Although it has been live as a part of a "soft launch" / Beta release for a few months now, I think we've reached a critical mass and are ready for a formal introduction to our readers. Please welcome to the site: The Barn's Live Music Calendar.
As we try to steer coverage to include more and more local content, the events calendar will represent a running inventory of live music experiences in our area (Chicago & suburbs) that are "Barn Approved". I know that there are many sites trying to offer you similar information, but wanted to point out some reasons why ours is different.
First, aligning with one of the sub-themes of the site, we wanted to imbue the calendar with visual meaning... creating a page that is readable as a chart, as well as a calendar. To that end, we've color coded every show to indicate the type of music that you can expect (this is a bit difficult with the amount of cool multi-band events that go down around here... but we'll do our best).
Since we cover such a wide swath of acts under our banner, each month looks like a virtual rainbow of options-- but presenting it like this should direct you to interesting shows that you may have otherwise overlooked. And, yes, we do tend to tilt coverage a bit towards improv-leaning acts if that's your sort of thing. But even in our little slice of the world, always plenty of choices, and readers of the site know, we love to branch out.
Second, we won't just list any show. If a show appears in our calendar, it means we recommend it, and have had featured the artist on the pages of The Barn Presents in the past (event pages will always have a link to discover related content on the site). With a few exceptions, the event will take place at a venue we trust and can enthusiastically endorse.
And you won't have to keep visiting the site to see what's new. You can "subscribe" to the calendar so that new events are automatically imported to your calendar of choice. The address is http://tomorrowsverse.com/events/ical. Here are some links that will help you add it to your calendar software of choice:
Apple iCal - Microsoft Outlook - Google Calendar - iPhone/iPad (see below)
But even if you don't, I'll try to make the calendar an integral part how we program content -- pushing out the occasional update notifications and aligning social content with upcoming shows (this may include more show announcements, on-sale reminders or just cool content to spotlight an upcoming event).
Notice a show that's missing or want to get your band listed? As much as we like to have our finger on the pulse of what's going on in Chicago, we can't do it all without your help. Drop us a line at info @ tomorrowsverse.com and let us know what we're missing.
How to Subscribe in iOS (iPhone / iPad)
- Tap the Settings icon
- Tap Mail, Contacts, Calendars
- Scroll down and tap Add Account…
- Tap Other
- Tap Add Subscribed Calendar
- In the server field, input: tomorrowsverse.com/events/ical/ – then tap Next
- On the next screen, change the name of the calendar under “Description” if you choose – then tap Save
