For the second year in a row, independent rocker Sufjan Stevens will tour North America as he reportedly works on new material. His 24-date tour begins October 12 at Metropolis Theatre in Montreal, QC, and is scheduled to run coast-to-coast, as opposed to last year’s Northeast-based circuit.
Similar to last year’s North American tour, Stevens will once again close his fall itinerary with a series of shows in the metro New York region. This year’s venue for the two-nighter will be the 2,894-seat Beacon Theatre, a notable upgrade from the 550-capacity Music Hall of Williamsburg that housed the closing shows in fall 2009.
During the one-month jaunt, Stevens and his backing band are slated to perform October 15 at Chicago Theatre in Chicago, IL; October 23 at The Wiltern in Los Angeles, CA; and November 6 at The Tabernacle in Atlanta, GA, among other U.S. markets.
North of the border, the singer-songwriter has additional stops planned on October 13 at Massey Hall in Toronto, ON, and October 28 at Orpheum Theatre in Vancouver, BC, one of the West Coast markets that he missed last year.
Ticket presales for the entire tour begin tomorrow afternoon, August 10 at 1 p.m. (ET), and the first public onsales will start later in the week on August 13. Most markets have tickets priced in the $30 or $35 range, though some have tickets marked lower ($22 in Seattle) and higher ($40 in Toronto), according to the Stevens-founded record label Asthmatic Kitty.
Also similar to his previous fall outing, a couple of anti-scalping measures are being introduced for the tour’s ticket sales. Orders will be limited to four tickets per person, and tickets in the first 20 rows will be available via Will Call only, according to the record label site.
Stevens enacted slightly more restrictive measures last year, when orders were limited to just two tickets per person, and pick-up was restricted to Will Call only with a valid ID for all orders. Many markets on the fall 2009 calendar sold out in a matter of minutes, and the entire tour sold out within two days.
The quick sell-out prompted Stevens and his opening act on the tour, Cryptacize, to release a statement regarding the sales process. “As music fans ourselves, we feel very strongly that scalping violates the democratic nature of the music we are trying to create and share,” the message read in part.
The fall 2009 tour message later added that anyone who had used multiple credit cards to purchase tickets would also be turned away by the venues, per “explicit instructions” from the artists. The message explained, “That these are smaller venues means that they are able to filter multiple buyers more carefully, or recognize someone that has left the venue and is trying to re-enter a second time.”
Stevens released two orchestral projects in fall 2009 — “The BQE” and “Run Rabbit Run.” This time around, the multi-instrumentalist is reportedly working on a new project with another staple of the indie music scene, The National. A project title and exact release date have not been announced.
Sufjan Stevens itinerary:
(Dates are subject to change.)
| October 12 | Montreal, QC | Metropolis Theatre |
| October 13 | Toronto, ON | Massey Hall |
| October 14 | Royal Oak, MI | Royal Oak Music Theater |
| October 15 | Chicago, IL | Chicago Theatre |
| October 16 | Minneapolis, MN | Orpheum Theater |
| October 17 | Kansas City, MO | Uptown Theater |
| October 19 | Austin, TX | Long Center for the Performing Arts |
| October 20 | Dallas, TX | McFarlin Memorial Auditorium |
| October 22 | Mesa, AZ | Mesa Arts Center – Ikeda Theater |
| October 23 | Los Angeles, CA | The Wiltern |
| October 26 | Oakland, CA | Paramount Theater |
| October 28 | Vancouver, BC | Orpheum Theatre |
| October 29 | Portland, OR | Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall |
| October 30 | Seattle, WA | Paramount Theatre |
| November 1 | Salt Lake City, UT | Kingsbury Hall |
| November 2 | Denver, CO | Paramount Theatre |
| November 4 | Indianapolis, IN | Hilbert Circle Theatre |
| November 5 | Knoxville, TN | Bijou Theater |
| November 6 | Atlanta, GA | The Tabernacle |
| November 7 | Asheville, NC | Thomas Wolfe Auditorium |
| November 10 | Philadelphia, PA | Kimmel Center |
| November 11 | Boston, MA | Orpheum Theatre |
| November 14 – 15 | New York, NY | Beacon Theatre |
