(NASHVILLE) – An indoor performing arts center is set to open this summer in Brown County tourist mecca a decade after an arson fire destroyed its longtime music venue.
Brown County Music Center officials say country singer Vince Gill will perform Aug. 24 in the first show at the new 2,000-seat indoor venue in Nashville.
Executive Director Dana Beth Evans says the $12.5 million concert hall will have beer and family gardens and state-of-the-art sound and lighting systems.
Brown County attracts more than 3 million visitors each year to the rural, forest-filled county.
But the county has lacked a big concert venue since the Little Nashville Opry venue burned to the ground on September 19, 2009. Investigators claim 77-year-old James Bowyer of Morgantown set the fire in an attempt to claim $3 million in insurance money, but a jury found Bowyer not guilty of the crime.
