Orange County’s resident orchestra group Pacific Symphony wasn’t sure where it would be performing for the upcoming summer concert season. The city of Irvine decided to build a temporary amphitheater that would accommodate 5,000 attendees and finished the project in two months.
First revealed in March, the city bookmarked a 300,000-plus-square-foot area of Irvine’s Great Park to raise the amphitheater dubbed Great Park Live in time for Pacific Symphony’s summer schedule of outdoor events.
“We were booking as we were building,” Great Park Chair Mike Carroll told the Business Journal of the eight-week period.
The buildout follows the end of Live Nation Entertainment’s lease of the previous temporary amphitheater from an affiliate of Irvine-based Five Point Holdings LLC (NYSE: FPH).
The Irvine City Council in February approved a $6.6 million budget for the temporary theater.
“We’re keeping live music in Irvine,” the symphony’s Chief Executive John Forsyte said. This year marks the group’s longtime conductor Carl St. Clair’s concluding year with the symphony.
The city partnered with Irvine-based event production and venue management firm PSQ Productions LLC to operate the amphitheater for the next couple of years. PSQ is also the owner of Costa Mesa’s Winter Fest OC.
Irvine also worked closely with the Great Park board of directors to ensure the timing and space of the stage. The amphitheater will have its own food and beverage operations including a new eatery called The Layover that will open in July.
Along with the standard seating options, Great Park Live will include a VIP tent along with exclusive cabanas.
The new venue kicked off its first event, Irvine Nights, on June 14 featuring night market dining and shopping with more planned for the summer season.
Not only the summer home of Pacific Symphony, Great Park Live will also host community-based events planned by the city.
The city of Irvine aims to deliver the official venue in the summer of 2027. The amphitheater is expected to span 25 acres of the Great Park, currently 500 acres, with a budget of $15 million.
“This is another piece to that amazing framework and rubric that is the Great Park in Irvine, California,” Carroll said.
