Denton festival rained out Friday night

[TexasStooge]

By LUCINDA BREEDING / Denton Record-Chronicle

DENTON, Texas - Visitors to Denton Civic Center Park were met with disappointment Friday evening when officials shut down the Denton Arts & Jazz Festival.

Friday’s worsening thunderstorms forced Denton public safety officials and representatives of the Denton Festival Foundation to stop the city’s biggest annual event.

John Cabrales, a city spokesman, said both the foundation and public safety officials plan to resume the three-day festival Saturday morning according to schedule. The event runs through 9 p.m. Sunday in the park.

“I just walked the park,” Cabrales said. “The booths have been locked with those little side panels you put on tents, and crews are putting tarps over the sound and lighting equipment as we speak.”

Festival officials weren’t immediately available for comment.

Saxophonist Joshua Redman was scheduled to perform tonight in the first headline concert of the festival. Hundreds of people - including merchants, artists and volunteers staffing information booths - packed up and left the park as steady rains fell.

Police will be in the park tonight, but Cabrales said officials expect common sense to keep festival goers at home or in their hotel rooms.

“The minute you drive into the parking lot, you don’t hear any music and you can tell nothing’s happening in the park. Any reasonable person can tell that the event has been cancelled for tonight,” Cabrales said.

The cancellation will put a dent in the concert’s attendance, which was expected to draw about 200,000 music and art fans.

The free festival was rained out for one night two years ago.

The National Weather Service predicts a 40 percent chance of thunderstorms Saturday, with partly cloudy skies Saturday night. Saturday’s high is expected to be 75, with a low of 54 Saturday night.

Sunday will be partly cloudy, weather service reports said. The high is expected to be 83, with a Sunday night low of 60.