Local band The Mopar Cams, plus a couple of guest musicians, are returning to perform The Beatles’ entire rooftop concert — a repeat of last year’s well-received show, with a new second act this year.
The show is scheduled to start 6:30 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 30 in Oneonta on the Autumn Café back patio, which overlooks South Main Street, creating a rooftop effect. Mark Pawkett, Ned Brower and Orion Palmer will be joined by Trystan Jennings and Andrew Carrington.
The first set will feature a recreation of the rooftop concert — the last Beatles concert, performed in 1969 from the roof of Apple Corps headquarters in London — followed by a set of songs from the White Album. A second set will feature Mopar Cams’ original material, but the band will face the restaurant crowd instead of the street.
Pawkett, SUNY Oneonta music lecturer who performs as John Lennon, said that the concert is expected to attract a diverse audience who can eat and shop downtown before and after the show.
“I’m always trying to incorporate the city into musical projects that are going on,” he said. “I find that this is a way where we can not only incorporate the city, but college students. They’re playing in the band, two of them are my students, but also the college students can come and watch it. It’s an all ages show.”
The same five-piece band performed the rooftop concert in its entirety and the B-side of “Abbey Road” last year as part of the Greater Oneonta Historical Society’s fall fundraiser. The positive response from the audience drove the decision for bringing back the show this year in an expanded version.
“People really seem to take to it,” Pawkett said. “The idea would be to do it every year, and then just switch up the second half of the set every year with some other Beatles thing, and possibly some other kind of music. But for now, I think just Beatles stuff is worthwhile. And then we just turn around and become our own band at 8 o’clock.”
Brower, the bass player performing Paul McCartney’s part onstage, said that the idea of performing the rooftop concert locally originated when he was on parental leave last year caring for his newborn daughter and watching the documentary series titled “The Beatles: Get Back.”
The band had planned to play the show as a Halloween concert at the B-Side Ballroom, but Rebecca Carrington, proprietor of the B-Side and Autumn Café, suggested using the restaurant’s back patio to create a “rooftop” effect, in addition to the other show at the B-Side.
“We could keep it going every year, the Beatles have a ton to draw from,” he said.
The show is free. Donations will be accepted. Attendees are encouraged to bring lawn chairs. South Main Street is set to close at 5:30 p.m.