LANCASTER COUNTY, Pa. (WHTM) \u2014 Asked who\u2019s on stage in Studio 1 \u2014 basically a stadium with a concert stage, complete with lights and a sound system and all the rest of it, but minus the stadium \u2014 Andrea Shirk doesn\u2019t hesitate.<\/p>\n
\u201cElvis,\u201d Shirk says. \u201cHave you ever heard of him?\u201d<\/p>\n
Obviously \u2014 never mind her straight-face deadpan \u2014 Shirk, CEO of Rock Lititz, is joking. But the idea she\u2019ll reveal who actually is practicing inside, likely for an upcoming tour, is just as far-fetched as the idea it could be Elvis Presley, considering\u2026 well, you know why it can\u2019t be him.<\/p>\n
The live events industry \u2014 concerts and so forth \u2014 is its own world. Within that world is an even more niche subindustry specializing in live event rehearsals.<\/p>\n
Lancaster County \u2014 best known outside the region for its Amish culture and craftsman \u2014 long had a cluster of businesses catering to the live events industry (including \u2014 as it turns out \u2014 some of those Amish craftsman).<\/p>\n
Lancaster is located in what is, for these purposes, a just-right location: a rather short 90-minute-to-three-hour drive from big cities like New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington, D.C., with all their first-tier concert venues, but far enough that land is cheaper and more plentiful than in the cities.<\/p>\n
Lititz is a borough within the county, although technically, Rock Lititz is outside the borough in nearby Warwick Township.<\/p>\n
The industry suppliers in the area started hearing the same question from entertainers and everyone who supports them.<\/p>\n
\u201cHey, can we practice closer to you, because it\u2019s easier to fix things \u2014 it\u2019s easy to make adjustments on the fly when we are within proximity to critical vendors,\u201d Shirk said, characterizing what they were hearing. \u201cSo we started dreaming of like, \u2018Well, why don\u2019t we just bring that rehearsal space here?’\u201d<\/p>\n
So they did.<\/p>\n
Rock Lititz opened in 2014. The early days were dicey: Although rather remote, the campus wasn\u2019t remote enough to avoid \u201ctorturing\u201d neighbors<\/a> with noise.<\/p>\n \u201cAs everyone knows,\u201d Shirk concedes \u2014 everyone around here, at least \u2014 \u201cwe had to learn how to soundproof in the beginning.\u201d<\/p>\n By all accounts, they did, and neighbors have voiced few complaints during the past decade.<\/p>\n Today \u2014 still growing \u2014 Rock Lititz has 700,000 square feet of indoor space on a 150-acre campus. On the campus are about 40 industry suppliers, everyone from folks who can figure out how to hang a band\u2019s speakers so sound and safety are both flawless, to an accounting firm that specializes in supporting acts that sell concert tickets and pay local expenses in numerous countries and currencies.<\/p>\n There\u2019s a Rock Lititz-branded on-campus hotel with 140 rooms and two penthouse suites, where the restaurant and bar stay open until the wee hours because performers and their crews don\u2019t stop practicing until then.<\/p>\n Sometimes crews leave something interesting behind.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not uncommon that there\u2019s a really unique design set piece on some world-famous tour that was done by a small local Amish company within Lancaster County,\u201d Shirk said.<\/p>\n A big part of what Rock Lititz sells is discretion and confidentiality, so just as Shirk refuses to name clients (even if everyone kind of assumes there\u2019s a reason a star as big as Taylor Swift has been seen in Lancaster County, of all places), she won\u2019t confirm what those set pieces are \u2014 which doesn\u2019t stop a visitor from observing a big Venus flytrap looks a lot like one from the on-stage production of \u201cLittle Shop of Horrors,\u201d or that a mock spaceship sure looks a lot like one that carried Lady Gaga through the air at concerts while she was on tour.<\/p>\n Rock Lititz is also a true \u201ccampus\u201d in the more traditional sense. Students get degrees at the Academy of Live Technology, which works with the Pennsylvania College of Art and Design.<\/p>\n There\u2019s lifelong learning, too. Nathaniel Hare attended a \u201cleadership summit,\u201d which included most of the independent Rock Lititz vendors.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s like I\u2019d never left grad school,\u201d said Hare, a manager with decades of experience. \u201cYou know, there\u2019s always some new thing to learn and be challenged on.\u201d<\/p>\n And although Shirk long liked to claim there was nothing quite like Rock Lititz, she\u2019ll concede that\u2019s no longer true \u2014 and that\u2019s fine with her.<\/p>\n \u201cWe had a ton of country artists coming up to Lititz and realizing the demand down there and the need there,\u201d Shirk said. \u201cSurprisingly, enough, was really no real large place to rehearse in Nashville.\u201d<\/p>\n