\/p>\n
Shafaee was cautious about using the word \u201crevitalization\u201d when referring to the Live Nation project on Rideau.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve thrown around the term \u2018revitalization.\u2019 We look at our location in Ottawa almost as a reimagination of the ByWard Market. A revitalization, to me, is trying to bring something back from the past. We need to look at the ByWard Market and the downtown core (and ask), \u2018What is it that we need it to be now?\u2019\u201d Shafaee said.<\/p>\n
The venue is expected to bring about 150 events throughout the year, he said, attracting about 300,000 people to the area annually. The venue will also employ 300 full- and part-time employees.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThose staff need to be able to live close to work, so it means bringing more people that are going to be staying in the downtown core or the ByWard Market. For that matter, 300,000 people are going to come downtown \u2026 to go for dinner before and drinks after. They\u2019re maybe going to the Rideau Centre for shopping \u2026 The idea is not only is it going to draw local tourism, but also out-of-town tourism (and) they\u2019re going to stay in hotel rooms,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
History Ottawa will be the second History location in Canada, with the first opening in the Beaches neighbourhood of Toronto. Shafaee said the Toronto flagship location energized the area and he thinks the Ottawa location will be no different.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we opened (in Toronto), people thought there\u2019s no way it\u2019s going to be a success. The Beaches, at the time, wasn\u2019t the best area in Toronto. Now, five or six years later, there\u2019s condos going up everywhere. There are restaurants thriving. There\u2019s a whole new audience that\u2019s moved to the area and it\u2019s totally revitalized the Beaches.\u201d<\/p>\n
All in all, Shafaee said he\u2019s optimistic about where the Ottawa live music scene is going.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not only about the mark that History Ottawa is going to make, but it\u2019s really the mark that we can make in the live music sector in Ottawa. We\u2019re (a) very vibrant music community. We have shows that happen on a daily basis (in) small, medium- and large-sized venues across Ottawa.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Canadian Tire Centre had a record (number) of shows in 2025. The Hard Rock just opened up and has excellent shows in the south end of Ottawa. The transformation of Lansdowne Park is going to bring a new mid-sized arena, which is going to be able to bring in a lot more tours that we haven\u2019t been able to bring into the market. Hopefully, in five to seven years, we have a new arena at LeBreton Flats. When you look long-term, Ottawa is shaping up to be a perfect market from a music perspective.\u201d
\nLeBreton would add to vibrancy
\nWhen the conversation turned to the proposed LeBreton Flats sports arena project, Shafaee said it would also bring people to the downtown core.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt would be a huge boost for what we\u2019re talking about here, which is the downtown core. Even though it isn\u2019t in the downtown core, it still brings people here \u2026 From a boost perspective, I think that that project will increase what we\u2019re talking about, which is revitalizing and reimagining what our core looks like from our sector,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
And if the proposed arena doesn\u2019t pan out, Shafaee said Live Nation \u201cwould be a big proponent of pushing forward a new development at some point in the downtown core.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ottawa\u2019s new music venue History Ottawa already has a slate of events planned from September onward, although an…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":489345,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194295],"tags":[49,48,20739],"class_list":["post-489344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ottawa","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-ottawa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=489344"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489344\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/489345"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=489344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=489344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=489344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}