By Bobby Panza
He’s back! Upper West Side local and Phish guitarist, Trey Anastasio, is performing two solo shows at the Beacon Theatre next month, June 22 & 23. The concerts will mark the first full-capacity indoor shows in Manhattan since the pandemic began. The event is being billed as “Two Evenings With Trey Anastasio.”
It was just seven months ago, October 2020, when Anastasio performed an 8-week residency at the Beacon. In the heat of the Covid-19 pandemic Trey and his band performed with nobody in the audience, a sight rarely seen during the pandemic with gathering restrictions set tight. The shows were transmitted worldwide using the Twitch app, with the audience communicating with Trey and one another in the app’s chat component.
The shows raised over $1 million for Phish’s long-running nonprofit organization, the Waterwheel Foundation, and its new Divided Sky Fund, whose initial objective was to build a drug treatment center in Vermont. Since the shows took place, Anastasio, who is now 14 years sober, announced the purchase of a facility in Ludlow, Vermont that will be developed into a non-profit substance use disorder (SUD) treatment center.
“Trey was the only artist to play live at The Beacon during the pandemic, so we’re honored that he’ll be the first artist back on our stage playing for a packed house,” said James Dolan, executive chairman and CEO of MSG Entertainment, in a statement. “There’s no question people are eager to start gathering to once again experience events they love — and are more than willing to get vaccinated to do so. We’re focused on opening up all our venues to not just usher in the return of live entertainment, but of New York.”
What’s interesting to note is that guests for these shows will need to be fully vaccinated, meaning the event must be at least 14 days after your second dose of the Pfizer-BioNtech or Moderna COVID-19 vaccine or at least 14 days after your single dose of Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen COVID-19 vaccine. The only exception is for children under the age of 16, who may provide proof of a negative antigen COVID-19 test, negative PCR COVID-19 test or full vaccination and are accompanied by a vaccinated adult. For more information, please visit beacontheatre.com/faqs.
In October 2019 Trey Anastasio played a pair of solo acoustic shows at the iconic Carnegie Hall. Here’s one of my favorites from that stand.
What about people who have already had Covid and therefore have natural immunity? Where’s the love?
I’m a covid contact tracer for NYC. I’ve had many clients get covid for a 2nd time. You are usually protected from getting it a 2nd time for at least 3 months after having it. Yes, often more — but the ones who got it a 2nd time — and I repeat, this has been MANY — were as recently as 5 and 6 months from their first case. Get vaccinated.
I accidentally posted this question to the wrong person: Morgan, I’m curious—as a contact tracer, are people who you trace considered your “clients?” Do they pay you? And I am also curious, by “get covid” do you mean they were significantly, or seriously ill? Or do you mean that they tested positive? Did they get seriously ill, recover, and then months later test positive again? These are important distinctions. The PCR test can pick up remnants of the Covid RNA sequence months after the patient has recovered from an actual infection.
1) The term client is used for every person we interact with. It is a neutral term of respect for every New Yorker.
2) This is a full-time (albeit temporary) paid job. In fact, we began exactly 1 year ago today, so that NYC could enter phase 1 of re-opening on June 1, 2020. It has been often grueling, but very rewarding work.
3) I mean a brand new positive PCR test, with a new onset of symptoms, greater than 3 months from that first positive test/symptom onset — usually with months of negative tests and even positive antibody tests in between those 2 positive lab results. New fever. new loss of smell/taste… A new covid infection.
Just get vaccinated already
Because the science doesn’t back up your hypothesis. Because people who have had covid once have gotten sick again. Get vaccinated.
I find it concerning that all the focus is on vaccines, while natural immunity is not even considered significant. Natural immunity to coronaviruses and all other infectious respiratory illnesses has long been proven to be robust, and to play a significant part in the development of herd immunity. There have been reinfections with Covid, but no studies showing that these are any more common or significant than with previous related illnesses–If someone here can share a study showing this, please enlighten us.
Meanwhile, how many New Yorkers have recovered from a serious form of the illness, and now told that in order to be able to go back to normal life, they ALSO have to get a vaccine? Vaccines are not “no-risk” propositions. If they were, you wouldn’t have to sign a waiver before getting one, and the companies that make them wouldn’t have lobbied for and gotten across-the-board legal immunity from being sued for injuries and deaths caused by their products. (That happened under the Reagan administration.)
If the purpose of a vaccine is to create antibodies, what is the difference between antibodies created through natural infection vs. through a vaccine.
The level of antibodies needed to protect an individual from both not contracting the virus and if they contract enough of the virus, to show symptoms, is unique to each individual.
The Journal of Nature published a study on May 26th said, “Many people who have been infected with SARS-CoV-2 will probably make antibodies against the virus for most of their lives. So suggest researchers who have identified long-lived antibody-producing cells in the bone marrow of people who have recovered from COVID-19” https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-01442-9
For those who already produced antibodies through natural infection, including myself, may feel it unnecessary to take on the small, yet very real risk, of a vaccine. Regardless of previous infections, accepting a vaccine is still a personal choice, made between a healthcare provider and an individual. No one else.
If the logic is that COVID-19 is different because of its communicable nature thus we should get a vaccine, then what about all of the people who are in this country who may not be inoculated against measles, mumps, rubella, polio and other more highly-communicable diseases? What about the people born before a certain point in time who have natural immunity to these diseases and have never been inoculated?
If we require everyone to be vaccinated, we’re willing to accept the risk of some people having adverse affects, even death, from the vaccine, instead of testing everyone. This shows that impairment or death from a vaccine is less important than impairment or death from COVID-19.
For those fearful of going out and catching it, regardless of vaccine status, don’t go out. The only healthcare decisions and reliance we should be taking is for our own selves. I still wear a mask and accept personal responsibility for my healthcare decisions.
Wow, this is a whole lot of nonsense.
Polio was eradicated in the US more than 40 years ago, so you’re showing your age there. Children in virtually every school system are required to be vaccinated for measles, mumps and rubella, which has successfully interrupted year-round, endemic transmission of these diseases in the US.
To the extent we have had flare-ups with these latter these diseases in recent years, it is because of parents who have flouted these vaccine requirements.
@Dan:
You realize that the “vaccines” have had significant “break out” cases break out?
Your “the science” claim isn’t exactly on firm ground.
Define “significant”. Documented breakout cases have occurred in something less than one in 10,000 vaccinated people. By comparison, roughly one in nine non-vaccinated people have gotten Covid 19. Do you see the difference?
Actually, DavidS, the important thing is severity. The CDC changed their way of tabulating breakthrough cases and now they are only recording those that result in hospitalization or death. So if the 1 in 9 statistic is true for the general population, you would have to either remove all cases that didn’t result in hospitalization or death, or re-introduce non-lethal, non-hospitalized cases into the breakthrough statistic. They also lowered the cycle threshold for PCR tests with vaccinated patients. Both of these seriously mess with the statistics.
https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/covid-19/health-departments/breakthrough-cases.html
We had Tanglewood tickets for 2020, already postponed for this season but still hopeful.
Am SOOOOO looking forward to the now twice-postponed Ringo show next June!👏💕🎉
Hope Tedeschi Trucks Band will be back at the Beacon this fall!
@D, current research shows immunity for the recovered. The vaccine was never tested on the recovered population nor pregnant women. Emerging evidence suggests that the vaccine compromises your natural immunity. Way more complicated issue than to just say, “Go get the vaccine”.
Also, the vaccine was absolutely tested on recovered patients. it showed a marked increase in protection — often up to 10x more — from the temporary protection people had from having covid. And this effect was observed no matter how mild or severe the original covid was
Hi. See my 12:45pm comment above
I think this is a great guy to have be the first one back with a full show! I loved walking on Amsterdam and peeking in the open doors when he was playing the concerts to an empty beacon for charity.
Since when is the front entrance to The Beacon Theatre on Amsterdam Ave???
It’s not, and that’s not what uwsmom said.
The back doors for loading equipment and probably to be emergency exits are on Amsterdam and they often have them open including today.
MaryC – The original caption of the top photo said “Amsterdam Ave”, before it was changed to “Broadway” after my post.
Now that makes sense, Brett Mann.
Thanks.
I remember walking by the Beacon one Thursday night during the pandemic, the Amsterdam side, and there were open doors, security and people hanging out and dancing outside. I was so confused and delightfully astonished at the same time, so I walked over and asked what was going on. Everyone was in such great spirits. I learned Trey and his band were rehearsing for the show the following night. Music in the streets… it was a small affair of some local fans it seemed but it won me over. I was loving it. Good stuff.
Replying to @Brandon
Thank you for your response. May I ask, how old do you think I am?
A measles vaccine was first developed in the US in 1963 and a weakened strain developed in 1968. In the 1970s it was first required in US schools. There are realistically people who have not had the vaccine and are in the workforce.
https://www.cdc.gov/measles/about/history.html
https://journalofethics.ama-assn.org/article/school-vaccination-laws/2003-11
As a white-collared, post-graduate degree professional, many of my colleagues are originally from India, China, Africa and Russia. Those countries do not have have same vaccination laws as the US. These people travel to and from their countries of origin and are never tested for any disease or are required to inoculate before or after their arrival to the US.
Federal law makes MMR and polio vaccinations, among others, a requirement for foreign nationals who intend to live and work in the U.S.
Universities also typically have vaccination requirements for international and domestic students.
As for older people, we don’t require them all to get retroactively vaccinated against pre-existing diseases like measles because those diseases have already been basically stamped out of common circulation — largely thanks to rigorous vaccine regimens targeted at children and young adults.
COVID-19, by contrast, is a novel disease, is still widespread in the community, and is more lethal the older you are.
How old do I think you are, you ask? Old enough to know better.